Kari Lake decries 'fake news' about the Katie Hobbs break-in? That's rich

A delighted Kari Lake called an “emergency press conference” on Thursday to bash Katie Hobbs and, of course, to give the stink-eye to the media.

It seems Hobbs’ campaign headquarters was robbed and her campaign manager, Nicole DeMont, had the audacity to insinuate that Lake was to blame.

Then reporters had the audacity to report her comments.

Then Phoenix police arrested a guy who appears to have no connection to politics, prompting the always aggrieved Lake to summon the press on Thursday for a trip fantastic down the well-worn path to her woodshed.

“She (Hobbs) put out a defamatory statement and you guys fell for it, and you all ran with it,” said Lake, who is at her most animated when bashing members of her former profession. “It was malpractice of journalism like I’ve never seen before.”

“You don’t care about the facts …, ” she said. “You’ll cover the lie, you’ll spread it all over the world over and over and over again. And that is how fake news is spread.”

So says the candidate who for more than a year has raged about a theft of a different sort, spreading fake news the world over without so much as a shred of evidence to back up her claims.

Hobbs bungled her response to the break-in

The Hobbs campaign did bungle the story of the break-in. But then, Hobbs has a habit of stumbling on the campaign trail when hot potatoes are tossed her way. There was her ham-handed handling of last November’s verdict in the Talonya Adams wrongful dismissal case. There was her refusal to debate Lake and her tendency to disappear on the campaign trail.

And now this, which seems more like a slightly stubbed toe than a full-out stumble.

Hobbs’ campaign announced the break-in to her campaign headquarters on Wednesday evening, providing a picture of the then-unknown culprit and implying that Lake had a hand in the caper.

In other news: Katie Hobbs' office limits public view of financial reports

“Let’s be clear: for nearly two years Kari Lake and her allies have been spreading dangerous misinformation and inciting threats against anyone they see fit,” DeMont said, in a statement announcing the break-in. “The threats against Arizonans attempting to exercise their constitutional rights and their attacks on elected officials are the direct result of a concerted campaign of lies and intimidation.”

The Arizona Democratic Party took it a step further, calling the break-in “a direct result of Kari Lake and fringe Republicans spreading lies and hate and inciting violence.”

By Thursday morning, Hobbs must’ve gotten word from the police that the theft of computer equipment and a camera wasn’t politically motivated, awkwardly telling NBC’s Vaughn Hillyard, “I’m not talking about the break-in today”.

Well, you should have, Secretary Hobbs.

It was a bad look and a chance to correct the record.

Lake has been slinging unproven claims for months

But then, Lake as a victim?

The candidate who for more than a year has been claiming – without evidence – that the 2020 election was stolen? That Joe Biden is an “illegitimate president”? That Katie Hobbs ought to be locked up?

The candidate whose incessant, incendiary comments have resulted in death threats against Hobbs and elections officials across the state?

Comments which, by the way, the media reported because that’s what reporters do when covering candidates who want to be governor. They report on what our aspiring leading lights say – and then press them to back up their claims and hold them accountable when they can’t.

Like Hobbs, on occasion.

And like Lake, who without so much as a shred of actual evidence has spent the last 16 months telling Arizona voters that they can’t trust our elections – and who on Wednesday evening insinuated that Hobbs may have staged the break-in to her own campaign headquarters.

“This sounds like Jussie Smollett part two,” Lake said, referring to the actor who in 2019 was convicted of making false reports to police that he was the victim of a hate crime.

Still no word on what evidence she has to back that up. Or was that, too, "fake news"?

Reach Roberts at laurie.roberts@arizonarepublic.com. Follow her on Twitter at @LaurieRoberts.

Support local journalism: Subscribe to azcentral.com today.

This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Kari Lake decries 'fake news' about the Hobbs break-in? That's rich