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Fake Conservative PAC Attacks President Trump Endorsed Kari Lake
A shadowy fake conservative political action committee ran an attack ad against Kari Lake, running for Arizona governor this year. The ad ran on the Sunday, final day, broadcast of the Waste Management Phoenix Open. This Professional Golf Association event is unique in its working-class, people’s tournament atmosphere, with a raucous crowd lining the course and no silence for every golf stroke. CBS carried the WM Phoenix Open, making this a large local market event in the hours before the Super Bowl. A quick search of both the state and federal databases shows this shadowy PAC is entirely off the radar. A reasonable conclusion is that we are seeing a technically independent Mitch McConnell/Kevin McCarthy/establishment GOP attack on the MAGA candidate.
The Waste Management Phoenix Open was great viewing, on the course or on-screen, with a hole-in-one on both Saturday and Sunday. “Clean up on 16” was the call on the famously loud hole with multistory viewing stands.
In this non-political party atmosphere, a very sketchy PAC ran an attack ad against the leading Republican candidate in the Arizona gubernatorial primary. Kari Lake is a well-known former Arizona television news broadcaster who turned against the establishment media’s reporting bias over the past two years. Kari Lake used Rumble to publish her declaration against the media. President Trump endorsed Lake early for Arizona governor. Arizona’s primary is in August, with the general election falling on the congressional midterm date in November 2022. Candidates need not start reporting finances until March, so we have more slack time than many states.
Doug Ducey is term-limited out, so the field is open, with several Arizona gubernatorial Republican and Democrat candidates, in addition to two minor party candidates, already declared. President Trump endorsed Kari Lake in September, 2021. The biggest name alternate is former Congressman Matt Salmon, who claimed family reasons when he left Congress in 2017. Salmon came to Congress as part of the Contract with America team, then left briefly to run for governor in 2002. He lost to Democrat Janet Napolitano, then went back to the U.S. House of Representatives from 2013-2017. In this context, we see political ads starting to prep the battlefield, trying to shape opinion and funding for or against candidates.
The anti-Kari Lake ad was run by an organization styling itself “Freedom’s Future Fund.” No such entity exists in either the FEC PAC database or the Arizona political organization official reporting page. The ad is posted to YouTube on a new account, created at the beginning of February 2022, with no identifying information. The ad points to “KariLakeFacts.com,” which is strictly a brochure site, no detail or depth. At the bottom of the KariLakeFacts page is “Paid for by Freedom’s Future Fund” with no contact information or link.
This has all the marks of a technically independent GOP establishment/McConnell/McCarthy/Chamber of Commerce smear operation. It relies on the usual visual video tricks and cherry-picked facts. Indeed, it looks a bit like an ad run right after she announced her candidacy, where that earlier ad was run by Arizona Best, a political action committee created to push Matt Salmon’s candidacy.
Lake has no record of conservative or MAGA activism or posturing before March 2021, when she came out in reaction to the difference in media coverage between Trump and Biden. She has tried to establish support and credibility with a detailed set of policies. Kari Lake’s official website “Issues” page reads well, sounds good, and like Donald J. Trump’s 2016 run, not backed by decades of political office position-taking. It is entirely right to test and challenge her. AND. Truly shadowy organizations attacking her, or any other candidate, may be taken as a mark in the attacked candidate’s favor.
If Freedom’s Future Fund is a legimate organization, where is their website? Where are their filings with the Federal Election Commission or the Arizona Secretary of State? Absent that basic level of honesty, I’ll take their poison pen video as a Valentine card to Kari Lake.
Published in Domestic Policy
Outrageous! I think I saw a video of her on Prager U. Are there legal steps that can be taken against this fake Pac?
If they are actually breaking federal or state election laws, yes.
In the ordinary course of events, I would not comment, but I live in Arizona and I vote here. It sounds like Kari Lake is being hit with dirty tricks, and thank you for exposing that. But let’s talk about Kari Lake.
From Wikipedia, there are four disqualifying counts against Kari Lake in two sentences at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kari_Lake:
“[1] She has called for imprisoning Arizona secretary of state Katie Hobbs on baseless and unspecified allegations of criminality related to the 2020 election; Hobbs is also a candidate for governor in 2022. Lake has been endorsed by [2] Arizona congressman Paul Gosar, [3] former Trump national security adviser Michael Flynn, and [4] MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell.”
Hummmmm. Imprisoning the Secretary of State. Being endorsed by Gosar, Flynn and Lindell. All four are disqualifying.
As I said, I live in Arizona and I vote. If we nominate a solid conservative like Incumbent Republican Governor Doug Ducey, who is term-limited, I will vote for him or her. But if my party nominates a Gosar endorsed candidate who wants to lock up her opponents, I will vote for the Democrat candidate. The choice is yours. Do you want to nominate a Kari Lake who loses the general election, or a non-nutty Republican who wins the general election?
In Klingon language, this is a “Gik’tal” (or “ghIqtal”) primary. From the 2:00 and 4:00 points:
It’s rather shameful that you keep coming up with this “if the rest of you nominate a Republican I don’t like, then I’ll vote for the Democrat and it will be YOUR FAULT!” nonsense.
Oh, and that “Gik’tal” was also fake.
I would expect the same tactics from The Turtle’s and Shrub’s group.
Inside McConnell’s Campaign to Take Back the Senate and Thwart Trump (yahoo.com)
Kari Lake is running for Governor, not the Senate, so this makes no sense.
Suit yourself, but if you nominate someone who has been endorsed by Gosar, Flynn and Lindell, please don’t expect traditional Republicans to vote for them in the general election.
I’ve seen that ad as well; it’s been running on Fox News lately. I wondered who was so afraid of Lake. Thanks for saving me the effort of researching the supposed sponsor.
@cliffordbrown, what do you think of Karrin Taylor Robson? She’s running some pretty hard-hitting ads, and has shown some ability to raise money. I thought she was a no-hoper until I heard her interviewed on the “Ruthless” podcast earlier this week. First, she managed to get that spotlight. Secondly, she has a much better background to actually do the job of governor than Kari Lake does. I was favorably impressed.
I still wish we had a good GOP candidate who’d been elected statewide. I don’t know why Salmon is running again. He’s already demonstrated a limited appeal.
Why not? Something like 90% or more voted for Trump.
Somehow you always overlook that you and those others are the hangnail, not the toe.
Where, genius, did I say they’d use those tactics specifically against Lake? I meant they are not above using those tactics in their efforts. OK; I should have been clearer.
Straining at a gnat, he doesn’t see the camel, missing the whole point.
But as I admitted, I should have been clearer.
EDIT: And I should have noticed the Combat Haiku. Excellent.
There are more Democrats than Republicans.
To win, Democrats need 90% of the vote, 80% won’t cut it, as Reagan proved.
Republicans need 95+% of the vote, 90% won’t cut it, as Trump discovered.
It takes an awful lot for me to withhold my vote, but in light of his behavior after the election and January 6th, I made the right choice.
Think about that in terms of just about anything else in life – for example, a court case – and see if you can figure out where you’ve gone wrong.
What’s with throwing beer cans after the hole in one? Is it because the sponsor is Waste Management?
BTW, I smell The Lincoln Project.
Everything Moves Towards Communism All Of The Time™
Gary, when you go to the principals first convention they are letting Joe Walsh speak. They are also letting the CATO immigration guy speak. Please report back on how these guys are moving things forward for the United States of America. Policies.
I noticed that they took about 90% of the people that get money from the left are off of the stage. The big exception is the woman that makes big bucks with Kristol off of Omidyar et. al.
I am not going due to masking requirements on the plane and at the convention hall.
Principles First has absolute radio silence about any local events. One convention a year and then a lot of screaming on Twitter is the only public thing they do.
It’s called “fundraising.”
They don’t get it from the members. That number is very low. They don’t even do anything that they need money for.
Isn’t it kind of a weak argument to disqualify a candidate because of a received endorsement?
First of all, why give publicity (much less credence or reverse credence) to someone you detest? To the publicity hound, any mention of their name is mutton in your pocket.
Was David Duke’s endorsement disqualifying for the Joe Biden voter in anyone’s booth?
I’d never heard of a Congressman Gosar until now. I’m not even Gosar-curious enough to look him up. Why mention him to potential voters or donors?
Are we really talking about Mike the Pillow Guy’s endorsement? He endorsed his friggin’ pillow but my wife returned it. As Trump would say, “very over-rated.” (Excellent return fulfillment, by the way.) Mike’s commitment to saturation advertising further clouds his endorsements. I’ll have to put a remote mute button in the kitchen if he keeps it up. So as former cocaine afficionados go, I’d pick Larry Kudlow over Mike for a cabinet post.
Kari Lake is a more serious question, because Arizona could tip a close national election. She spoke at the AZ Trump rally which I watched. So far, not a fan. I suppose I should get over wincing at the Kari with an “i” thing. And I advocate finding candidates from the talent pool of local anchorettes, especially in a state populated by alter cockers — a demo of fast-declining political viability.
Alas, Kari(hope she doesn’t dot the i with a circle)’s anti-abortion tirade sounded like true conviction, the kind of thing even a veteran news twinkie can’t fake. So you pro-lifers out there can send her money instead of me. Good-looking women against abortion rights:me::work:Maynard G. Krebs. I just hope the GOP nominee becomes Governor of Arizona, because if California’s crime problem gets any worse I may have to show up there. On the way to Florida.
That might be reason to wince at her parents, unless you think she did it herself.
You could opt to not vote for a Democrat. You also have that option, in between posting Star Trek videos.
And if “traditional” (read “establishment?”) Republicans can put up people like McCain and Romney over and over, and expect – and get – support, it’s about time they let it go the other way.
Every institution is failing from a conservative and libertarian perspective.
We did every single thing wrong in the face of the wage deflation and job destruction from automation and globalized trade.
We are at least 20 years past the point of blah blah blah too much government spending.
Trading with China was a huge mistake.
Look up bourgeoisie values as discussed by Deirdre McCloskey.
The Democrat party has to create social problems or lie about them. They also have to find excuses to create more and more non-public goods.
The Constitution cannot function as intended when four tech companies control the public square.
Act accordingly.
I have not looked into any of the current gubernatorial candidates closely yet, in part because the primary is in August.