This conservative isn’t going to back down in the face of bullying from the left.
Arizona Republican gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake on Sunday shared her plans for border security if she’s elected in November, telling an audience on KAZT-TV that she’s determined to bring the immigration crisis under control.
Lake stood by her pledge to declare the state’s illegal immigration crisis an “invasion,” even if the act resulted in a wave of corporate boycotts and an attempt to strip the state of the NFL’s 2023 Super Bowl.
Interviewer Mike Broomhead questioned Lake on the possibility of the NFL changing the venue of Super Bowl LVII — currently scheduled for State Farm Stadium in Glendale — in the event she wins the governor’s office.
As a precedent, Broomhead cited the NFL’s decision three decades ago to move the 1993 Super Bowl from its scheduled venue in Tempe, Arizona, to Pasadena, California, because Arizona voters had failed to approve a holiday honoring civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. in a 1990 referendum.
(Arizona voters approved the holiday in a 1992 referendum.)
“I’m not going to be taking marching orders from the NFL,” said Lake, a former television journalist.
“I’m taking marching orders from the people of Arizona.”
“I don’t answer to the @NFL
I answer to the people of Arizona.
If the NFL wants to play chicken over the 2023 Super Bowl, I can promise you that I win that game.” pic.twitter.com/8KtnIk28io
— Kari Lake (@KariLake) October 24, 2022
In defending her border plans, Lake pointed to the nationwide epidemic of the deadly drug fentanyl, much of which enters the United States in smuggling operations across the U.S.-Mexico border.
“I talk to parents all the time,” Lake said, growing emotional (about the 18-minute mark in the video below).
“Hardest thing in the world is having a mother come up to you and tell you that she lost her 19-year old because he took a pill… He didn’t know it came from Mexico, from the cartels.”
Lake pointed to a state governor’s authority under Article 1, Section 10 of the the Constitution (about the 16:30 mark of the video) to declare an invasion in response to the record-setting influx of illegal immigration under President Joe Biden, much of which occurs in Arizona.
Such a declaration could pave the way for state authorities to use new powers to secure the territory of the state, such as buffed state immigration enforcement or the use of state National Guard forces in securing the southern border.
This was originally supposed to be a debate event, but Lake’s Democratic opponent Katie Hobbs has completely refused to appear on the same stage with Lake.
“Unfortunately my opponent doesn’t have the courage and doesn’t have the respect for the people of Arizona to show up here, sit on this stage and take the same questions,” Lake said of Hobbs.
Polling has moved in favor of Lake, who has been endorsed by former President Donald Trump.
RealClearPolitics‘ aggregate of polling shows Lake with a thin 1.4 percent lead over her Democrat opponent, an advantage she gained last month.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
