Arizona Senate candidate Kari Lake (R) called on the state’s GOP chair Jeff DeWitt to resign after an audio recording showed that he tried to convince Lake to stay out of the Senate race by offering her money.
“He’s gotta resign. We can’t have somebody who is corrupt and compromised running the Republican Party,” Lake told a reporter for NBC at former President Donald Trump’s New Hampshire primary victory party.
Kari Lake demands resignation of Arizona Republican Party chair who offered her a bribe not to run | @MailOnline https://t.co/oF9WTsxqEb
— Alana Austin (@alana_austin) January 24, 2024
The recording was first published by the Daily Mail and appears to show DeWitt offering Lake money in exchange for her staying out of politics for two years. The audio revealed how DeWitt made the offer at Lake’s home last year.
“There are very powerful people who want to keep you out,” DeWit reportedly told Lake in the recording. “Just say, is there a number at which,” and he stopped there after being cut off.
Lake responded: “I can be bought? That’s what it’s about.”
“You can take a pause for a couple of years, you can go right back to what you’re doing,” DeWitt responded.
Lake is heard responding on the audio stating that she would not accept even a billion dollars followed by “This is not about money, it’s about our country.”
DeWitt has been the state’s party chair since January 2023. Prior to that, he was the chief operating officer for Trump’s 2016 and 2020 presidential campaigns.
Lake ran for governor of Arizona in 2022 when she lost a close race to Democrat Katie Hobbs and is now running for Kyrsten Sinema’s (I-Ariz.) Senate seat as the heavy favorite for the GOP nomination.
Throughout the 10-minute audio clip, Lake never seemed to waiver even when DeWitt described to her the circumstances surrounding the proposed bribe.
“I don’t want to make a deal with these kinds of people. This is a hill worth dying on,” Lake said. “I’m not … if they’re gonna steal the election to make me and our movement go away. I’m not letting them do that. I owe it to the people of Arizona to carry their torch and voice.”
