Arizona GOP Chair Resigns After Audio Appears to Show Him Bribing Kari Lake Not to Run for Senate
DeWitt claimed Lake “released a selectively edited” recording of a conversation they had ten months ago. He also said it was “taken out of context.”
Arizona Republican Party Chairman Jeff DeWitt has resigned after The Daily Mail published audio that shows him trying to bribe Kari Lake not to run for the Senate.
DeWitt claimed Lake “released a selectively edited” recording of a conversation they had ten months ago. He also said it was “taken out of context.”
The conversation happened when Lake contemplated launching a Senate run.
Lake officially announced her candidacy in October.
“This morning, I was determined to fight for my position,” DeWit wrote. “However, a few hours ago, I received the ultimatum from Lake’s team: resign today or face the release of a new, more damaging recording. I am truly unsure of its contents, but considering our numerous past open conversations as friends, I have decided not to take the risk.
“I am resigning as Lake requested, in the hope that she will honor her commitment to cease her attacks, allowing me to return to the business sector-a field I find much more logical and prefer over politics.”
Lake told NBC that DeWit had to resign because the Arizona Republican Party couldn’t “have somebody who’s corrupt and compromised.”
Maricopa County Republican Committee Chair Craig Berland agreed: “If this is, in fact, true, I’m asking AZGOP Chairman Jeff DeWit to resign.”
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Statement from Chairman @JeffDeWitAZ
#AZGOP pic.twitter.com/qxKd2Pqlp6
— Arizona Republican Party (@AZGOP) January 24, 2024
The audio is 10 minutes long. Here is a snippet:
DEWIT: “Is — just to say, is there a number at which —”
LAKE: “I can be bought?”
DEWIT: “Not be bought.”
LAKE: “That’s what it’s about.”
DEWIT: “You can take a pause for a couple of years now.”
LAKE: “No.”
DEWIT: “They go right back to it.”
LAKE: “No. 10 million, 20 million, 30? No, no, no. A billion? No. This is not about money, this is about our country. I think it’s disturbing that they would even — that anybody would think this is —”
DEWIT: “Now, to be fair, even me — even me, I’ll say this, I want a fresh face right now for the reason that I’ve never seen anyone, I can’t think of a single person in a federal race who’ve lost [indecipherable]. I can’t think of it. If you can think of it let me know.”
LAKE: “I’m not going to let these people who hate our [bleep] country tell me not to run. You should call them and tell them to get behind me.”
DEWIT: “I mean, I — I will happily say those words.”
LAKE: “I can win and they should get behind me.”
“Contrary to the notion of me being an enemy of Lake’s, this conversation was recorded while I was actually employing Lake in my private company,” explained DeWit. “In fact for over a year and a half we had many conversations where I was looking out for her financial interests. The ethical breach in her recording of our conversation, while Lake was my employee, raises serious legal and moral concerns.”
DeWit said he thought he was “offering a helpful perspective to someone I considered a friend.”
“Since our conversation where I advised Lake to postpone her campaign and aim for the Governor’s position in two years, she has been on a mission to destroy me,” added DeWit. “It was a suggestion made in good faith, believing it could benefit both her future prospects and the part’s overall strategy.”
DeWit called Lake’s actions proof of her “disturbing tendency to exploit private interactions for personal gain and increases concerns about her habit of secretly recording personal and private conversations.”
The habit concerns DeWit because of her closeness to former President Donald Trump.
“I question how effective a United States Senator can be when they cannot be trusted to engage in private and confidential conversations,” stated DeWit.
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Comments
Karri Lake is someone who was recently rejected, and the last thing we need right now is someone who will drag down the top of the ticket.
Regardless of if he should have tried to bribe her not to cost them a senate seat and undermine chances of winning the state she should not run.
There is a recent former governor with a good record who is popular in the state of Arizona, and won election and re-election who clearly Arizonan voters like who could be an asset instead of a liability we could nominate.
Yeah. Let’s go for the GOPe candidate who will lie to us, and cave to Progressives like they are quite known to do, yet expect us to vote for their people anyways?? No. We are done with lying corrupt politicians and I am glad this coward stepped down.
Karri Lake means a Democrat senator and Trump has a lower chance of winning the state.
Your imaginary vision of the former governor being something to go on gives us more aesthetic caucus.
We already have TWO Democratic Senators, and one is because of thr execrable Marth McSally, who Ducey supported to fill McCain’s seat.
No.
BOTH of them are there because of McSally, did you not remember this?
FIRST she lost her race for Senator to Sinema in 2018, letting the first Democrat in.
THEN Ducey put the loser in to fill the vacancy in the OTHER seat, which she promptly lost in the next election to Mark Kelly, making her a two-time loser who lost BOTH Senate seats.
@Olinser, I knew it! Thanks for reminding me how much of a loser Martha McSally was!
So I was imagining the 2022 election cycle?
No more losers, goes for McSally and Kari Lake.
Why does Danny fear parents being in charge of children’s lives?
Is that because that makes it harder for Democrats to fuck them?
Late and MAGA *are* the GOP establishment now, and not particularly competent ones.
Dear God they STOLE her election too!!!!
Her the freaken blinders off danny
And they *know* they stole her election. They admit it behind closed doors, and put a fancy face up in public, but Kari Lake lost because the Ds cheated.
The Ds cheated WITH THE SUPPORT of the RINOs.
100% true. Kemp and Raffensburger definitely hid the steal in Georgia.
Although, they did kill Kemp’s future son-in-law, so I can understand why he folded.
Not sure what kind of leverage they have over Raffensburger, but it wouldn’t surprise me if it was something akin to the Zulock monsters.
Not enough people realize that four of the five supervisors of Maricopa County are Republicans.
Kemp and Raffensburger won because they act like normal human beings. People will vote for conservative Republicans who can act normal. People will vote against Republicans who don’t.
She lost. Not every Republican lost statewide or did poorly in that election. People rejected her because they were afraid she’d act if she lost how she is acting now.
Normal Republicans can win in the Southwest, including Arizona and Nevada, but enough people will vote against Trumpy/MAGA election conspiracy nuts to ensure Dems will win against the later.
The last thing we need right now is for the AZ GOP to take any advice whatsoever from Danny or people like him.
You are right the Arizona GOP under Lake and others like her is doing so well.
They have the governorship, the SOS, the Senators…..oh no wait they don’t.
The Karri Lake results are defeat from the jaws of victory and you know it.
Lake can be a winner on a national ticket even if she lost in a state contest. Richard Nixon was a “loser” too, but he ran again and won. “Lost once and quit” is for losers.
I’m reminded of how many times Lincoln lost.
Ironically, one of the statements DeWit makes (which is marked as “unintelligible” in the captions but really isn’t that hard to hear) is that he can’t think of any candidate who ever lost a race for federal office, then ran again and won. The counterexample being (as you note) Nixon. You would think a pro would know that.
Funny you say that.
Nixon didn’t lose, either. The Democrats have blatantly admitted for decades now that Chicago stole the election for JFK.
I’ll be blunt: Lake is stupid. She’s not qualified for any national office, and we don’t need any more women in national political office. They’re weak as a rule. every half century or so, there’s a Maragaret Thatcher. Lake is not Margaret Thatcher. She was shilling for BO years ago. What the hell are we talking about putting HER on the ticket?
Yeah, Danny, they lost both senate seats — because they put up precisely the type of chickens*t candidates that you are advising them to put up again, and not even Republicans could be bothered to vote for them.
Cindy McCain is the mole in plain sight.
You better get out of here recommending Doug Ducey for anything. That man gave in to the teachers’ union, shut down the state for the Wuhan and them let the state become a wild west when he lifted the shut down, enthusiastically recommended the vaccine, supported the execrable Martha McSally for the Senate, and more importantly, is an ardent NeverTrumper. F that guy, we don’t need him, and we are beyond these sorry Republicans who care more about fighting their own than fighting the Left.
Also, until it is proven otherwise, Katie Hobbs stole the governorship from Kari Lake. Don’t you find it bizarre the Secretary of State can overlook her own election? Miss me with that.
1. I care about control of the senate
2. You should care about control of the senate
3. The list of judges who get appointed by Trump if he wins and we don’t take the senate is zero
4. You could see right now how it works when Biden holds the senate and we lose.
5. Karri Lake lost fair and square. You sound exactly like Stacey Abrams supporters right before Brian Kemp gave her a second walloping.
6. I would equally support Martha McSally not running for anything to.
No more losing winnable seats. We have seen that Karri Lake can not win.
The senate very much is a numbers game like it or not, as is the electoral college and I want a senate candidate who is an asset instead of liability for the presidential elections in that state. Arizona last went red 2016 which is nearly a decade ago.
“We have seen that Karri Lake can not win.”
At worst, we have seen that Karri Lake did not win. This is not the same as “can not win.”
Yes she did
No room on your list for “honest elections and the surrender of proof of honesty upon demand”?
Hey, BOTH participants are on that tape uttering variations of the concept that if they refuse to play ball with the mysterious people back east, they may very well end up dead. And you think elections are “fair?”
Note to The Feckless R’s: “Pyrrhic victory” doesn’t mean you won. Lining up for another Pyrrhic victory is just aiming for another loss of your own making.
For Bogs sake, Barry O got more traction on his agenda, and “fundamentally transforming the country” that The Feckless R’s have racked up with unwashed Aegean stables of “wins.”
For example, if The Feckless R’s wanted to get elected or govern, they’d be all over each of the election shenanigans around the last governor’s race.
It doesn’t matter if the “claims” got adjudicated away — it should never come to a trial, or a suit.
“Put us in office — win or lose, you’ll believe it.” would be a hell of a policy point.
The senate is a numbers game. We don’t have the senate Biden does. If we did have the senate there would be no new Biden judges.
Republicans HAD the Senate, AND the House, after winning the White House in 2016. And they did jack shit with them. Because the RINOs who were there were the same ones that people like Danny want us to keep putting on the ballot. No mas, tonto.
Who blew the “red wave” in the last election cycle; the outsiders or the insiders among The Feckless R’s?
Why should the smart “electability” folks be any more right this time than they were last cycle. Or, since this is in Arizona, McCain’s run for Prezzy. And of course Mittens.
Jeff?,…Is that you?
Lay of the day drinking before you post, Danny Boy
The voters of AZ should decide their representation, not a federal wing of the GOP.
I would like to know who he is relaying a message for as that was not included. That’s the buried lede.
I’m not so sure that she lost.
So he’s admitting there’s EVEN WORSE ‘open ended conversations’ out there.
As I said in the other thread, the only thing that surprises me about this is that he offered this directly to her instead of offering one of her children a cushy no-show job on the board of a Ukrainian gas company.
If you actually look at the employment of children/siblings/close relatives of members of Congress, the ones that have high-salary jobs on ‘boards’ of companies in industries that they have absolutely zero experience in, it will make you either throw up or scream in rage.
And this is how the GOPe RINOs keep control. They buy off or destroy anybody they consider a challenge to their favored RINO congresscritters, so they can always ensure that the choice is between a complete RINO or a Democrat.
I’d sure like to know what’s in that “more damaging” recording. And who the East coast muckety-mucks are (assuming all this is true).
Oh it’s true
“It is easy to read between the lines in his letter. He resigned because Lake threatened to reveal a more disastrous recording that includes his mentioning the names of “the people back east,” and that would surely ruin him and, perhaps, worse.
Moreover, his presumption that she could be successfully bribed is personally and professionally disrespectful to her and an egregious insult to her moral character. Karma is flashing a beautiful smile.“
“a more disastrous recording that includes his mentioning the names of “the people back east,” and that would surely ruin him”
And then (according to his own admission) his car key would never again be his trustworthy friend.
When I listened to this tape a couple days ago, I did it in full knowledge that Lake knew the conversation was being recorded, and DeWit didn’t. Clearly, Lake wasn’t going to say anything that would make her sound bad (in fact, I think she overacted the incorruptibility glurge), but DeWit condemned himself completely. I don’t care how this was “edited” or what “context” was missing — there’s no other way anyone could interpret it. And I’m glad he’s gone.
One fewer finger on the dead hand of John McCain.
“When I listened to this tape a couple days ago, I did it in full knowledge that Lake knew the conversation was being recorded, and DeWit didn’t.”
Well, he’s disqualified for stupidity and lack of discipline, on top of the dispicable proposal. Every mic is live, and there’s always a mic.
Our PolitiCritters have to stay on scripted message to speak safely, or even coherently. Ideally, they could be coherent off the cuff, but no chance of that when you’ve not thought things through, when you’re saying the quiet part out loud, or you’re just plain dumb.
Just culling for callow stupidity would improve the breed immensely. Can we do that, regardless of party? For Tammany Hall’s sake, can no one find competent crooks any more? I’d take that over what we have now, by a corrupt surveyed mile.
The remaining McCain machine loyalists (who unsurprisingly seem most loyal to their own fortunes, political and otherwise) ain’t gonna go willingly. The AZ grassroots GoP gonna have to do the work to take over one County at a time until they wrest control of the State party.
This is where much of the rino /establishment power comes from; the unwillingness of average GoP members to get involved in their own County level GoP. People have lives to lead, Spouses, Children, jobs. Going into near knockdown drag out political brawls is a pain in the ass and the establishment takes advantage of it to remain in power. Not that you need me to tell you any of that Henry, more of an expression of frustration on my part with folks who unfailingly complain about internal GoP politics but not only refuse to get involved locally but ain’t even registered as GoP voters and don’t have a seat at the table.
Did you see the map of China owned American land, in each state?
Arizona , it was like 1/5
Most of SW area of the state
I look at it this way: Kari Lake just bagged a record-setting RINO of her own, and she ain’t even elected to anything yet,
“Did you see the map of China owned American land, in each state?
Arizona , it was like 1/5
Most of SW area of the state”
No, maybe you could provide a URL.
Most of the SW area of the state consists of a national monument, a national wildlife refuge, a large Indian reservation, and the Barry Goldwater military firing range. Pretty sure China doesn’t own any of it.
Except MAGA/Trump *is* the establishment.
In Nevada, the entire party apparatus is a wholly owned subsidiary of the Trump campaign.
And no, the MAGA establishment *isn’t* the grassroots. The actual grassroots may be fine with Trump in the White House, but they’d be fine with a non-MAGA conservative or even center-right individual. Oh, and they may toe the line about supporting Trump, but a lot of the grassroots leaders really would like non-MAGA candidates who can actually win.
Political Hat,
Who are you addressing those comments towards? I ask b/c your argument seems to center upon MAGA and I didn’t invoke MAGA once in my comments.
I was trying to reply to the person who replied to you.
If the tape was “selectively edited,” he’d be able to prove it, wouldn’t he?
No only is he totally unethical, but he’s also a bold-ass liar. What a horrible, reprehensible human being.
No, he can’t prove it because HE didn’t record it.
Do we know that? Maybe he was setting Lake up for a fall by extending a bogus bribe during a recorded conversation that didn’t go the way he expected. Why else would he make such a phone call, which is so easily recorded? Or maybe he’s “just really, really stupid.” But maybe not.
It wasn’t a phone call, it was face to face. At CPAC, Kari leads into the tape by saying that DeWit called her about something he didn’t want to talk about over the phone, and that got her all nervous. Which also explains why she decided to record it.
His mistake was to believe that she would honor confidentiality, which is clearly implied by “not over the phone”.
I don’t fault her, but as a practical matter, even the good people on the right will not be able to effectively combat the left if confidence is broken. The left enjoys a well-kept confidentiality that provides them a shit ton of cover.
Who knows? If the point was to burn him, why wait nine months to release it? Something else happened here.
‘Selectively edited’ is the standard buzzword whenever anybody is recorded.
And the ONLY time that’s accepted as an excuse is if they demand the entire recording be shown.
He’s not only not doing that, in his resignation he ADMITS that there are far worse conversations that were probably recorded.
Literally the only way that the ‘selective editing’ excuse would fly is if Kari Lake had demanded before the recording started, what he was offering, which is obviously not the case.
‘Selective editing’ is the new ‘hacked’.
Another corrupt GOPe exposed. If the nation has the good fortune for Trump to win in ‘24 it puts more pressure on McConnell to approve Trump’s cabinet and high level nominees (if the GOP regains the Senate).
One of the key tasks for a restructured DOJ is to send iFederal marshals and attorneys to oversee 2022 elections in most big cities starting with Philadelphia, Phoenix, Milwaukee and Atlanta.
How would Trump in 2025 send anyone to monitor 2022 elections?
I haven’t listened to the entire recording, but DeWit really sounds like a corrupt scumbag in the first few minutes. Lake’s comment on DeSantis not being “America First” is just obnoxious, but I am glad she is using the recording to force DeWit’s resignation.
This guy DeWit is too stupid to be in charge. If you don’t think every conversation you hold can be recorded and made public ..particularly if you are discussing things that you do NOT want made public …. you may not deserve it but you probably gonna get it.
This is a bit naive of how politics works and I usually don’t see that from you. A trade in secrets is part of the warfare and ultimately an effective balancer that would further disadvantage conservative movements if it is completely disregarded.
Secrets are morally neutral, They span everything from what you got mom for her birthday, to how you molest your little sister. Some secrets don’t deserve confidentiality. There are even laws that make keeping some secrets actually illegal (“designated reporter” is one). I’m not puzzled that Kari blew the lid on this… I”m actually more puzzled that she sat on it for so long.
The height of naivety would seem to be expecting honorable conduct by the political class. The establishment is able to remain in power b/c they operate outside public view. The more they are forced to come out of the shadows the better. Who’s to say they would have kept their end of Lake had accepted it? Would they have leaked their ‘purchase’ of Lake to tarnish her? That would be the best play by the establishment to permanently eliminate Lake from a political future.
So you don’t think there are things that are good and right to do and discuss but are too sensitive for the American public to know about?
I’m not saying this should be classified but think about the giant pile of twitter idiots, the harpy Karens that jump on every little thing they can to suit their narrative, the journalists that carry water for opposition to conservatives and smear them every chance they can (even with outright lies and half-truths at times), etc.
Should those people have free access to all information of a sensitive nature? At some point, you have to find some people you trust and trust them to do the job right. The current crop of “leaders” aren’t very trustworthy. I get that and I don’t disagree. I don’t disagree that Kari Lake SHOULD have brought this out. My point is that there are times when people should keep stuff back and what this guy is trying to invoke is a breach of that confidentiality. I don’t think he’s right and I don’t think he’s just. I said as much in a comment above.
But many commenters here have become as bad as the twitter cesspool so I’m not surprised by the reaction to reasonable balance of thought. I mean one guy is even talking about secrets of molesting his little sister for crying out loud.
“So you don’t think there are things that are good and right to do and discuss but are too sensitive for the American public to know about?”
That’s always the first step towards a swamp. Inevitably, the Overton Window of what is “right and good” moves in the direction most convenient for the secret-keepers — the only group even know that window exists. Then you get things like MK-ULTRA, Tuskegee syphilis studies, and Ray Epps.
The silver lining is that absolutely none of the Tuskegee men, nor even Ashli Babbitt, was anybody’s younger sister.
The idea that the government can’t operate with some degree of secrecy with the trust of the American people is asinine.
It’s literally the strongest argument the left can use to justify the Trump lawfare crusade.
I’d expect candy, or a shiny nickel for that old dime.
DeWit called Lake’s actions proof of her “disturbing tendency to exploit private interactions for personal gain…”
What a stupid statement. If Lake had a “disturbing tendency to exploit private interactions for personal gain” she would have “bit” on the bribe. His opinion is not only unsupported by any facts, the very conversation at the center of this situation refutes it.
She is in it for the money. It’s just that she can make more money grifting off of “stolen election” nonsense than she was offered. That the current grift stokes her ego and gets her the attention she craves is the frosting on the cake. Oh, she may imbibe on the snake oil she’s selling, but selling snake oil she is.
I listened to the entire thing. If by “just offering advice” means “hey, babe, take the money and live a nice life so the professional republicans can get on with the business of making money for ourselves” then he gets it right.
Sucks when the new tech makes those backroom deals suddenly public.
¡Plata o Plomo!
I trust nothing and suspect it’s a giant con.
1) The headline says: “Arizona GOP Chair Resigns After Audio Appears to Show Him Bribing Kari Lake Not to Run for Senate”
The audio shows him TRYING to bribe Kari Lake and failing miserably.
2) Making the assumption that the person back east is McConnell trying to lessen the number of conservative and pro-Trump senators; what does that say about the nature of the Republican Party?
Subotai Bahadur
Never mind that, DeWit comes out and says if he names the source of the offer, he’ll earn a car bomb. He’s either OK with that, or he’s resigned to it — neither is an attitude I want in the people I elect to fight for me.
Quite right on 1. If he were bribing Lake then that would mean she took the bribe. He tried and she refused. “Trying to…” “Attempting to…” would be more accurate
This is an insane story. The Republican Party is a dumpster fire. There are about a dozen GOP Senators of any value, the rest not worth a bucket of warm spit. In the House, it’s about a third of the caucus that has any value and in the party machine itself, there may not be any redeeming characters.
This kind of thing is EXACTLY the impetus the partisan hacks were waiting for to unravel what’s left of the GOP. I suspect they pulled some manpower off the J6 prisoners in order to build a giant RICO case against the national and state GOP…in an election year.
DeWitt did nothing wrong. Trying to get a proven general election loser to drop out of the primary was the right thing to do.
Now, the Arizona GOP has lost one of its last hopes to retaining relevance in the state.
Bribery is “nothing wrong”? Where did you leave your moral compass? If she want’s to run and people vote for her then how is that bad? Lincoln lost 7 elections before being elected President. Should he have called it quits after the first one? Is that the type of person you are, quit after one failure?
It’s not bribery. It was trying get a grifter to stop making things worse by compensating for loss of a lucrative grift. A chairman trying to save his party in his state by making deals is not a bad thing.
2022 made it clear that swing voters don’t want election-denying grifters who act like lunatics in office, but they will vote for conservatives who act sane.
Cindy called. She said to get off the computer, she wants to see the stables hosed out by 5:00.
She can clean up her own horse pucky by herself with the rest of the grifting losers.