Trump-Endorsed AZ GOP Gov. Candidate Loves Imprisoning People Without Charges, Except For When She Doesn't

Kari Lake went on '60 Minutes Australia' just to be embarrassing.

On Sunday night, "60 Minutes Australia" aired an interview with Trump-endorsed Arizona gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake. Part of one, anyway. The Republican hopeful, upon taking deep offense over reporter Liam Bartlett referring to Donald Trump as "your man Donald," had a bit of a meltdown, eventually leading to her storming out of the interview entirely.

Before walking out in a huff, however, Lake managed to demonstrate her astoundingly deep misunderstandings of the situation with January 6 defendants, the US criminal justice system, Australian gun laws and COVID policies. And that was all in just three minutes!

“The only thing keeping us from being Australia right now is our second amendment.” In a fiery interview with #60Mins, Republican Kari Lake claimed Australians “have no freedom” and the country would be better off with more guns.pic.twitter.com/szrXnc3VJI

— 60 Minutes Australia (@60 Minutes Australia) 1647167739 

After repeatedly insisting that her position on January 6 defendants didn't matter because it has nothing to do with being governor of Arizona, Lake finally said:

"What I don’t like is that people are being held in prison without being charged. Maybe they get away with that stuff in Australia. Perhaps in Australia because you’ve given your rights away, you’ve melted down all your guns, and you guys have no freedom, you find that OK."

First of all, the January 6 defendants have all been charged, etc. Over 700 of them have been charged. What she's thinking of is the fact that many of them were or are in pretrial detention — i.e. being held in jail without having been convicted of anything. That is super- American. US American, anyway. Nearly half a million people at any given time are incarcerated in the United States without having been convicted of anything, and much of the time this is because they cannot afford bail.

Ironically, perhaps, Lake herself has a history of announcing that she would like to see people arrested without specific charges of any kind. The first actual policy she proposed was that she wanted to arrest any "OSHA goons" trying to enforce COVID mandates in Arizona. Working for OSHA is not a known criminal offense of any kind. Lake, who believes the 2020 election was stolen, has also repeatedlycalled for the imprisonment of Arizona Secretary of State Katie Hobbs (also a Democratic gubernatorial candidate in the race) for having certified the election, encouraging her audience in a "Lock Her Up!" chant last year. She has called for the jailing of journalists, leading her audience in a "Lock themup!" chant last year, saying, "They should be! I mean some of them probably should be." 

She has also stated her desire to arrest people for being homeless. 

So Lake in fact loves the idea of incarcerating people without charging them with crimes, we guess so long as those people are not conservatives.

READ MORE:  Is Trump-Endorsed Kari Lake Too Coup-Coup For Arizona Gov? 

Lake also clearly does not understand Australian gun laws. There are still guns in Australia. Lots of them. They didn't get rid of all of the guns, they just enacted gun control, banning certain types of firearms, making it more difficult to buy them illegally and requiring people to have firearms licenses in order to own one. As a result of these laws, deaths by firearms, including suicide by firearms, decreased 61 percent. Australian schools also do not have to conduct active shooter drills in order for kids to practice "not dying" in the event that one of their gun-toting classmates gets turned down for prom and decides to make everyone pay.

But apparently our terrified American children are just the price we have to pay so we can enjoy privileges like the January 6 insurrection.

READ MORE:  Trumpy Gov Candidate Kari Lake Bans All John McCains From Arizona GOP 

Lake went on for a minute about how Australians have no freedom and Americans have freedom because of the Second Amendment, and then claimed lack of guns was the reason Australia had very strict COVID laws. Of course she made up several of those "laws."

"What we saw happening in Australia, where you have internment camps, and people are being forced, if they’ve encountered anyone with COVID, to be locked into a quarantine camp, is the most horrifying thing I think I’ve ever seen a government do. It’s frightening, and if you can’t see that, I feel sorry for you."

There were no "COVID internment camps." Rather, those who returned to Australia during the height of the pandemic were required to quarantine for two weeks in a quarantine facility before being able to come back. Because of this and other measures taken to prevent the virus, the country has only had about5,000 total deaths. Surely, there are a whole lot of people in the US who would have happily dealt with that to have their loved ones back again.

Horrifically, Kari Lake is the current frontrunner for the GOP gubernatorial primary in Arizona, and the only Republican who beats Secretary of State Hobbs — whom, again, she would like to arrest on charges of "doing her job" — in a matchup. It's only one percentage point, but that's still enough to be concerned.

[ 60 Minutes Australia ]

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