Kari Lake Attack Ad Features Pastor With Documented History of Homophobic and Islamophobic Remarks
A new campaign ad attacking the Democratic nominee for governor of Arizona, Katie Hobbs, which was approved by her GOP opponent Kari Lake, features a pastor who has made vehemently homophobic and Islamophobic statements in the past and whose website calls for the “submission” of women in the household.
The ad called “Justin” features a Phoenix businessman named Justin Erickson blasting Democrats for the rise of everyday goods due to inflation and concludes “Katie Hobbs is just too liberal to be governor of Arizona.”
While the ad seems like standard fair, Erickson is also a pastor at the fundamentalist Desert Bible Church in Scottsdale.
Mother Jones’s David Corn explained earlier in the week that “the ad leaves out important information: Erickson is not merely a local business owner concerned with inflation; he is a homophobic and Islamophobic pastor.”
The website for Erickson’s Church reads, “we affirm the headship of the husband and the submission of the wife.” He also publicly decried Islam as a “Satanic” force.
Corn reported on Erickson’s long history of homophobic remarks:
In a 2014 sermon on homosexuality, Erickson proclaimed that “fifty percent of the homosexual LGBT-Now-Q community, 50 percent have AIDS. One in twenty are child molesters, on the sex offender registry.”
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In that sermon, Erickson also claimed, “80 percent of homosexuals have STDs, and—how sad is this?—2 percent, 2 percent of homosexuals in the LGBT community make it to the age of 65. The average lifespan for an average person in our world is 75. Those is the LGBT community, most of them don’t make it to 39.”
Arizona Central reported the ad was “funded by the Republican Governors Association (headed still by Arizona’s own Gov. Doug Ducey) in partnership with the Yuma County Republican Party.” The ad however, notes that it was “authorized by Kari Lake.”
Lake previously stirred controversy in her run for governor by endorsing Jarrin Jackson for Oklahoma state Senate, which raised eyebrows across the media as recent reports have uncovered Jackson’s long history of anti-Semitic and homophobic statements. Lake eventually rescinded her endorsement.
