‘Our flag was taken down and replaced with a rainbow.’ They want to militarize our adversaries and disarm Americans.
‘Let us get back to our roots: God, Guns, and Glory.’
Rick Stevens, one of the area’s most well-known drag artists who performs as Barbra Seville in theaters, clubs, and parties, claims to have held parties at Lake’s home shortly after.
He shared photos of Lake posing with him and other drag performers on social media, and Lake responded with identical photos from 2012 and 2014.
Half of what I know about makeup, I learned from watching friends like @BarbraSeville,’ the caption read.
Stevens also told Arizona Central about how Lake invited him to her central Phoenix home around 10 to 12 years ago to act as Marilyn Monroe at her birthday party, and how Lake’s then primary school-aged daughter was in the audience because she was wearing spectacles at the time.
He expressed empathy for her because he disliked wearing spectacles as a child.
Lake is friends with drag queens, according to Stevens. ‘She had her child in the presence of a drag queen.’ I’ve done drag for her friends and family in her home.
‘They don’t pose a threat to her,’ he stated. ‘She would attend shows on a regular basis.’
‘It was just too much to make me the bogeyman for political advantage.’
Lake’s campaign, however, denied that her daughter had ever been to a drag event.
‘Richard’s charges were full of lies,’ she told Arizona Central in a statement.
‘The event in question was a gathering at someone else’s home, and the performer was dressed as Marilyn Monroe.’ It wasn’t a drag show, and the problem we’re discussing isn’t grownups going to drag shows.
‘The problem is that campaigners are sexualizing young children, and this has to stop.’
Lake was a frequent at drag events in the 1990s, according to Stevens, when she was an anchor on FOX 10 News and she and some of her coworkers would go to the 307 Lounge, a gay club in downtown Phoenix that sponsored drag shows.
‘They’d go down to the 307 Lounge, which was about a mile or two from the station, and haggle,’ Stevens said, adding, ‘She’d come to the performance very regularly.’ It wasn’t every week, but it wasn’t unheard of.’
They became friends eventually, he claimed, and he became her “go-to gay person” for interviews on news stories about LGBTQ issues.
‘Kari was a friend of mine, and I stood by her when she turned to the right,’ Stevens – as Seville – wrote on Facebook.
‘When she was publicly humiliated, I reached out (and she responded several times).’
But, according to Stevens, Lake is merely pretending to be a far-right warrior.
He told Arizona Central, “She backed Obama, and now I’m here to tell you that she supported drag queens, and she put her baby in front of drag.”
‘So if there’s anything I can do to expose the hypocrisy and keep someone like that a few votes away from power, I’m happy to do it.’