An envelope containing “suspicious white powder” was received Saturday at the campaign headquarters of the Arizona Republican governor nominee.
An employee at Kari Lake’s campaign headquarters in Phoenix opened an envelope containing white power, a campaign spokesman said.
Law enforcement sources familiar with the investigation told reporters that items recovered during the investigation will be tested in a lab in Arizona. The FBI laboratory in Quantico has not received any evidence, the source said.
On Sunday morning, Lake campaign spokesman Colton Duncan informed reporters that two envelopes had been seized by law enforcement and were “sent for examination to Quantico specialists.”
Initially, Lake’s campaign was told the suspicious mail would be sent to Quantico for examination, “but apparently there’s a closer lab and that’s where they actually sent the substance, so we’re going to find out what it was.”
According to police, they responded to a “property call” near 40th Street and Camelback Road.
“When officers arrived, they learned there were suspicious items located inside the mail. Additional resources responded to collect the items and secure the area,” said Sgt. Phil Krynsky. “There have been no reports of injury and the investigation remains active.”
Earlier on Sunday, Lake’s team thanked the authorities for looking into the incident, saying it took the “threat extremely seriously.” According to Duncan, the staff member was under medical supervision.
“In the meantime, know that our resolve has never been higher, and we cannot be intimidated. We continue to push full speed ahead to win this election on Tuesday,” Duncan explained.
The state of Arizona has been rife with extremist anger and threats against political and election officials. Both Democratic and Republican leaders have been subjected to these threats.
“We’re in dangerous times. It’s not the first time we’ve been threatened; I’ve been threatened many times,” Lake told reporters at a Queen Creek campaign event.
“We’ll get to the bottom of this, I really don’t want to get too far ahead of it, I want investigators to look into it and I truly want to find the people who sent this because it’s wrong that this is happening.”
As the Democratic opponent of Lake, current Arizona Secretary of State Katie Hobbs said the incident was “incredibly concerning.”
“Political violence, threats, or intimidation have no place in our democracy,” Hobbs stated. “I strongly condemn this threatening behavior directed at Lake and her staff.”
Late last month, Hobbs’ campaign office was broken into. In that case, a suspect has been arrested, but police said he had recently broken into at least one other office. The suspect was not linked to any political motive, according to police.
Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly described the incident on Sunday as “horrible.”
“There is no place in our democracy for stuff like that,” Kelly told reporters during a campaign event in Tucson. “But we don’t need to, anybody needs to be doing anything like that. It’s just wrong. And hopefully there’ll be an investigation and they’ll find who did it and they’ll arrest them and prosecute him.”