WASHINGTON (AP) — President-elect Donald Trump said Wednesday that he's picking Kari Lake as director of Voice of America, installing a staunch loyalist who ran unsuccessfully for Arizona governor and a Senate seat to head the congressionally funded broadcaster that provides independent news reporting around the world.
Lake, an immigration hard-liner, was a television news anchor in Phoenix for nearly three decades until she left in 2021 after making a series of controversial statements on social media, including sharing COVID-19 misinformation during the pandemic.
Telegenic, engaging and adept at communicating, Lake launched her political career a short time later, quickly building a loyal following and national profile as she sparred with journalists and echoed Trump in her sharp criticism of what she called the “fake news.”
In a statement, Trump said Lake would be ultimately be appointed by and work closely with the head of the U.S. Agency for Global Media for his incoming administration, “who I will announce soon.”
He said Lake will “ensure that the American values of Freedom and Liberty are broadcast around the World FAIRLY and ACCURATELY, unlike the lies spread by the Fake News Media.”
The president-elect has in the past been a fierce critic of Voice of America, including saying in 2020 that “things they say are disgusting toward our country.”
The broadcaster drew additional criticism during Trump’s first term for its coverage of the early days of the coronavirus pandemic, with a White House publication, the "1600 Daily” email summary of news and events, accusing it of using taxpayer money “to speak for authoritarian regimes.” That was after VOA covered the lifting of lockdowns in the Chinese city of Wuhan, where the virus first emerged.
VOA was founded during World War II, and its congressional charter requires it to present independent news and information to international audiences. It responded to Trump’s criticism by defending its coverage.
Upon taking office in January 2021, President Joe Biden’s administration swiftly removed a number of senior officials aligned with Trump from VOA and positions affiliated with it.
Lake endeared herself to Trump through her dogmatic commitment to the falsehood that both she and Trump were the victims of election fraud. She has never acknowledged losing the gubernatorial race and called herself the “lawful governor” in her 2023 book, “Unafraid: Just Getting Started.”
Lake continued her unsuccessful fight in court to overturn it even after beginning her run for Senate — which she lost by an even higher margin last month, after trying to moderate her tone during her tone but struggling to keep a consistent message on thorny topics, including election fraud and abortion.
Trump nonetheless considered her for his vice presidential running mate before deciding on JD Vance.
Also Wednesday, Trump announced Leandro Rizzuto as his choice to be the U.S. ambassador to the Washington-based Organization of American States, and said he wanted Florida personal injury attorney Dan Newlin to be his administration's ambassador to Colombia.
He also picked Peter Lamelas, a physician and the founder of one of Florida's largest urgent care companies, to be the U.S. ambassador to Argentina. Lamelas is also a large donor to the past campaigns of Trump and other top Republicans.
Cooper reported from Phoenix.
FILE - Kari Lake, Republican candidate for Senate in Arizona, speaks to supporters at a campaign event, Sept. 4, 2024, in Mesa, Ariz. (AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin, File)
ZAÑA, Peru (AP) — Pope Leo XIV on Saturday denounced the “suffering and humiliation” endured by African enslaved people as he made a tangible show of remorse in Peru following his historic apology for the Holy See’s own role in legitimizing the African slave trade in the Americas.
The U.S.-born Leo, whose own family tree includes enslaved people and slave owners, delivered the remarks in the northern Peruvian city of Zaña, a UNESCO-recognized memorial site for slavery and a center of the Afro-Peruvian community today.
Zaña is part of Leo’s former diocese of Chiclayo, and the former Robert Prevost came here often to pray before the relics of a 16th century saint, including the night before his ordination as a bishop. He knows the city and the history of African-descended Peruvians well, and the continued discrimination that Afro-Peruvians face today.
In remarks to the community Saturday, Leo said Zaña “preserves the memory of generations of Africans who were torn from their homes and subjected to slavery.”
“Many endured great suffering and humiliation. Dear brothers and sisters of African descent, today I want to express my affection and closeness to you,” he said.
Zaña, a historic town in Chiclayo province, was recognized by UNESCO in 2017 as a “site of memory of slavery and African cultural heritage.” The recognition was the first of its kind granted to a Peruvian Afro-descendant community or any comparable community along South America’s Pacific Coast, the government says.
Zaña is also home to the sanctuary of St. Turibius of Mogrovejo, the first archbishop of Lima. Mogrovejo is revered here for having denounced abuses against Indigenous and enslaved people by Spanish colonizers, and Leo has made clear on this trip that he modeled his ministry on Mogrovejo’s example.
In addition to having crisscrossed his vast archdiocese on foot and horseback, Mogrovejo learned Indigenous languages and was known for having confirmed St. Martin de Porres, the first Black saint of the Americas and the patron saint of racial harmony, social justice and people of multiracial backgrounds.
“I know that many families in this region suffer because of crime, extortion and insecurity,” Leo said Saturday in the shadow of the Mogrovejo sanctuary. “I am pained at the thought of those who live in fear, of people whose honest labor is under threat and of those who continue to experience discrimination. I hold you in my prayers and ask the Lord to grant you the peace you so deeply need.”
In his first encyclical, “Magnificent Humanity,” Leo made a sweeping apology for the role of past popes in legitimizing slavery in the Americas and failing to condemn it for centuries. It was a reference to the series of 15th-century directives from the Vatican that authorized European sovereigns to conquer Africa and the Americas and enslave non-Christians.
“It is impossible not to feel deep sorrow when contemplating the immense suffering and humiliation endured by so many in stark contrast to their immeasurable dignity as persons infinitely loved by the Lord,” Leo wrote in the encyclical. “For this, in the name of the church, I sincerely ask for pardon.”
The estimated 100,000 African slaves brought to Peru after the arrival of Spanish conquistadores toiled in sugar plantations and silver mines, with some becoming urban artisans. At one point, they and their descendants were more than 40% of Lima’s population.
Blacks now are a small fraction of Peru’s 35 million people. But they have struggled to advance in the more than 170 years since emancipation.
“Historically, the Afro-Peruvian community — much like other Afro-Latin American communities — has faced a twofold form of invisibility: the denial of its demographic and cultural weight in the nation’s formation, and the reduction of its contributions to mere folklore,” said Alejandro Frigerio, researcher at the National Council for Scientific Research of Argentina who focuses on Afro-American religions.
He said Peru had made significant strides in institutional recognition of the community, but “the primary challenge remains ensuring equitable access to rights and eradicating both everyday and institutional racism.”
The 2017 national census recorded 1,311 Zaña residents who identified as Afro-Peruvian, compared with 78,639 across the entire Lambayeque region.
On Saturday, Leo addressed them, saying he was aware that many families in the region are suffering because of crime and extortion.
“I am pained at the thought of those who live in fear, of people whose honest labor is under threat and of those who continue to experience discrimination,” he said. “I hold you in my prayers and ask the Lord to grant you the peace you so deeply need.”
There was a hint on the day Leo arrived in Peru that he would address the legacy of African-descended Peruvians when Susana Baca, the Latin Grammy-winning Afro-Peruvian singer, serenaded him on Lima’s Plaza Mayor.
Baca, arguably the best-known Afro-Peruvian musician, was also Peru’s first Black Cabinet minister and became a leading figure in the campaign to end the discrimination that has long made second-class citizens of Black Peruvians and Peru’s Indigenous peoples.
Known for her velvet voice and barefoot dancing, Baca told The Associated Press that she felt a special connection to Leo because of the importance he has placed on asking forgiveness for past injustices.
“I believe that one of the most important things in the history of Afro-Peruvians is that we did not remain submerged despite our history of suffering,” she said after her barefoot performance on Wednesday. “We are an Afro-Peruvian people who have learned to forgive.”
“And perhaps this is what connects me, in my conscience, to the pope,” she said in an email. “I feel that in all his homilies and teachings, the pope emphasizes the importance of asking for forgiveness and forgiving — that the injustices of many moments in history are less painful if we have the capacity to forgive and to be forgiven.”
Members of Zaña’s Afro-descendant community celebrated the return of Leo, their former bishop, and were particularly proud of Baca’s performance before an American pope with Black ancestors.
“I’m so proud to see an Afro-Peruvian person singing to the pope, and to know that Black blood courses through his veins,” said Felipe Gutierrez, a local chef and poet known as Frontado.
All four of Leo’s maternal great-grandparents were “free people of color” in 19th-century Louisiana census records. As part of the melting pot of French, Spanish, African and Native American cultures in Louisiana, the pope’s maternal ancestors would be considered Creole.
Zaña is home to an Afro-Peruvian museum, which features a rich collection of historical photographs, plantation carts and percussion musical instruments of African origin from Peru, Cuba and Brazil. It also holds records relating to enslaved people and some of the shackles used to restrain them.
One of its walls has photos of the Chicago-born Leo during visits to the town when he was bishop. There are also large framed photographs of Barack Obama, the first Black U.S. president, and South African anti-apartheid leader Nelson Mandela.
“They show us how someone who is Black as we are in Zaña became a president and we’re proud because we all deserve the same rights,” said Gutierrez, wearing a Chicago Bulls shirt with Michael Jordan’s iconic No. 23 on the back.
Winfield contributed from Chiclayo, Peru.
Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.
Pope Leo XIV arrives for a meeting with the Catholic community on the occasion of the closing of the Jubilee Year of Santo Toribio de Mogrovejo at the Shrine of Santo Toribio de Mogrovejo in Zana, Peru, on the ninth day of his twelve-day apostolic journey to South America, Saturday, Nov. 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini)
Women wait to welcome Pope Leo XIV ahead of his meeting with the Catholic community in Zaña, Peru, Saturday, Nov. 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
Pope Leo XIV arrives for a meeting with the Catholic community on the occasion of the closing of the Jubilee Year of Santo Toribio de Mogrovejo at the Shrine of Santo Toribio de Mogrovejo in Zana, Peru, on the ninth day of his twelve-day apostolic journey to South America, Saturday, Nov. 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini)
Pope Leo XIV arrives for a meeting with the Catholic community on the occasion of the closing of the Jubilee Year of Santo Toribio de Mogrovejo at the Shrine of Santo Toribio de Mogrovejo in Zana, Peru, on the ninth day of his twelve-day apostolic journey to South America, Saturday, Nov. 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini)
Pope Leo XIV attends a meeting with the Catholic community on the occasion of the closing of the Jubilee Year of Santo Toribio de Mogrovejo at the Shrine of Santo Toribio de Mogrovejo in Zana, Peru, on the ninth day of his twelve-day apostolic journey to South America, Saturday, Nov. 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini)
Pope Leo XIV is greeted by Peruvian singer Susana Baca during a meeting on the challenges and hopes for the future of the Peruvian people in the square outside Lima's cathedral, on the seventh day of his twelve-day apostolic journey to South America, Thursday, Nov. 12, 2026. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini)
Pope Leo XIV is greeted by Peruvian singer Susana Baca during a meeting on the challenges and hopes for the future of the Peruvian people in the square outside Lima's cathedral, on the seventh day of his twelve-day apostolic journey to South America, Thursday, Nov. 12, 2026. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini)
A figurine of a Black Virgin Mary is part of a Nativity scene displayed at the Afro-Peruvian Museum in Zaña, Peru, ahead of Pope Leo XIV's visit to the town to lead a prayer service at the Sanctuary of St. Turibius of Mogrovejo, Friday, Nov. 6, 2026. (AP Photo/Martin Mejia)
Carmen Cossio Aguilar smiles during a tour of the Afro-Peruvian Museum in Zaña, Peru, a hub of Afro-Peruvian culture, ahead of Pope Leo XIV's visit to lead a prayer service at the Sanctuary of St. Turibius of Mogrovejo, Friday, Nov. 6, 2026. (AP Photo/Martin Mejia)
Percussion and other musical instruments are displayed at the Afro-Peruvian Museum in Zaña, Peru, ahead of Pope Leo XIV's visit to the town to lead a prayer service at the Sanctuary of St. Turibius of Mogrovejo, Friday, Nov. 6, 2026. (AP Photo/Martin Mejia)
Pope Leo XIV arrives for a meeting with the university community at Santo Toribio de Mogrovejo Catholic University in Chiclayo, Peru, Friday, Nov. 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
Faithful wait for the arrival of Pope Leo XIV on the occasion of his meeting the university community at Santo Toribio de Mogrovejo Catholic University in Chiclayo, Peru', Friday, Nov. 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini)
Pope Leo XIV meets the university community at Santo Toribio de Mogrovejo Catholic University in Chiclayo, Peru', on the eighth day of his twelve-day apostolic journey to South America, Friday, Nov. 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini)
Pope Leo XIV waves to the faithful as he arrives for a meeting with the university community at Santo Toribio de Mogrovejo Catholic University in Chiclayo, Peru, Friday, Nov. 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
Pope Leo XIV delivers his message during his meeting with the university community at Santo Toribio de Mogrovejo Catholic University in Chiclayo, Peru', Friday, Nov. 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini)
