Joshua Russell, 46, of Ohio, left threatening messages for Katie Hobbs in 2022, when she was Arizona’s secretary of state and successfully ran for governor.
An Ohio man who threatened to kill Katie Hobbs in 2022 when she was secretary of state in Arizona and running to be governor was sentenced Monday to two and a half years in prison, prosecutors announced.
The man, Joshua Russell, 46, of Ohio, pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court in Arizona in August to one count of making an interstate threat, according to the Justice Department. He was indicted in December 2022 on charges that he had left several voice messages containing death threats with the Arizona Secretary of State’s Office during the midterm election season, in which Ms. Hobbs was elected governor.
Ms. Hobbs, a Democrat, was secretary of state in Arizona and was the state’s top election official when Joe Biden’s 2020 victory there was certified. She was not named in court documents, but a letter filed in court last week on Mr. Russell’s behalf was addressed to her.
In the letter, Mr. Russell apologized to Ms. Hobbs and said that he was being treated for anger and drug and alcohol abuse, which he cited as a factor in making the threats.
“Social media and news reports (that I didn’t know if they were true or false) became another addiction for me, and only fueled my depression, anxiety and anger,” Mr. Russell wrote.
The governor’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Monday night, and Mr. Russell’s public defenders could not immediately be reached.
Mr. Russell’s sentence was a result of the Justice Department’s broader effort to prosecute people who threatened and intimidated election officials in the aftermath of the 2020 presidential election.
Fueled by conspiracy theories and lies peddled by former President Donald J. Trump claiming that fraud had lost him the election, poll workers and election officials experienced a surge in threats.
Ms. Hobbs has said that she received thousands of threats for certifying the state’s voting results in that election. One man pleaded guilty last year to threatening Ms. Hobbs with a bomb in 2021 and was later sentenced to three and a half years in prison.
