New bodycam footage has put Oklahoma Secretary of State Benjamin Lepak in the spotlight after police say he was found outside a McDonald’s in Edmond and arrested on suspicion of public intoxication. The encounter, which unfolded late Friday night, quickly turned into a political headache after state officials started trading sharp public criticism over what happened and what should happen next.
Officers were called to the restaurant around 10:45 p.m. after a report that a man appeared drunk in public. According to an arrest affidavit, police found Lepak near the drive-thru area with his vehicle parked nearby, and he told officers the car was his. From there, the situation escalated as officers tried to figure out whether he had been drinking and how he got there.
Police said Lepak showed signs they considered consistent with intoxication, including “extremely slurred speech” and an “odor of an alcoholic beverage coming from his breath.” The affidavit also says he had trouble pulling his identification from his wallet, which added to the officers’ concerns. In the bodycam footage, he is seen answering questions about where he had been and what he had consumed that evening.
Lepak told officers he had been at a gathering with other fathers at a church earlier in the night. He also pushed back on the suggestion that he was unsteady, even as police continued pressing him on how he arrived at the McDonald’s. When asked about drinking, he acknowledged having beer but kept his account limited, saying, “I had a beer … that’s it,” and later saying he had consumed less than one because he did not finish it.
The affidavit says police believed he could not keep a “coherent train of thought” during the exchange and that he gave inconsistent explanations about whether he drove himself. Officers eventually arrested him on suspicion of public intoxication. That part of the story is what turned a late-night police stop into a far bigger problem for a high-ranking state official.
A spokesperson for Lepak said he was simply waiting outside the restaurant for dinner and pointed out that police did not administer a breathalyzer test. “Mr. Lepak was waiting outside McDonald’s for dinner. He was not given a Breathalyzer test,” the spokesperson said. “Mr. Lepak will address the ticket appropriately through the legal process.” That response leaves the legal fight open, but it does little to calm the political firestorm already building around the arrest.
Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond wasted no time demanding action from Republican Gov. Kevin Stitt. After reviewing the footage, Drummond said Lepak appeared “thoroughly inebriated” and accused him of misleading law enforcement about how much he had to drink and how his car ended up at the scene.
Drummond also aimed at Stitt for choosing Lepak in the first place. He pointed to Lepak’s earlier arrest years ago, when he was found unconscious in a running vehicle, and argued that the governor should have seen the warning signs before elevating him to such a prominent post. The message was blunt and unmistakable, with Drummond saying Stitt could still limit the damage by removing him now.
Stitt appointed Lepak as secretary of state in October 2025, after Lepak had already served as the governor’s general counsel and later led the State Chamber Research Foundation. That background made the arrest sting even more, since the office carries a public trust that is hard to square with bodycam footage, police allegations, and a fast-moving call for dismissal.
The video itself keeps the tension alive because it shows a tense, awkward encounter that is now being read far beyond one parking lot in Edmond. In politics, these kinds of moments rarely stay small for long, especially when the person at the center is one of the state’s top officials and the questions keep piling up instead of fading away.
