OAN’s Brooke Mallory
12:12 PM – Tuesday, May 23, 2023
Democrat Katie Hobbs’s election win was upheld on Monday after a judge dismissed the last remaining legal claim in Republican Kari Lake’s protest of her loss in the 2016 race for governor of Arizona.
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Peter A. Thompson, the judge for the Maricopa County Superior Court, said that Lake was unable to substantiate her assertion that Maricopa County did not verify mail-in ballot signatures as required by law.
In her support of former President Donald Trump, Lake had been one of the most vocal Republican candidates running the previous year. According to reports, she is also considering running for Kyrsten Sinema’s current U.S. Senate seat in the future. Sinema changed her party affiliation from Democrat to Independent, back in December 2022.
If Trump were to win the 2024 presidential election, many Republicans have voiced that Lake would make an excellent choice for vice president due to her loyalty, courage, and assertive nature.
Lake, the former television news anchor, had refused to concede after losing the gubernatorial race in November. She has highlighted her legal battle in many speeches and fundraising events around the nation.
The Republican politician did not immediately comment on the ruling. However, she tweeted on May 22nd that a “big announcement” was coming out soon.
Lake filed a lawsuit after Hobbs defeated her by around 17,000 votes. She had requested that the courts call for a new election. Although Thompson dismissed the case, the Arizona Supreme Court reinstated a claim that questions the methods used to verify signatures on early ballots in Maricopa County, where more than 60% of the state’s voters reside. County officials publicly claimed that they had nothing to hide and supported the signature verification attempts.
A three-day trial was held to address Lake’s claim regarding the signature verification. Her attorneys asserted that there was proof of lower-level screeners who had discovered signature irregularities that were reported to higher-level verifiers, however, their concerns were ignored.
According to Thompson, who was appointed to the bench by former Republican Governor Jan Brewer, he claimed that she was not able to provide enough proof.
“The evidence the Court received does not support Plaintiff’s remaining claim,” he wrote.
Earlier in the lawsuit, Lake had concentrated on issues with the ballot printers at a few Maricopa County polling locations. The flawed printers created ballots that were too faint for polling place on-site tabulators to read. In several places, lines were held up due to the uncertainty. Lake argued that deliberate misconduct was what had been causing issues with the ballot printer.
Since voters impacted by the printers were eventually transferred to more technologically advanced counters at election headquarters, county officials claim that everyone had a chance to vote and that all ballots were counted fairly.
The Arizona Court of Appeals also rejected Lake’s assertions in the middle of February, finding that she had failed to provide any proof that poll workers were unable to count ballots that were unreadable.
The majority of Lake’s appeal was turned down by the state Supreme Court during the ensuing month because the judge asserted that there was no evidence to support her claims that more than 35,000 ballots were added to the total number of votes cast. In addition, the court earlier this month also penalized Lake’s attorneys $2,000 for what they believe was an attempt to make false statements.
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