A three-day trial is scheduled to begin Wednesday over the only remaining legal claim in Republican Kari Lake’s challenge of her defeat six months ago to Democrat Katie Hobbs in the Arizona governor’s race.
The former TV anchor was among the most vocal of last year’s Republican candidates promoting former President Donald Trump’s election lies, which she made the centerpiece of her campaign.
Lake, however, did not concede defeat after losing her race in November. She lost Hobbs’s race by over 17,000 ballots.
The Arizona Supreme Court has revived a claim that was dismissed by the courts. that challenges the implementation of signature verification procedures on early ballots in Maricopa County, home to more than 60% of the state’s voters.
In a Monday ruling, Superior Court Judge Peter A. Thompson stated Lake claims that Maricopa County officials did not perform higher level signature checks on mail-in votes that were flagged for inconsistencies by lower level screeners. Lake’s lawyers maintain they are challenging all levels of signature verification.
Three workers on lower-level signature verification who filed declarations in court on Lake’s behalf have said they experienced rejection rates due to mismatched signatures on 15% to 40% of the ballots they encountered.
Attorneys for Arizona election officials said the workers’ speculation on signature verification efforts does not amount to a violation of the law or misconduct by election workers — and raised questions about whether the three workers could know the outcome of the specific ballots they had flagged.
Lake isn’t contesting whether voters’ signatures on ballot envelopes matched those in their voting records.
In a ruling Monday night, Thompson refused to throw out Lake’s claim.
Lake must prove that not only did her signature-verification efforts affect the outcome of Lake’s race but they also affected it.
Officials from the county say that they have nothing to conceal and are confident of their victory in court.
Lake’s lawyers say there was a flood of mail-in ballots in Maricopa County at a time when there were too few workers to verify ballot signatures. Her lawyers claim that the county eventually accepted thousands ballots rejected earlier because of mismatched signatures.
By reviving this claim, the Arizona Supreme Court overturned a decision of a lower-court that Lake waited to long to bring it up.
Lake’s lawsuit focused earlier on problems with the ballot printers of some polling locations in Maricopa County. The defective printers created ballots too light for the polling place tabulators to read. The confusion caused some lines to be backed up. Lake claimed the malfunctioning ballot printers resulted from intentional misconduct.
The county officials claim that everyone had the chance to vote, and all ballots counted. This is because those affected were brought to counters with more sophisticated technology at the headquarters.
In mid-February, the Arizona Court of Appeals rejected Lake’s assertionsShe concluded that she had not presented any evidence to show that voters who’s ballots could not be read by the tabulators in polling stations were unable vote.
The following month, the state Supreme Court declined to hear nearly all of Lake’s appeal, saying there was no evidence to support her claim that more than 35,000 ballots were added to vote totals.
Earlier this month, the court sanctioned Lake’s lawyers $2,000 Falsely claiming that the total number of ballots has been increased by more than 35 000 votes.
The trial beginning Wednesday will be the second conducted in Lake’s election challenge.
