Kari Lake files lawsuit in bid to overturn Arizona election

Kari Lake, the Republican defeated in Arizona governor’s race, is formally challenging her loss to Democrat Katie Hobbs.

Kari Lake, Arizona Republican candidate for governor, speaks to supporters at the Republican watch party in Scottsdale, Arizona, in November.
Kari Lake has sued Maricopa County officials and Democrat Katie Hobbs in her current role as Arizona's secretary of state [Ross D Franklin/AP]

Kari Lake, the Republican defeated in the Arizona governor’s race, is formally challenging her loss to Democrat Katie Hobbs, asking a court to throw out certified election results from the state’s most populous county.

Lake, an ally of former United States President Donald Trump, in her lawsuit filed late on Friday appealed the court to either declare her the winner or rerun the governor’s election in that county. The lawsuit centres on long lines and other difficulties people experienced while voting on Election Day in Maricopa County.

One of the highest-profile Republican candidates in the midterm elections, Lake had narrowly lost to Hobbs in a bid to become the next governor of Arizona.

The challenge filed in Maricopa County Superior Court also alleges hundreds of thousands of ballots were illegally cast, but there is no evidence that is true.

Lake has refused to acknowledge that she lost to Hobbs by more than 17,000 votes. She had also embraced former President Trump’s false claims of voter fraud in the 2020 presidential elections.

The Trump-endorsed gubernatorial candidate has bombarded Maricopa County with complaints, largely related to a problem with printers at some vote centres that led to ballots being printed with markings that were too light to be read by the on-site tabulators.

Lines backed up in some polling places, increasing Republican suspicions that some supporters were unable to cast a ballot, though there is no evidence it affected the outcome. County officials say everyone was able to vote and all legal ballots were counted.

Lake sued Maricopa County officials and Hobbs in her current role as Arizona’s secretary of state.

Sophia Solis, a spokesperson for the secretary of state’s office, said Lake’s lawsuit was being reviewed but had no other comment on the filing.

Jason Berry, a Maricopa County spokesperson, declined to comment on Lake’s request to throw out the county’s election results in the governor’s race. But he said the county “respects the election contest process and looks forward to sharing facts about the administration of the 2022 general election and our work to ensure every legal voter had an opportunity to cast their ballot”.

In this combination of photos Arizona gubernatorial candidates, Republican Kari Lake and Democrat Katie Hobbs appear side by side.
Lake (left) and supporters of her failed campaign for Arizona governor are attacking Hobbs as having a conflict of interest for overseeing the election she won [Ross D Franklin/AP]

Hobbs, in a post on her Twitter account, called the lawsuit “Lake’s latest desperate attempt to undermine our democracy and throw out the will of the voters”. She posted a statement from her campaign manager that called the lawsuit a “sham” and said her camp remained focused on “getting ready to hit the ground running on Day One of Katie Hobbs’ administration”.

Lake’s lawsuit says Republicans were disproportionately affected by the problems in Maricopa County because they outvoted Democrats on Election Day 3-1. GOP leaders had urged their voters to wait until Election Day to vote.

In late November, Lake filed a public records lawsuit demanding Maricopa County hand over documents related to the election. She was seeking to identify voters who may have had trouble casting a ballot, such as people who checked in at more than one vote centre or those who returned a mail ballot and also checked in at a polling place.

Earlier this year, a federal judge also rejected a request by Lake and Mark Finchem, the defeated Republican candidate for secretary of state, to require hand counting of all ballots during the November election.

The judge has since sanctioned lawyers representing Lake and Finchem, saying they “made false, misleading, and unsupported factual assertions” in their lawsuit. The lawyers told the court that their claims were “legally sound and supported by strong evidence”.

Hobbs, in her role as secretary of state, has petitioned a court to begin an automatic statewide recount required by law in three races decided by less than half a percentage point.

The race for attorney general was one of the closest contests in state history, with Democrat Kris Mayes leading Republican Abe Hamadeh by just 510 votes out of 2.5 million cast.

The races for superintendent of public instruction and a state legislative seat in the Phoenix suburbs will also be recounted, but the margins are much more significant.

Source: News Agencies