PHOENIX — Kari Lake is launching a last-ditch legal effort in her bid to argue that she, and not Katie Hobbs, was elected governor in 2022.
Lake is asking the Arizona Supreme Court to revisit — and overturn — prior court rulings rejecting various claims that the election was improperly run in Maricopa County.
Her attorneys said the justices should give her the chance to present what she claims is “new evidence” about the extent of the failure of tabulators used on Election Day.
The state court of Appeals rejected those claims less than a month ago.
And Lake is attempting to resurrect arguments that there is no way Maricopa County properly verified the signatures on all of the early ballots it had received. But even the trial judge ruled — and the appellate court agreed — that her arguments about how long it took to verify the average signature are legally irrelevant.
At the very least, Lake wants the high court to order a new election in Maricopa County.
And if the justices are unwilling to do that, she said they could proportionally strike 275,000 early ballots from the final total — the number she claims could not have had their signatures verified in the time allotted.
Given that Hobbs outpolled her among early voters, Lake figures that maneuver, if ordered by the court, would be more than enough to erase Hobbs’ 17,117-vote margin of victory statewide.
All this comes less than three weeks before Lake faces off against Pinal County Sheriff Mark Lamb in the bid to be the Republican nominee for Senate. And if she wins, Lake then has to defeat Democrat Ruben Gallego for the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by Kyrsten Sinema.
Even if the justices were to grant review and even if they ordered a new election, it is unlikely that could be completed before the Nov. 5 general election. And that raises the question of which office Lake actually wants.
Repeated messages to Lake and her campaign Friday were not returned.
This is actually her second bid for Supreme Court review after Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Peter Thompson first threw out her claims after the official results showed her losing to Hobbs.
The first time, the justices at the high court rejected all of her claims except for one: questions about the signature verification process for early ballots used in Maricopa County, sending that back to the trial court.
She fared no better with those arguments at a second trial, however, a decision upheld by the Court of Appeals.
Now Lake is asking the high court to review that.
Central to the latest claim is that election logs showed county workers reviewed more than 275,000 early ballot signatures in less than three seconds each, comparing them to signatures on file using computer screen images of both. And 70,000 were reviewed in less than two seconds.
“Common sense dictates, that it is impossible to ‘compare’ ballot-envelope signatures with record signatures, as required by law and Maricopa’s stated signature procedures at those speeds,’’ her attorneys are telling the justices, citing testimony of Lake’s hired expert witness.
That argument, however, didn’t wash with the Court of Appeals.
Appellate Judge Sean Brearcliffe said Lake presented no evidence that those doing the signature verification had to follow any specific process or had to take any specific amount of time. Instead, he said, it comes down to an election worker concluding either that the signatures correspond or, if they don’t, sending them to a process where they can be “cured’’ through a call to the voter.
And Brearcliffe said the trial judge was free to conclude that the testimony of county election officials about verification was “more credible’’ than what was offered by Lake’s own expert witness.
Anyway, he said, Lake presented no testimony to show that even if her allegations about improperly counted ballots were true that any of that would have affected the results.
The rest of Lake’s latest claim to the Supreme Court concerns that alleged “new’’ evidence that she said she didn’t get a chance to provide to the trial judge the first time around when he threw out the case.
Those claims cover everything from an alleged failure to conduct legally required “logic and accuracy’’ testing on tabulating machines to allegations the county had advance notice that those tabulators at vote centers would reject ballots on Election Day.
That, in turn, goes to her arguments that would-be voters, frustrated by long lines, left without casting ballots. And Lake contends that a majority of those discouraged voters were Republicans and would have voted for her.
In its ruling, the Court of Appeals acknowledged that there are legal procedures to resurrect a case — even after a judge has made a ruling. And that can be based on whether evidence was not available at the time. But the appellate judges said the claims that Lake was making just didn’t fit any of the requirements.
In fact, they noted that Lake’s attorneys actually had the evidence at the time of the trial, evidence they contend shows misconduct in the way the election was handled. Only thing is, she didn’t present it because her expert didn’t have the time to study it.
“The rule does not provide relief for one who possesses documents at the time of an election contest, but does not have the time, for whatever reason, to analyze them,’’ Brearcliffe wrote. And he said even if there was misconduct — something the court did not decide — Lake didn’t show how any of that interfered with her ability to present her claims in court.
Even after the fight over the 2022 election is resolved, Lake still has legal issues.
Most notably is the defamation case filed against her by Maricopa County Recorder Stephen Richer over statements she made after the election accusing him of illegally injecting more than 300,000 ballots into the system and purposely having ballots printed the wrong size.
Lake has since admitted the defamation, calling it a strategic move to allow her to focus on the Senate campaign. But now she is in court fighting over the amount of damages she will have to pay, with a trial judge just granting a request by Richer for access to documents to show her financial worth, a factor a court can consider when assessing punitive damages.
