OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.
Arizona Republican gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake remained undeterred after a judge on Christmas Eve tossed out all of her claims regarding the November election. Her Democratic opponent, Secretary of State Katie Hobbs, has been certified the winner by some 17,000 votes and is due to be sworn into office Jan. 5.
According to the Arizona Mirror, Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Peter Thompson issued his decision the morning of Christmas Eve, rejecting all of her claims that problems encountered at many polling stations throughout the state’s largest county last month led to substantial voter disenfranchisement and cost her a victory. Most polls had her ahead of Hobbs before Election Day:
The outlet added:
His decision came after a two-day trial on Wednesday and Thursday in which Lake’s team attempted to convince him that a Maricopa County employee had intentionally tampered with Election Day ballot printers in an effort to disenfranchise Republican voters and that the county’s failure to adhere to chain-of custody rules for early ballots dropped off on Election Day led to thousands of illegal ballots being injected into the system.
“Every one of Plaintiff’s witnesses — and for that matter, Defendants’ witnesses as well — was asked about any personal knowledge of both intentional misconduct and intentional misconduct directed to impact the 2022 General Election,” Thompson wrote in his decision. “Every single witness before the Court disclaimed any personal knowledge of such misconduct. The Court cannot accept speculation or conjecture in place of clear and convincing evidence.”
He also noted that in a case like this, the burden of proof is on the plaintiff and that the proof must be of the “most clear and conclusive character.”
Lake announced on social media she planned on appealing the ruling.
“My Election Case provided the world with evidence that proves our elections are run outside of the law,” Lake tweeted Saturday morning. “This Judge did not rule in our favor. However, for the sake of restoring faith and honesty in our elections, I will appeal his ruling.”
My Election Case provided the world with evidence that proves our elections are run outside of the law. This Judge did not rule in our favor. However, for the sake of restoring faith and honesty in our elections, I will appeal his ruling.
— Kari Lake (@KariLake) December 24, 2022
However, Thompson also gave the defendants in the case — Hobbs, the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors, and other county election officials — until 8 a.m. Monday morning to file any sanctions against lawyers for Lake for bringing a lawsuit they say she never had evidence to support, the AZ Mirror noted further, adding:
More than 200 people submitted statements to the court attesting to their frustrating experiences trying to vote on Election Day in Maricopa County because of ballot printing issues that caused tabulator problems.
But nearly every one of those voters ended up casting their ballots, and unhappiness with Election Day errors didn’t constitute grounds for overturning the election results, Thompson concluded.
“This Court acknowledges the anger and frustration of voters who were subjected to inconvenience and confusion at voter centers as technical problems arose during the 2022 General Election,” Thompson wrote.
Critics blasted the decision.
“The standard should have been whether voters were disenfranchised, not all the additional hoops Thompson added. If inner city blacks had been disenfranchised, Thompson would not have added all those extra requirements, he would have made the law fit,” wrote Rachel Alexander for Townhall.com. “Robert Gouveia, a rare attorney who isn’t afraid to speak up and who describes himself as watching prosecutors, judges, and politicians, said the standard should have been whether there was voter suppression.
“Instead, Thompson said Lake had to show an extremely vague, high bar in order to prevail, that an election official intentionally caused the printer changes in order to change the results of the election, and that it did affect the outcome,” she continued. “He explained away many of the disturbing election anomalies as accidents or mere coincidences. He ignored the vast majority of them; in a show of arrogance, his opinion was less than eight pages long.”
“What makes this case so difficult for Kari Lake, is it’s her burden to prove it,” Gouveia said of the ruling, per the Arizona Sun-Times. “They don’t have to negate anything. They just say ‘we did our job.’”
