Arizona Supreme Court rejects almost all of Lake’s appeals, sends one back to trial court

TUCSON, Ariz. (13 News) -A portion of Republican gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake’s election appeal will be sent back to a trial court for review following a ruling by the Arizona Supreme Court released Wednesday, March 22.

The lower court is ordered to look at whether Maricopa County properly followed the signature verification policies in November’s election.

The Supreme Court denied six of Lake’s other requests for appeal.

In a filing made on March 2, Lake’s attorneys focused on problems with ballot printers at some polling places in Maricopa County, which is home to more than 60% of the state’s voters.

They alleged chaos created by the technical problems had disenfranchised Republican voters. They claimed the chain of custody for ballots was broken at an off-site facility and that the Arizona Court of Appeals applied the wrong standard of proof in deciding Lake’s challenge.

In the nearly four months since Lake’s defeat, the courts concluded she presented no evidence that voters whose ballots were unreadable by tabulators at polling places were not able to vote.

In rejecting her appeal weeks ago, the state Court of Appeals said the only thing Lake had in backing up her claims about the tabulator problems was “sheer speculation.”

Lake, who lost to Hobbs by just over 17,000 votes, was among the most vocal 2022 Republicans promoting former President Donald Trump’s election lies, which she made the centerpiece of her campaign. While most of the other election deniers around the country conceded after losing their races in November, Lake did not.

Kari Lake released the following statement:

“I am thrilled that the Supreme Court has agreed to give our signature verification evidence the appropriate forum for the evaluation it deserves. For years signatures have been a third rail for Maricopa County. The process of verifying these signatures is the only security measure on mail-in ballots. The amount of time allotted to check these signatures was only 8 seconds, which is not humanly possible. The system is completely broken. That’s why they are absolutely terrified of letting anyone take a look at their signatures.

The signature verification process in Maricopa County is a house of cards. Thanks to this ruling my team will get the chance to topple it. Immediately following the election, multiple Maricopa County Elections Department officials – individuals who were involved in the signature verification process – reached out to me and urged my team to review the signatures. Now, thanks to this Supreme Court ruling, my team will be able to give the signatures the scrutiny they deserve. Three whistleblowers came forward with revelations of massive failures in the signature verification process. These whistleblowers were intimately involved in the process and they allege that Maricopa County WILLFULLY ignored law and procedure.

This violation of procedure allowed for tens of thousands of illegal ballots to be approved and counted. Aside from all other issues, including nearly 60% of polling locations being inoperable on Election Day, this issue alone casts the veracity of Katie Hobb’s victory in serious doubt. When we verify these allegations, there will be no doubt that this election was compromised and that its results fail to meet the standard of certainty as outlined in Arizona law.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.