Last Kari Lake legal challenge to loss dismissed

Arizona gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake’s last legal challenge of her loss in the state’s 2022 governor’s race has been dismissed. 

Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Peter Thompson ruled that Lake did not prove that Maricopa County did not verify signatures on mail-in ballots as law requires. Lake, a Republican, refused to concede after Gov. Katie Hobbs (D) was declared the winner in their race by about 17,000 votes and launched multiple legal challenges that have already been mostly dismissed. 

The Arizona Supreme Court had revived one challenge Lake made to the mail-in ballots in Maricopa — the largest county in the state, making up more than 60 percent of its voters. 

During a three-day trial last week, Lake’s attorneys argued that evidence showed some lower-level screeners found discrepancies with voters’ signatures, mentioned them to their superiors and were ignored. 

Lake needed to prove that the signature verification process was flawed and that it caused the outcome of the race to change. Thompson found that the bar was not met. 

“The evidence the Court received does not support Plaintiff’s remaining claim,” he said in the ruling. 

Lake previously argued that defective printers in Maricopa County caused some voters to not be able to vote, because their ballots were unreadable by tabulator machines. County officials had said more sophisticated counters at election headquarters tabulated the ballots that were affected by the printers, and everyone who wished to vote was able to. 

The Arizona Court of Appeals ruled in February that Lake had not presented any evidence that those whose ballots were unreadable at the polling locations were unable to vote. 

Lake’s legal team was fined $2,000 earlier this month for making false statements about voter fraud occurring in the county. 

The Hill has reached out to Lake’s campaign for comment. 

The Associated Press contributed.