Kari Lake | Arizona Capitol Times

Gallego expects Dems to seek common ground on Trump immigration, deportation policies

Newly elected Sen. Ruben Gallego said Thursday said he is prepared to support the deportation of “a certain type of illegal immigrants,” a category he did not define.

But Gallego, who is being sworn in Friday morning, said it’s premature for him to talk about what actions, if any, he will take to combat any proposal by incoming President Donald Trump for “mass deportations.”

“We actually haven’t heard any plans,” he said in a Zoom press conference.

Gallego may not have to wait long.

In a speech last month in Phoenix, Trump vowed to issue “a historic slate of executive orders” on his first day in office, Jan. 20, to close the border to those trying to cross illegally “and stop the invasion of our country.” That, however, is just part of it.

“And on that same day, we will begin the largest deportation in American history, larger even than that of President Dwight D. Eisenhower,” the president-elect said of the 1954 action. That action, according to U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service resulted in the mass deportation of about 1.1 million Mexican nationals, though some estimates say that figure is inflated.

The Office of Homeland Security Statistics put the number of “unauthorized” in this country at about 11 million in 2022. The private Center for Immigration Studies, which has advocated for lower immigration numbers, puts the current figure of those not here legally at about 13.8 million.

Gallego said he and other Democrats are adopting a wait-and-see stance on what the new president proposes.

“We’re not going to just automatically knee-jerk and reject anything that comes from the White House,” he said. “We’re not going to run to the barricades when they use words like ‘mass deportations’ because even now, to this day, they have not really qualified what their plans are.”

In his press conference, Gallego also said that he does not see recent events, including the terrorist attack in New Orleans and the explosion in front of a Trump hotel in Las Vegas, as a reason to rush through Trump’s choices for various security positions in the Cabinet.

“In light of what we saw yesterday we want to make sure we have the right national security nominees,” Gallego said.

“So just putting somebody in place doesn’t mean you’re actually going to have the type of collaboration and intelligence sharing that you need,” he continued. “We have to make sure the people who are ahead of this are able to actually manage these very important challenges.”

And Gallego said he wishes Republican Kari Lake luck if his general election foe ends up, as Trump has proposed, as the next director of the Voice of America, the government funded international broadcasting site.

“Look, she’s got great experience in the media,” Gallego said, referring to her time as co-host of the news on a commercial Phoenix TV outlet. But that endorsement of sorts came with a caveat.

“I hope she has learned that misinformation is not appreciated by Americans,” he said, a reference to various claims during the 2024 campaign, including that she actually won the 2022 race for governor despite being outpolled by Democrat Katie Hobbs. “I hope that she will take that lesson and effectively be director of Voice of America because I think Voice of America is a very important group and apparatus of the government to really spread the good news of America.”

But it is Gallego’s views on border security and deportation that could prove the most significant for the new senator who throughout the campaign had to battle charges by Lake that he supported “open borders.”

“What I focus on, and what I talked about on the campaign trail, and what Arizonans talked to me about is they want more border security, they want more customs and police officers, they want, where necessary, border walls,” he said. “And, yeah, they want a certain type of illegal immigrants deported.”

What Gallego said he did not hear his constituents calling for were things like family separations and jailing children.

“So what I’m going to do is actively work with Democrats and Republicans and this White House to fulfill that demand,” he said.

What has to happen next, said Gallego, is wait for the Trump administration to provide details of what it wants and “see if we can work together to fulfill what Arizonans ask of me to do.”

But the new senator said there are limits to his cooperation.

“When we feel that it’s actually bringing less security to Arizonans, then we’ll find ourselves at a loggerhead,” Gallego said. But he said this has to be decided on a case-by-case basis.

“That does not mean that’s going to always stop us from trying to work together,” the senator said.

Gallego will have little choice but to work with Republicans, and not just on this issue.

Democrats got control of the Senate after the 2020 election, albeit with having Vice President Kamala Harris able to cast the deciding vote. The 2024 race in which Trump was elected saw Republicans take control of the chamber with 53 votes.

Gallego on Thursday noted the historic nature of his election: He is the first Latino ever to be elected to the Senate from Arizona.

“(There are) the thousands and thousands of Arizonans and the families that will see someone like me for the first time representing them,” he said. “I will make all of Arizona proud.”

While Gallego defeated Lake by more than 80,000 votes, that victory cost a lot of money.

The last campaign finance reports showed that Gallego spent more than $65 million to win the race. That doesn’t count money spent on his behalf, including more than $10 million by Protect Progress, which spends money on behalf of Democratic candidates who support cryptocurrency and blockchain technology.

And WinSenate PAC, which is affiliated with then-Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer spent another $1.5 million on commercials supporting Gallego, plus another nearly $18.6 million in anti-Lake ads.

All that compares with $25.1 million in campaign expenditures reported by Lake. And her outside help was much more limited, led by Win It Back PAC which supports conservative Republicans. It ran $15.2 million in anti-Gallego ads.

Trump taps immigration hard-liner Kari Lake as head of Voice of America

WASHINGTON (AP) — President-elect Donald Trump said Wednesday that he’s picking Kari Lake as director of Voice of America, installing a staunch loyalist who ran unsuccessfully for Arizona governor and a Senate seat to head the congressionally funded broadcaster that provides independent news reporting around the world.
Lake, an immigration hard-liner, was a television news anchor in Phoenix for nearly three decades until she left in 2021 after making a series of controversial statements on social media, including sharing Covid misinformation during the pandemic.
Telegenic, engaging and adept at communicating, Lake launched her political career a short time later, quickly building a loyal following and national profile as she sparred with journalists and echoed Trump in her sharp criticism of what she called the “fake news.”
In a statement, Trump said Lake would be ultimately be appointed by and work closely with the head of the U.S. Agency for Global Media for his incoming administration, “who I will announce soon.”
He said Lake will “ensure that the American values of Freedom and Liberty are broadcast around the World FAIRLY and ACCURATELY, unlike the lies spread by the Fake News Media.”
The president-elect has in the past been a fierce critic of Voice of America, including saying in 2020 that “things they say are disgusting toward our country.”
The broadcaster drew additional criticism during Trump’s first term for its coverage of the early days of the coronavirus pandemic, with a White House publication, the “1600 Daily” email summary of news and events, accusing it of using taxpayer money “to speak for authoritarian regimes.” That was after VOA covered the lifting of lockdowns in the Chinese city of Wuhan, where the virus first emerged.
VOA was founded during World War II, and its congressional charter requires it to present independent news and information to international audiences. It responded to Trump’s criticism by defending its coverage.
Upon taking office in January 2021, President Joe Biden’s administration swiftly removed a number of senior officials aligned with Trump from VOA and positions affiliated with it.
Lake endeared herself to Trump through her dogmatic commitment to the falsehood that both she and Trump were the victims of election fraud. She has never acknowledged losing the gubernatorial race and called herself the “lawful governor” in her 2023 book, “Unafraid: Just Getting Started.”
Lake continued her unsuccessful fight in court to overturn it even after beginning her run for Senate — which she lost by an even higher margin last month, after trying to moderate her tone but struggling to keep a consistent message on thorny topics, including election fraud and abortion.
Trump nonetheless considered her for his vice presidential running mate before deciding on JD Vance.
Also Wednesday, Trump announced Leandro Rizzuto as his choice to be the U.S. ambassador to the Washington-based Organization of American States, and said he wanted Florida personal injury attorney Dan Newlin to be his administration’s ambassador to Colombia.
He also picked Peter Lamelas, a physician and the founder of one of Florida’s largest urgent care companies, to be the U.S. ambassador to Argentina. Lamelas is also a large donor to the past campaigns of Trump and other top Republicans.

Ruben Gallego outspent Kari Lake to win Senate seat but other Arizona races proved money isn’t always enough

More than $250 million poured into Arizona’s contests for the U.S. Senate and House. After all the ads, mailers, phone calls and rallies, not a single seat flipped – proving, experts said, that money isn’t everything in politics.

The Senate race between Democratic Rep. Ruben Gallego and Republican Kari Lake, a former news anchor, drew the bulk of that spending – $156 million, according to OpenSecrets, a group that tracks campaign spending.

Gallego and his allies outspent the other side more than 2-1. He won by nearly 81,000 votes, or 2.4 percentage points.

“It’s an arms race,” said Ian Vandewalker, senior counsel with the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University who studied this year’s Arizona elections.

By the end, national Republicans closed the spigot as Lake’s support consistently lagged that of former President Donald Trump – a strategic decision that let Republicans spend their money in more competitive states.

“The Senate race did attract less money in Kari Lake’s favor than people may have thought given that it is a battleground,” Vandewalker said.

Arizona’s Senate race was one the most expensive in the nation, though well below the all-time record set this year in Ohio – $421 million, and likely closer to a half-billion once the final bills come in.

The 2020 Senate race for an open seat was Arizona’s costliest, at roughly $258 million, campaign records show. Spending dipped to $228 million in 2022. Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly won both races.

Gallego will replace one-term Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, an independent who was elected as a Democrat and still caucuses with that party. Her 2018 race drew $118 million.

Even if Democrats “overspent in the Senate race, it was worth it because they got that seat,” said Matthew Foster, who teaches government at American University.

Republicans ended up taking control of the Senate 53-47, but Democrats were eager to save every seat they could in a bad year.

Overall, Democrats outraised Republicans about $83 million to $45 million in the Arizona Senate and House races, according to Federal Election Commission data.

Outside groups spent another $130 million, according to OpenSecrets.

Gallego far outperformed Vice President Kamala Harris.

Analysts largely credit Lake, an outspoken denier of Trump’s 2020 defeat who has yet to concede her own 2022 gubernatorial race. She alienated many mainstream Republicans by pushing out a popular state party chairman and by insulting supporters of the late Sen. John McCain.

“Some voters are not completely averse to splitting tickets if the candidate is a quality candidate,” Foster said. “Kari Lake was deeply flawed. … The Senate race really exemplifies how important candidate quality is.”

Most of the state’s nine U.S. House districts are strongholds for one party or the other. Republicans went into Election Day 2024 with six of the seats and emerged with the same number.

The most competitive of those was a rematch between first-term Rep. Juan Ciscomani, R-Tucson, and former state Sen. Kirsten Engel.

Each side poured more than $18 million into the battleground district, campaign records show.

Ciscomani won by about 11,000 votes – a far bigger margin than two years earlier and a major disappointment to Democrats, who were scrounging for enough wins to retake the House.

That was the only district ranked as a true toss-up by analysts such as the Cook Political Report, though Democrats also went after Rep. David Schweikert, R-Fountain Hills.

His race drew more than $25 million between candidate committees and outside groups. With Trump adding momentum to the GOP side, Schweikert defeated Democrat Amish Shah 52-48 – the margin topped 16,500 votes – to win his 8th term, despite the challenger’s $2.1 million edge.

When each side sees victory within reach, Vandewalker said, “neither side is going to back down” and both will “spend as much as they can to win.”

In Phoenix, Rep. Greg Stanton, a Democrat and a former mayor, fended off Republican Kelly Cooper by a 7-point spread to secure a fourth term. That race attracted little outside attention, and the incumbent held a 4-1 financial edge.

Most of the House races weren’t close. In most, the candidate with more money won.

Gallego’s successor, Democrat Yassamin Ansari, outspent a challenger 10-1 and scored a 44-point landslide.

Republican newcomer Abe Hamadeh held a 6-1 fundraising edge in the district where Rep. Debbie Lesko, R-Peoria, is retiring. He sailed to victory by 13 percentage points – two years after he lost a bid for state attorney general to Democrat Kris Mayes by about 500 votes.

For more stories from Cronkite News, visit cronkitenews.azpbs.org.

How Maricopa County, Arizona, prepared for the Election Day spotlight

Votebeat is a nonprofit news organization reporting on voting access and election administration across the U.S. Sign up for Votebeat Arizona’s free newsletter here.

It’s Sunday morning before the big event, and Jennifer Liewer is standing outside the elections center in downtown Phoenix, inspecting a metal tent frame that contractors are erecting in the parking lot.

“I told him to make it bigger,” she tells a colleague. “I’m not sure if this is the ‘bigger.’”

Liewer, Maricopa County’s deputy elections director for communications, knows hundreds of journalists from around the world will be here on Election Day, working in this tent. To be able to do her job then, she needs to be a logistics manager now, directing trucks and workers, while ensuring that voters can still drive up to the ballot drop box in the parking lot.

The last two federal elections, county officials were caught by surprise when worldwide media attention turned toward Maricopa. After 2020, journalists arrived to watch allies of Donald Trump recount all 2.1 million ballots cast in the county after Trump claimed, without evidence, that the election was rigged against him. Then, on the day of the midterm election, widespread technical failures at the polls spurred similar claims of fraud, this time from failed GOP gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake.

This year, Trump and Lake were both back on the ballot. Arizona — and especially Maricopa, the country’s largest swing county — was predicted to help decide the presidential election. Nearly 700 journalists applied for credentials. Liewer and her colleagues knew this was an opportunity to help restore public trust in elections in the most scrutinized county in one of the most closely watched states.

The county brought on more staff to handle media requests, sent a packet to reporters in advance detailing how the county runs its elections, prepared a live fact-check page on its website, required journalists working from the elections center tent to obtain credentials, and spent $35,000 to set up the media tent and bathrooms in the parking lot.

Liewer allowed Votebeat to shadow her in the days leading up to her Election Day gantlet.

On Sunday, her phone buzzed repeatedly as she met with colleague Ali Flahive in a room serving as a communications command center. Soon, anyone responsible for election messaging would be sitting at the rows of tables, fitted with computer monitors. Two projector screens at the front of the room would soon show wait times at the polls, and a running list of pending media inquiries. On the wall were framed black-and-white signs with quotes from Scott Jarrett, one of the county’s two elections directors.

“THIS IS The Super Bowl of Elections,” one said.

“WE ARE The Belle of the Ball,” another declared.

County officials didn’t ask for this attention, but they’re getting used to it.

‘Cut through the noise’: Maricopa County officials fight back

In 2020 and 2022, Liewer watched from behind the scenes as a spokesperson for the county attorney’s office. When she stepped into her role last year, she knew what she was getting into.

It’s not her first high-pressure role, and she’s often found herself responding to crises. Just out of college, she began working for the American Red Cross in Phoenix and was called to New York after the 9/11 attacks. She was spokesperson for the city of Glendale when it hosted the 2008 Super Bowl and responded to high media interest about financial problems, and later for the Arizona Supreme Court as the elected county attorney faced disciplinary proceedings. She started in the county attorney’s office under Allister Adel in 2019, and represented the office as Adel publicly battled alcoholism.

And she was there in 2022, when the office commissioned an outside investigation of the Election Day problems. The next year, when the communications role opened, she knew she could handle it.

“Here, we are all doing it together, and the chaos is on the outside,” she said, sitting in her office on the Sunday before the election. It’s not lost on her that she is now coordinating media arrangements and messaging for what Jarrett calls the “Super Bowl of elections,” when she once did the same for the actual Super Bowl. Of course, the stakes for the presidential election are a little different.

She’s watched county election officials manage all the twists and turns of the past four years, and she uses that information to anticipate what’s coming her way.

For a while, the county took a “backseat approach” to communications, said Supervisor Bill Gates. That was true even as state Senate Republicans subpoenaed every ballot cast in the county’s 2020 election for what they called an audit.

But the strategy shifted quickly.

In May 2021, the Senate’s contractors, Cyber Ninjas, falsely accused the county’s workers of deleting election files. County Recorder Stephen Richer, a Republican, had been reserved until then, but when Trump echoed that false claim on social media, Richer responded on Twitter, calling it “unhinged.” That’s around when the typically mild-mannered Supervisors Chairman Jack Sellers, a Republican, began to call the audit a “grift.”

From then on, the county’s tone changed.

“We thought, ‘That’s enough. We can’t remain silent,’” Gates recalled. “And that’s been the motivation ever since. It’s about defending the team, defending our workers.”

County Communications Director Fields Moseley began to transform the county’s sleepy social media account with live fact-checking, plus some snark, aimed at the auditors.

“#RealAuditorsDont: Assume guilt and post false information like it’s a Season 1 cliffhanger,” the account tweeted on May 14, 2021.

It was their way to “cut through the noise,” said Zach Schira, Gates’ chief of staff at the time and now an assistant county manager overseeing elections. “There was no other answer.”

The 2022 midterms: A setback on Election Day

As the 2022 midterm election approached, the county adopted a strategy from its COVID-19 response and set up a command center for the first time.

“Immediacy is top concern,” a draft county communications plan from the time said. “Rumors/misinformation should be addressed ASAP.”

Leading up to the election, county officials were holding weekly press conferences. Then, when polls opened on Election Day, they found themselves contending with a significant problem: Tabulators across the county weren’t accepting ballots, and county officials had to tell reporters they didn’t know why.

That night, reporters filled the lobby of the elections center to question officials. The officials explained that the problem was with the ballot printers, not the tabulators, but didn’t provide details that night — or for months. The lack of immediate answers allowed conspiracy theories to flourish.

Voter confidence took another hit.

Afterwards, to shore it up, the county started to more aggressively push public tours of the elections center. Officials hosted about 100 tours this year alone so far, in between running elections. The county also spent $1.8 million on paid TV, radio, digital, and social media ads and billboards this year, trying to get information about voter registration, mail ballots, and other issues straight to voters before the election.

Deciding what to say, and what not to say

Behind Liewer’s desk is a sign: “Do what is right not what is easy.”

When pressure hits, she said it’s important for her to be honest about what’s happening, while still respecting her team’s opinions on what information they aren’t prepared to share. If she can’t talk about something, she said, she is up front about that.

“I think it’s about being true to the people you work for directly, but also being true to the community,” she said.

Of course, not everyone agrees on “what is right” — or that the county has gotten its communications efforts right in the past.

At times, the county has withheld information. Officials chose not to respond to the Cyber Ninjas’ questions about the 2020 election, and, after 2022, chose to wait five months, until an independent investigation was complete, to provide detailed answers about what went wrong with the ballot printers. In both instances, misinformation spread without a quick official response.

Critics have also taken aim at the county’s past requests to social media platforms to remove posts officials believe are false or harassing. And, after the county started restricting events only to credentialed media, a court ruled that it had to provide access to outlets it had banned, such as The Gateway Pundit, a right-wing website that frequently publishes misinformation. Liewer has to now take all of that into account.

‘We will not be playing whack-a-mole’: Officials lay out plan

On the Monday morning before the election, Liewer swivels in her chair at her desk as she talks to a local radio reporter from KTAR. She’s been getting media requests all morning, and she seems antsy to get off the phone. She still has to finish preparing for a press conference in a few hours, the final of three leading up to the election. Dozens of journalists are expected. She tells the reporter she has to go.

“I hope I was nice,” she says as she hangs up.

She reads through a script she’s printed out, highlighting certain comments, crossing out others.

Some reporters have gotten word that the county is experiencing delays while processing early ballots, and they’re asking her about it. A local reporter for Axios Phoenix texts her to ask exactly what results would come out at 8 p.m. election night. Would they be all early ballots received up to Friday, or Saturday?

“It’s actually neither,” Liewer says, dictating a text message into her phone. “The recorder is going to address it in the press conference this afternoon.”

Flahive stops by to let her know the staff started a new spreadsheet, this one to keep track of news broadcasters’ liveshot requests for Election Day. They are trying to get through the backlog in the media inbox, but requests are coming in faster than they can respond. Overall, from September through mid-November, a team of seven would field more than 1,000 media inquiries.

In the afternoon, more than 100 journalists sit at tables or stand behind cameras on tripods in a county conference room. The Gateway Pundit employee banned in 2022 is in the first row.

Gates, Richer, Schira, and Liewer walk to the front of the room. Moseley, the county communications director, is already there, in the back.

Schira speaks last, telling the crowd that if misinformation shows up on Election Day “we will not be playing whack-a-mole.”

“But what we will be taking very seriously is any misinformation that impacts a voter’s ability to vote a ballot,” Schira said. “That misinformation, we will be very aggressive in reporting.”

Liewer sets the stage for what the visiting reporters can expect. “Obviously, there are a lot of members of the press here,” she tells the crowd. Her staff can’t take questions from everyone, she says, but they will be there all week to help.

And with that, she opens it up to the floor.

Jen Fifield is a reporter for Votebeat based in Arizona. Contact Jen at jfifield@votebeat.org.

Votebeat is a nonprofit news organization covering local election integrity and voting access. Sign up for their newsletters here.

https://www.votebeat.org/arizona/2024/11/18/maricopa-county-election-media-preparations-communications-jennifer-liewer/

Arizona splitting the ticket: a candidate quality issue

The GOP had several notable victories in Arizona for the 2024 Election. However, Republicans suffered one high-profile loss, with Ruben Gallego winning the Senate seat. With Trump’s victory in Arizona, GOP senate contender Kari Lake would have had a shot at the Senate seat.

Unfortunately for one of MAGA’s biggest cheerleaders, the odds were against her.

“Trump in heels” learned little from her 2022 Gubernatorial loss to Katie Hobbs. In 2024, Lake made matters worse by marring her campaign with new mistakes. She not only was tone deaf to the political will of moderates but also managed to turn off some Republican voters. Her campaign suffered from muddy messaging, poor optics, and limited appeal.

Lake’s 2024 bid for the Senate leaves many wondering if she is a flip-flopper. She has been consistent on issues such as immigration and border enforcement since 2022. But one of her biggest gaffs was back-peddling on abortion.

Lake reversed course on the issue of abortion, leaping from “ultimate sin” to denouncing enforcement of the 1864 ban in April. Lake doesn’t do herself any favors by trying to pander to her conservative base by changing her position once again! Days later, panning county sheriffs for not enforcing the ban.

Being wishy-washy during an election with an abortion measure on the ballot is political suicide. Arizona voters didn’t fall for this untactful sophistry. Lake’s first flip-flop was a sour note for her conservative base, leaving pro-life advocates such as Pastor Luke Pierson wondering, “Who do we count on?”

Her second shift on the issue was damage control to appease her base. Is Lake just trying to pander to the public? Her radical swings on this issue make it difficult to tell.

Her opponent, Ruben Gallego, took a more moderate position on border security. Gallego shifting to the center and staying there was an easier feat than Lake moving to the middle on abortion. It is possible to rebound from calling the border wall “dumb” and “stupid,” but not equating abortion with blasphemy.

Beyond playing musical chairs on abortion, she also suffered from a shaky public image. Despite recommendations for Lake to drop these claims and focus on “unifying subjects, such as inflation and border security,” she continued to promote the conspiracy theory that the 2022 election was stolen. Throughout her campaign, she continued to contest the results.

Her fixation on election fraud claims didn’t bode well with voters. One Trump supporter viewed her complaints as “incessant whining” and another referred to her as a “nutjob.”

Overall, she lacked Trump’s mojo and likeability. As one analyst put it, “Trump is a unicorn,” and it’s difficult to replicate his formula for political success. Lake could have been likable if she relied on Trump’s secret weapon, humor. After all, the MAGA movement is populism, the best way to break the ice is to be entertaining.

When Lake had opportunities to poke fun at Gallego, she opted for cruelty instead of jokes. Lake’s comments about Gallego’s father were cheap shots that made her look harsh. In the words of GOP consultant Marcus Dell’Artino, “She lacked the ‘I want to have a beer with candidate’ quality” among voters.

If the other flaws of Lake’s campaign weren’t enough, her campaign was more targeted towards her base with incendiary rhetoric and “scorched earth tactics.” She failed to craft a campaign appealing to moderates, completely ignoring that Arizona is a state with many independent voters.

This left a wide opening for Gallego to swoop in and grab the “anti-Trump Republicans”, moderates, and “Latinos”.

He used his working-class background and military service to win the hearts and minds of McCain Republicans and “patriotic” Latino voters. Lake couldn’t even convincingly make peace with the moderate Republicans she attacked in 2022.

I don’t blame GOP leadership for not spending a dime on Lake’s campaign because it would have been a losing bet. The 2024 election proves that she didn’t learn her lesson from 2022. Avoiding unclear policy positions, veering away from fostering an erratic public image, and aiming for the moderate vote could help you win in Arizona.

Peter Clark is an Arizona-based writer. His work has been published by AzCentral, AZ Capitol Times, FEE, AIER, Inside Sources, Tobacco Reporter & RealClear Markets.

Lake, Richer settle defamation suit

Stephen Richer has settled his defamation lawsuit against Kari Lake.

The agreement comes eight months after Lake conceded in legal papers she had, in fact, made false statements about the Maricopa County recorder and the way he conducted the 2022 gubernatorial race that she lost to Katie Hobbs.

elections, voter intimidation, ballots, Richer, Kavanagh, legislation, hand counts, tabulation — Maricopa County Recorder Stephen Richer

Despite that, Lake and her husband, Bruce Halperin, continued to argue that they did not owe Richer anything – or at least very little -– saying that there was no evidence he actually was harmed.

No details were released. But an attorney involved in the case confirmed it was resolved on mutually agreeable terms.

In her March filing in Maricopa County Superior Court, Lake effectively defaulted on the lawsuit, acknowledging everything that Richer first alleged.

That specifically included that she knew it was false when she claimed he had “sabotaged” the 2022 election by having ballots printed in the wrong size so they would not be read by on-site tabulators. Lake also acknowledged that she knew it was false when she claimed that Richer illegally inserted more than 300,000 phony early ballots into the system.

But that did not end the litigation.

In a video statement at the time explaining her decision, Lake insisted her legal capitulation had nothing to do with her conceding that what she said was factually wrong – even if that’s exactly what was in the legal papers filed in Maricopa County Superior Court. Instead, she said it was a strategic move to allow her to focus her attention on her bid for the U.S. Senate.

“By participating in this lawsuit it would only serve to legitimize this perversion of our legal system and allow bad actors to interfere in our upcoming election,” Lake said.

As it turned out, Lake lost to Democrat Ruben Gallego by close to 80,000 votes.

Richer, for his part, said Lake’s March filing was a total victory for him and his fight to clear his name of the charges Lake made.

“It is now official that she accepts that all of that is a lie,” he told Capitol Media Services.

“She has been lying the entire time, we have told her she has been lying the entire time,” Richer said. And he said Lake knew she was lying because judges in other election cases she had filed challenging her loss had found there was no basis for either the claim that the ballots were deliberately mis-sized or that there had been fraudulent ballots inserted into the final count of the election that was won by Democrat Katie Hobbs by 17,117 votes.

“And now she officially will have a judgment entered against her for lying about me in connection with the 2022 election,” Richer said.

In filing suit last year, Richer said that Lake, her campaign, and the Save Arizona Fund, a political action committee which she has used to raise money, all acted with “actual malice.” That is crucial because, in general, people who are considered public figures like Richer cannot get a defamation judgment unless they prove by clear and convincing evidence that the person making the statement knew it to be false or that the statement was made with reckless disregard for the truth.

Lake initially sought to have the case thrown out, claiming that her comments were “mere rhetorical hyperbole” that were never meant as statements of fact. A trial judge rejected that assertion, a decision upheld earlier this year by the Arizona Supreme Court.

That left only two options for Lake: go to trial or concede. Richer said at the time that, based on Lake’s record in this case, he presumed she would choose the former.

“I thought, great, we’ll relitigate whether 2022 was stolen or not for the umpteenth time,” he told Capitol Media Services at the time. “But, apparently, she doesn’t want to do that.”

Lake, however, had a different explanation for her decision.

“It’s called lawfare: weaponizing the legal system to punish, impoverish and destroy political opponents,” she said.

Once Lake admitted liability, what that left was figuring out how much she owes Richer, something Lake wanted determined by a jury.

In legal filings, Tim La Sota, one of Lake’s attorneys, said the decision not to fight the defamation claim placed the burden on Richer to prove how he was harmed.

That, he said, included showing that any damage to Richer’s reputation was caused by anything Lake did or said. He argued there were plenty of other reasons the recorder suffered what he said in his complaint was a “decline in career prospects.”

For example, La Sota said, Richer had made comments about Donald Trump, at one point calling the former president “unhinged” for accusing the county of deleting an elections database.

Whatever the reason, Richer lost his bid for a new four-year term when he was defeated in the Republican primary by state Rep. Justin Heap. The Mesa Republican then won the general election over Democrat Tim Stringham.

But Richer also claimed actual expenses, like additional security for his home and family he said was necessary because of threats, including calls for their execution. Then there are the damages Richer said to his reputation.

And Daniel Maynard, his attorney, said in court filings there was also the aspect of “unjust enrichment.” That, he said, is based on the amount of money both her campaign and her political action committee took in each time Lake made one of her false statements and then used those statements to solicit donations on social media.

In filing suit, he pointed to a website for her political action committee that featured a six-minute video of Lake discussing the 2022 election and accusing Richer of intentionally sabotaging the election. The site also asked visitors to “donate to support Kari Lake and Save Arizona,” seeking donations from $25 to $100,000.

Maynard said at the time he believed that just between Dec. 5 and Dec. 24 she raised hundreds of thousands of dollars through the Save Arizona Fund. That was a period when the trial judge in a separate case Lake filed to challenge her election loss determined there was no evidence of fraud in the election. And Maynard said all the funds raised have been used to boost Lake’s political ambitions.

For example, Maynard said, the Save Arizona Fund paid for campaign events in Iowa where Lake had met with voters.

“That follows a prior pattern where Lake has told her supporters that fundraising money was needed to contest the election, but then spent the money raised on other items, including more than $35,000 on travel and hotel accommodations,” Maynard said.

There also was something else that could have paved the way for a settlement.

In admitting that she acted with actual malice, Lake opened herself up to having to pay punitive damages. These are awards designed not so much to compensate victims but to punish those who are liable.

Calm post-election period prompts reflection on public trust

An election reform group prepared to launch a litigation tracker to keep tabs on an anticipated surge in legal challenges to the 2024 election.

But after the presidential election yielded no widescale legal effort, and states having so far seen little promise of impending courtroom battles, the group had to pivot.

Election Overtime, a project of Election Reformers Network, sought to keep tabs on litigation expected to spring out of a close presidential race, and predicted tight contests in a handful of states, including Arizona.

The day after the election, Election Reformers Network President Kevin Johnson put out a letter noting a decision to postpone the launch of the tool designed to keep tabs on races contested in court.

Johnson wrote, “It was clear last night, there’s no overtime in this presidential race. It’s a different day than we expected, and maybe a different world.”

The presidential election sidestepped predicted legal challenges. And though contests could still emerge after Arizona’s statewide canvass on Nov. 25, those working in election spaces have so far noted a comparatively calmer post-election environment than in 2020 and 2022.

The relative quiet gave way to some reflection on how and if public trust in elections has changed since 2020 and a hope that past post-election litigation vindicated security in state election processes among the public.

“The damage that’s been done to voter confidence, the damage that, in many ways, Arizona was an epicenter for, is long-lasting,” David Becker, executive director and founder of the Center for Election Innovation and Research, said. “I’m cautiously optimistic over time that confidence will be restored. I’m hopeful that some of the really destructive ideas that were based on disinformation … melt away now that those who spread some of the disinformation about elections saw the candidates that they prefer winning in 2024.”

The post-election legal environment in 2024, both nationally and statewide, stands in stark contrast to 2020, where in Arizona alone, the presidential election brought on seven lawsuits challenging election administration and results and eventually stirred a months-long hand count audit.

And it pales to 2022, when gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake, attorney general candidate Abe Hamadeh and secretary of state candidate Mark Finchem – all Republicans – lodged lawsuits contesting the results of their elections, with allegations of some level of fraud or misconduct.

Lake and Hamadeh’s contests, and Finchem’s attempt to get out of court-ordered sanctions, were all denied review by the Arizona Supreme Court on Nov. 6. So far, no candidates have announced intent to challenge election results.

Becker said it was too early to say whether Arizona is out of the woods yet in terms of high-caliber election distrust or post-election litigation, but he hopes this cycle, as well as the recent close of election litigation in the past cycle, helps dispel unfounded claims of election fraud.

“This was always based on a lie. The Democratic Party, being out of power, did not somehow find a way to overcome the massive power of the Trump administration in 2020 and then forget how to use that power in 2024,” Becker said. “There wasn’t some grand conspiracy to have Arizona’s electors go to Trump, but to send a Democratic senator to the United States Senate. None of these conspiracy theories ever made any sense. And hopefully, people will wake up to that now.”

He noted post-election litigation in the last four years, though in some ways damaging to voter confidence, has ultimately polished the public’s understanding of the courts as a safeguard in ensuring proper election results and processes.

“The work of every single election official in Arizona has been under the scrutiny of the courts for years, and every single time it has withstood that scrutiny. Every single time, they’ve shown their work, and they’ve demonstrated their work reached the outcome as defined by the will of the voters,” Becker said.

He continued, “Arizonans, having gone through this trial by fire over the last four years, should have more confidence than ever about their election administrators, their elections process and the courts that will review it in the case of very close elections.”

Jen Wright, election attorney, said from her view, the most recent election cycle ran smoothly, though noted support from third parties could have played some role in ironing out any wrinkles.She noted in particular the party buses deployed by Turning Point USA to shuttle voters to less crowded polling places.

“Most importantly is that people had a good voting experience. Because to me, that is so critical. That’s how we restore trust,” Wright said. “More people who have bad voting experiences equals more questions and concerns about the election. Fundamentally, like whether it was through a third party assisting or not, the fact of the matter is, I really do commend the fact that it did go very smoothly on Tuesday, but I hope that going forward, it can go even smoother.”

Despite a lack of election challenges thus far, Election Reformers Network released the election litigation tracker Nov. 12, featuring a collection of nationwide litigation potentially impacting results and future procedures.

In announcing the launch, Johnson noted a host of races still remain uncalled, and election contests could still be on the table.

But he hopes litigation of past cycles, and any potential litigation in 2024, highlights for the public the distinction between what he deemed the “real results process,” or ballot counting, recounts and post-election litigation, and the “media or political centric process” characterized by race calls and projections.

“There will be elections again that are super close, there will be a narrative of misinformation that arises again in some election very soon,” Johnson said. “They need to know the difference, and they need to be ready to understand the ‘real results process’ when things are too close.”

“We should all be thinking of litigation in election results, not as an indication that things have gone awry, but as a normal part of making sure things are done right,” Johnson said.

Lake loss leaves question of next steps

Kari Lake lost her second statewide election in two consecutive election cycles, following a Senate race call for Congressman Ruben Gallego Monday night, leaving the question of how, or if, she will make another run for public office.

Lake served as the exception to sweeping Republican success up-and-down the ballot. Consultants say a future, successful campaign is not completely out of the question but could prove difficult given key electoral failings in 2024.

“She lost in a year where we’ve seen many Republicans down ballot do exceptionally well and over perform, particularly in swing areas,” Paul Bentz, pollster for HighGround Public Affairs said. “It was a very Republican year, with the exception of Lake, who was on the outside looking in.”

Gallego came out the gate on election night ahead of Lake by about 118,000, but back-and-forth in ballot drops slimmed down his lead to less than 33,000 votes, then later brought the vote difference back to 72,626 after another round of results from Maricopa County.

According to the Associated Press, the call came after determining that in order to prevail, Lake would have had to win 70% of the 181,000 remaining uncounted ballots, a near impossibility given lackluster vote splits for Lake in Maricopa and Pima counties.

On X, Lake did not acknowledge her defeat, but the Kari Lake War Room account lambasted the fact Lake was outspent by Gallego and “abandoned” by the Senate Leadership Fund, which spent $0 in support of Lake, per campaign finance records.

Lake has yet to concede. A spokesman for Lake’s campaign did not respond to an inquiry on Lake’s concession, or alternatively, any potential legal action she was considering in light of her loss.

But the race call, and Lake’s prior unsuccessful attempt to take the governor’s office, does leave a specter of what looms in Lake’s political future.

Consultants speculated Lake could see success in conservative media, potentially secure some position in President-elect Donald Trump’s administration and floated a rumor that Lake may go after the state party chair position, currently filled by Gina Swoboda.

A Lake spokesperson did not respond to requests for comment on Lake’s future plans.

As for any position in the Trump administration, Caroline Leavitt, Trump-Vance transition spokeswoman, said in a statement, “Trump is making decisions on who will serve in his second administration. Those decisions will be announced when they are made.”

In terms of aspirations for future elections, Bentz noted Lake’s difficulty in capturing Maricopa County this election cycle could spell trouble.

“We see up and down ballot that Republicans did incredibly well, lesser known Republicans did incredibly well in Maricopa County,” Bentz said. “She is still losing Maricopa County. She’s got a challenge in our most populous region. It would take a massive amount of rehabilitation for her to be electable in Maricopa County.”

Bentz added her lag behind Trump proved a problem too. Trump successfully pulled congressional and legislative candidates over the finish line but left Lake in the lurch.

But her most recent election loss, and her gubernatorial loss are not necessarily a death knell.

“You just never can count these types of candidates out when there’s something about campaigning that is very attractive to individuals like her,” Bentz said. “Never say never.”

Jason Rose, consultant and president of Rose+Allyn Public and Online Relations, said he thought another bid for office was not out of the question for Lake either but noted a more disciplined approach to be crucial going forward.

“Kari Lake is a talented individual, but she cannot invoke that self control,” Rose said. “It’s not like she’s going to alienate her base. She could just be a saner, more sublime person.”

Rose said he could see Lake going for Secretary of State, given her affinity for elections. “There’s somewhat of a nexus there,” he said. “And if anyone says she can’t win it, look at the Maricopa County Recorder’s race.”

He floated the possibility of a bid for lieutenant governor, too, but noted if she strived for the governor’s office again in 2026, he had doubts about her ability to secure an endorsement from Trump.

“The Trump World does not like people who lose,” Rose said.

Overall, though, Rose said a step back may need to come before a step forward in any direction.

“She just needs to take some time away. She needs to then put some new voices around her, rather than having many sycophants and really reflect on what’s going to be the winning formula,” Rose said. “Winning often is a little more nuanced, and especially in a state like this.”

Lake likely to lose as vote counts nears end

There is no way for Kari Lake to become the state’s next senator.

An analysis by Capitol Media Services show that as of Monday afternoon there were fewer than 76,000 votes to be tallied in four counties where the Republican contender has outpolled Democrat Ruben Gallego.

But as of the same time, the Secretary of State’s Office reported that Gallego was outpolling Lake by more than 68,000.

Theoretically, that could allow Lake to catch up if she got pretty much every single one of those votes in Cochise, Pinal, Yavapai and Yuma counties. But even in Yavapai County, which among those probably has the largest GOP margin, Lake was getting fewer than two out of every three votes.

The other side of the equation is that the largest collection of untallied votes is in Maricopa County, where more than 84,000 votes have yet to be tallied. Here, more than 2 million have been counted.

What makes that significant is that as of Monday afternoon, Gallego had received slightly more than a million of them against about 911,000 for Lake.

Put another way, for every nine votes coming in for Lake, Gallego is getting 10.

That disparity shows up in even greater form in heavily Democratic Pima County.

Election officials on Monday said they still had nearly 63,000 ballots not yet counted.

But of the more than 461,000 that have been tallied, for every two votes that Lake got, Gallego picked up three.

In the past two elections, some of the last votes to be counted actually skewed in favor of Republican candidates. In fact, ahead of then 2022 election, some GOP officials were telling people not to vote early amid false claims that mail-in voting was insecure.

This year, however, the party engaged in an active effort to “bank” early votes. That gave many Republicans, including Donald Trump, an edge from the get-go that he never lost.

Even with that push, though, Lake never caught up with Gallego.

Lake also ran far behind Trump.

Those Monday numbers show the former president with more than 1.66 million votes against just 1.46 million for the GOP senate hopeful

Messages left with the Lake campaign were not immediately returned.

What also remains to be seen is whether Lake will accept the results.

She spent the last two years in court contesting her 17,117-vote loss in the 2022 gubernatorial race to Democrat Katie Hobbs. Not a single court accepted her arguments that there were flaws in the way the election was conducted.

The victory for Gallego is bittersweet. A former state legislator before being elected to the U.S. House, he goes to a Senate that had been in Democratic hands to one where the Republicans now will be in control for at least the next two years.

But while the GOP majority expected to hit 53, it is short of the 60 needed by Republicans to avoid a filibuster of their measures.

Still, that rule does not apply to confirming nominees for the U.S. Supreme Court, pretty much clearing the way for Trump to fill any vacancies.

And there’s something else: There isn’t going to be a Democrat in the White House for the next four years to quash some GOP priorities.

As of Tuesday, however, control of the U.S. House remained undecided.

Republicans gained one seat, bringing their total to 214, with Democrats keeping control of 204. But it takes 218 for a majority in the 435-seat chamber, with several races undecided.

Arizona Supreme Court blocks Kari Lake’s final appeal to overturn 2022 governor’s race

Kari Lake is not going to be the governor of Arizona – at least not unless she runs again in 2026 and wins.

Without comment the Arizona Supreme Court on Wednesday turned away her last-ditch effort in her bid to argue that she, and not Katie Hobbs, was elected governor in 2022. That leaves undisturbed prior rulings by trial judges and the Court of Appeals rejecting her claims that she should be allowed to present new evidence about the failure of tabulators used on the election.

With the new order, also now gone, forever, is Lake’s request that the justices order a new election in Maricopa County.

The new ruling means that Lake, who lost to Hobbs by 17,117 votes, has exhausted all of her appeals.

Politically, that leaves her with only her current bid to be a U.S. senator. But at last count Thursday evening Lake was trailing Democrat Ruben Gallego by nearly 44,000 votes out of more than 1.5 million ballot already counted.

Lake, however, has refused to concede. And there were more than 780,000 ballots yet to be tallied

The justices issued a similar order Wednesday against Abe Hamadeh, putting an end to his claim he is entitled to a new trial so he could argue he really didn’t lose the 2022 race for attorney general.

Hamadeh contends that Mohave County Superior Court Judge Lee Jantzen denied him the time and ability to find and present new evidence that shows not all votes for him were counted.

The appellate court judges, however, said there were multiple flaws in Hamadeh’s case, ranging from some of the claims having been filed too late to the failure to prove that even if the ballots he said were ignored were counted that it would help him overcome his 280 vote loss to Democrat Kris Mayes.

But the ruling on Hamadeh comes with a couple of caveats.

First is that this may not be the end of the legal road for him as he still has a parallel challenge to the outcome of the 2022 election.

His attorney, Ryan Heath, contends that illegal votes were counted in Maricopa County and wants all ballots cast in the county disregarded for both Hamadeh and Mayes. And since Mayes did better than Hamadeh in the county, Heath says throwing out those ballots and deciding the race on what was left from the other 14 counties would leave his client with more votes.

The Court of Appeals rejected that claim just a week ago. But that still leaves the option of a Supreme Court review.

Second is the fact that Hamadeh just won the race for the U.S. House of Representatives in CD 8.

He did not return messages asking whether, assuming he got his new trial and was declared attorney general, he would take that position over serving in Congress. But given that Hamadeh will be sworn in in January, any bid to be attorney general is likely moot.

The Supreme Court on Wednesday also issued an order in the case involving Republican Mark Finchem and his 2022 bid to be secretary of state.

Finchem, who lost that race to Democrat Adrian Fontes by more than 120,000 votes, gave up trying to overturn the election last year. But he asked the Court of Appeals to set aside the decision by Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Melissa Julian, who ruled that his lawsuit was “groundless” and ordered he and his attorney to pay more than $47,000 in legal fees.

On Wednesday, the Supreme Court not only kept that order in place but also upheld a decision by the Court of Appeals to say Finchem must pay another $38,500 on top of that in legal costs incurred by Fontes in the appeal.

Finchem, a former state representative from Oro Valley, just won his bid this week to become a state senator from Prescott.

Lake attorney demands answers on Pima County ‘clerical error’

What Pima County officials say was a clerical error led it to reporting incorrect numbers of untallied ballots on Friday.

But it took a complaint by an attorney for Republican Senate hopeful Kari Lake to make it public.

In a letter to county officials, Jennifer Wright pointed out that the estimated number of uncounted ballots reported by the county actually went up in a two-hour period on Friday.

“Kari Lake for Arizona demands that Pima County provide an immediate explanation of the discrepancies in the numbers combined with complete and accurate accounting of how the number of uncounted ballots increased between the 1:23 p.m. report and the 3:23 p.m. report,” she wrote to Daniel Jurkowitz, the assistant chief civil deputy in the Pima County Attorney’s Office.

That’s not the only issue.

“Even more strange than the number of uncounted ballots increasing, at one point, the report purported to be uploaded at 3:23 p.m. was initially identical to the report uploaded at 1:23 p.m.,” she wrote It was only about two hours later, Wright said, that the numbers in report were changed without changing the time stamp.

Those figures have led to criticism on X by Lake’s campaign.

“We should know what the static number of ballots to count is,” the post reads. “Instead, it’s like an accordion.”

“It’s a clerical error,”said Mark Evans, a spokesman for the county.

“It’s an easy explanation,” he said. “But in this age of conspiracy, everything gets blown up into inserted votes.”

Wright told Capitol Media Services she’s willing to give the county the benefit of the doubt.

But she said no one from the county has yet responded to her inquiry or provided her any details about how the number of uncounted ballots suddenly increased by 14,666.

“Show me your work,” Wright said.

She now is seeking detailed numbers from the county broken down by categories including how many are waiting to be processed, how many are waiting for signature verification and how many need to be “cured.”

That refers to situations where the signature on early ballot envelopes appears to not match other signatures the county recorder already has on file from that person. Arizona law gives five days – through Sunday – for individuals to contact the office and cure the ballots, verifying that they did, in fact, come from them.

“I think that it’s really important in our election systems and processes that we have transparency and accountability and the numbers add up,” Wright said. “And that’s how you restore confidence and trust in our electoral system.”

What it comes down to, she said, is getting “clear answers.”

“If there’s a clear explanation that resolves the concern, I’ll check that out,” Wright said.

Evans said the posting error is due to the fact that the number of issues that went to voters required that the ballot be broken into two separate cards.

In some cases, he said, not every voter returned both cards. So the number of cards being counted isn’t always double the number of ballots.

What happened here, said Evans, is related to that two-card issue.

“When we reported the numbers to the secretary of state we read the wrong line,” he said.

“We reported the number of cards we had counted rather than the number of ballots we had counted,” Evans said. “So we reported we had counted 30,687, but that was the number of cards

By contrast, he said, the number of ballots actually counted was 15,492.

“So when we caught it, Constance (Hargrove, the county’s elections director) asked staff to correct it when they reported the second batch of results,” Evans said. And that new tally – the one at 3:23 p.m. – also included a smaller batch that had since been processed.

Wright said she’s still waiting for an answer from the county.

“People are pointing this out to me and it’s not adding up to me, either,” she said

“I hope that there’s a clear, innocent explanation so I can put this issue aside,” Wright said. “People deserve answers. It’s just transparency.”

The desire to verify the numbers comes as Lake is trailing in her bid to be elected Arizona’s next senator.

Reports from the Secretary of State’s Office on Saturday showed Lake trailing Democrat Ruben Gallego by 33,898 votes out of more than 2.7 million ballots already tallied.

Separate reports showed there were still more than 588,000 ballots uncounted statewide. While the lion’s share is in Maricopa County at about 337,000, the most recent report still showed 120,907 in Pima County.

Those uncounted Pima ballots won’t sway the heavily Democratic county her way. That last report showed Gallego with about a 90,000 vote lead over Lake.

Lake also is trailing in Maricopa County by about 60,000 votes.

But her campaign is counting on picking up enough votes in both counties which, combined with strong showings for her in many rural counties, could provide the margin of victory.

On top of that, Lake and her allies in the Republican Party are out looking for people they believed voted for her on that “cure” list to see if they can bolster her numbers by the Sunday deadline.

What remains to be seen is whether what happened with the numbers in Pima County could provide the basis for Lake, who spent two years challenging her 2022 loss in the gubernatorial race to Katie Hobbs, to mount another legal challenge if she loses this race.

Last time, however, the focus was on Maricopa County.

Lake filed a 70 page lawsuit after that 2022 race alleging that “hundreds of thousands of illegal ballots infected the election.” She also claimed that Election Day problems the county had with its printers and tabulators at vote centers “could not have occurred absent intentional misconduct.”

That case took two years to resolve, only coming to an end when the Arizona Supreme Court on Thursday dismissed her final appeal.

Lake, however, also has other active litigation: A lawsuit filed against her by Maricopa County Recorder Stephen Richer that stems from false allegations she made about his role in that 2022 loss.

Lake made repeated statements that Richer inserted 300,000 “illegal,” “invalid,” “phony” or ”bogus” ballots into the vote count. That was based on Lake’s claim about disparities between preliminary and final counts of ballots dropped off on Election Day, ballots she argued were not within the legal chain of custody.

The other basis for the lawsuit was Lake’s claim that Richer – along with Maricopa County Supervisor Bill Gates – “sabotaged election day.”

One post by her campaign, for example, said the pair “knew 75% of Kari Lake’s voters would show up on game day, so they programmed the machines to print 19-inch images on 20-inch ballots.” The claim was that the mis-sized ballots created election day problems and long lines, all of which resulted in some voters – Lake argued they were her supporters – leaving before casting a ballot.

Lake admitted in court filings earlier this year that everything Richer said she did in his complaint was true. What remains before the court is the question of financial damages.

But Lake, in a video explaining her decision, insisted it had nothing to do with conceding that her statements were wrong – even though her court papers admit that they were.

Instead, she said it was a strategic move allowing her to focus her attention on her Senate campaign. And Lake said Richer and his attorneys were trying to tie her time up in lawsuits and keep her off the campaign trail.

“It’s called lawfare; weaponizing the legal system to punish, impoverish and destroy political opponents,” Lake said. “We’ve all seen how they’re doing it to President Trump. And here in Arizona, they’re doing the exact same thing to me.”

Gallego leading Lake in U.S. Senate race

Kari Lake is lagging behind Ruben Gallego, per initial election night results, with Gallego capturing 52.6% to Lake’s 45%.

Polling has put Gallego ahead of Lake for the vast majority of their matchup, and the most updated vote count puts the Democrat candidate in step with prior projections.

As of the first ballot drop at 8 p.m. election day, Gallego leads Lake by 118,646 votes.

Green Party candidate Eduardo Quintana got about 1.72% or 30,720 votes.

The Senate seat vacated by Kyrsten Sinema set up a contentious race between Gallego, a Democrat congressman from a deep blue district, and Lake, a former newscaster, onetime gubernatorial hopeful and Trump acolyte.

Gallego entered the race early and tied anchors to his military background and working-class upbringing, while Lake kept in line with America First messaging and entered the Senate race while still contesting her 2022 gubernatorial election.

Consultants marked independent voters as an essential voting bloc for both Lake and Gallego to capture, with the campaign marked by each candidate attempting to paint their opponent as the more extreme choice for the state.

Key issues continued to be the border and immigration, with Lake trotting out Gallego’s past comments calling the border wall “stupid and dumb” and contrasting it to his Senate-run characterization of walls as “necessary.”

Abortion became tantamount, too, with Gallego seizing on contradictory comments by Lake, in which she heralded then later urged the repeal of the 1864 abortion ban.

As for money, at each benchmark in campaign finance reporting, Gallego far outraised Lake and garnered more outside spending.

Post-primary campaign finance reports show Lake had raised a total of $21.4 million, compared to $56.8 million raised by Gallego. As far as outside spending, Lake saw little support from national Republican outfits, while Democrats threw all their weight behind Gallego.

Closer to home, two local pollsters put Lake and Gallego nine points and four points apart, with Lake seeing particular trouble courting Republicans and independent voters.

Per a poll of 775 likely general election voters in Arizona conducted October 28 to 30, Noble Predictive Insights found Gallego still leads Lake by 3 points, or 4 when undecided voters were pushed to make a choice.

Lake saw slightly lower loyalty from the Republican party, at about 82%. Gallego has consolidated about 90% of Democrats and took the lead on Independents with about 14 more points in his favor.

The poll slightly contrasted an earlier Senate race finding from HighGround Public Affairs, which found Gallego leading Lake by 9 points.

Initial results released tonight put the margin closer to 8 points.

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