Kari Lake

Lake at a campaign event on October 2, 2021, with a thin blue line flag

Lake was a member of the Republican Party until November 3, 2006,[32] when she changed her registration to become an independent. She registered as a Democrat on January 4, 2008, the day after the Iowa Democratic presidential caucuses were won by Obama.[32] Lake returned to being a Republican on January 31, 2012. She explained leaving the Republican Party in 2006 as a reaction to the then-ongoing Iraq and Afghanistan wars. She had supported John Kerry in 2004 and Barack Obama in 2008.[32] She also made several donations to Democratic presidential candidates.[32][33] After launching her campaign for governor in 2021, Lake cited Trump, Ronald Reagan, and Arizona Republican Party chair Kelli Ward, all former Democrats, as precedent for her party-switching.[34]

GOP primary results

  40–50% Lake

  50–60% Lake

Lake at a campaign event in Scottsdale, Arizona, July 5, 2021

Lake filed paperwork in June 2021 to seek the Republican nomination for governor of Arizona in the 2022 election to succeed incumbent governor Doug Ducey, who was term-limited.[35] Four candidates sought the Republican nomination: Lake; former real estate developer and Arizona Board of Regents member Karrin Taylor Robson; Paola Tulliani Zen, and Scott Neely.[36] Lake and Robson were the front-runners, leading in polling and fundraising.[36] A fifth Republican candidate, ex-congressman Matt Salmon, dropped out of the race after trailing in polls and endorsed Robson.[36]

Throughout her campaign, Lake was described as "a champion of the far-right" movement in the United States.[37][38][39] Lake received Donald Trump's endorsement in September 2021.[40] The primary was seen as a "battle" between Republicans aligned with Trump and establishment Republicans. Robson was supported by figures such as former Vice President Mike Pence, governor Ducey, and former New Jersey governor Chris Christie.[41] By the end of 2021, Lake had raised $1.4 million from 12,000 sources.[42] Lake centered her campaign on promoting the false claim that the 2020 presidential election in Arizona and nationwide was "rigged and stolen"; Boris Epshteyn, a former Trump White House aide who promoted Trump's efforts to overturn the election results, attributed her victory in the Republican primary, despite being "outspent 10-to-1," to that stance.[40] Lake won the Republican primary in Arizona on August 2, 2022, winning in all counties.[43]

After winning the Republican primary, Lake said that "we're all big boys and big girls", urging people to "come together"; however, within a week of that victory, Lake said: "We drove a stake through the heart of the McCain machine".[44] Later in early November, Lake participated in a campaign event where she told "McCain Republicans" to "get the hell out!"[45] Lake also called the traditional Republican Party "the party of McCain", and then stated: "Boy, Arizona has delivered some losers, haven't they?"[45] Her statements were in contrast to her past description of John McCain (Arizona's former Republican Senator) four years earlier, after his death, as "courageous", "a war hero, icon and a force to be reckoned with".[45]

Democratic gubernatorial candidate Katie Hobbs refused to debate Lake during the election.[46] However, both attended a gubernatorial candidate forum in September 2022, held by the Arizona Chamber of Commerce and Industry, where they separately answered questions.[47]

In August 2021, during the COVID-19 pandemic, Lake led anti-mask rallies,[48] calling on Arizona State University students to go against the university's mask mandates.[48] Lake said that as governor she would not tolerate mask and vaccine mandates of the COVID-19 pandemic.[49] In November 2021, Lake told a group of Republican retirees that she was taking hydroxychloroquine to prevent COVID-19 infection. She stated that, as governor, she would work to have hydroxychloroquine and ivermectin produced in the state to "make it easier for us to get these lifesaving drugs".[50] Lake questioned the science behind COVID-19 vaccines[51] and said that she had not been vaccinated.[52]

Lake had been a leading proponent of the false claim that the 2020 presidential election was "stolen" from Trump.[6] During her campaign, she aligned herself with Trump[48] and centered her candidacy on promoting election lies.[6][53][54]

Lake claimed President Joe Biden did not receive 81 million votes and that Arizona (which was won by Biden in the 2020 presidential election) was actually won by Trump.[6][55] After the 2021 Maricopa County presidential ballot audit found no evidence of election fraud, she demanded the election be "decertified"—a legal impossibility,[6] as such a process does not exist.[56] Lake tweeted quotes made by Sidney Powell on Lou Dobbs Tonight falsely asserting there was a sweeping election fraud conspiracy. She has advocated imprisoning Arizona Secretary of State Katie Hobbs, her Democratic opponent in the gubernatorial race, on baseless and unspecified allegations of criminality related to the 2020 election.[6] Lake also called for imprisoning journalists.[6] Lake repeatedly claimed that defendants arrested in connection with the January 6 United States Capitol attack were "being held in prison without being charged".[57][58]

Trump endorsed Lake's candidacy,[59] as did pro-Trump Republican figures such as Arizona congressman Paul Gosar and former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn.[60] By contrast, Lake's main primary opponent, Robson, was endorsed by outgoing Republican governor Doug Ducey,[61] as well as Arizona Senate president Karen Fann and Americans for Prosperity.[56] Lake attacked Robson for failing to endorse false claims of election fraud.[53] Lake attended events headed by My Pillow founder Mike Lindell, a prominent promoter of false claims regarding fraud in the 2020 election.[48] During her 2021 campaign for governor, she said that she would not have certified Biden's 2020 election victory in Arizona if she had been governor at the time.[62] During a June 2022 debate among candidates for the Republican nomination, Lake continued to make baseless claims the 2020 presidential election was "stolen" and "corrupt".[53]

Fox News reported in July 2022 that nine days before the 2017 Inauguration of Donald Trump, Lake had posted a meme on Facebook that declared the inauguration a "national day of mourning and protest", in which she asked her followers how they would react to Trump's inauguration. She asked "Will you be protesting the inauguration?" and how they might protest. The post was deleted after Fox News asked Lake's campaign about it.[63][64]

In February 2023, Lake said: "We've got great candidates on the Republican Party and on our side. We've got so many great candidates that if our elections were really fair, I believe the ranks of Congress, the Senate, I think a White House, I think all the state governorships would be Republican if elections were fair".[65]

In June 2023, Maricopa County Recorder Stephen Richer initiated a defamation lawsuit against Lake, alleging that she had repeatedly accused him of intentionally sabotaging the 2022 election by printing wrong-sized ballots and injecting 300,000 illegal votes into the Maricopa County vote count; Richer also alleged that this led to threats against him and his family, as well as him being ostracised from Republican donors and networks.[66]

After Lake posted remarks critical of drag queens performing in front of children, Rick Stevens, who performs professionally under the name Barbra Seville, published photos and text messages purportedly demonstrating a professional relationship and personal friendship with Lake. Stevens said that he has performed at Lake's home and in front of Lake's then "9 or 10 years old" daughter at Lake's invitation. Lake described Stevens' allegations as "defamatory lies", specifically denying they had been friends and denying that he had ever been in her home. Lake has threatened litigation against both Stevens and outlets that pursued the story.[67][68][69][70]

Lake endorsed Jarrin Jackson, a far-right online streamer, in his campaign for the Oklahoma State Senate. Jackson was subsequently scrutinized for his past record of making antisemitic comments, including claims that "the Jews" are evidence that "evil exists"; "Jews will go to hell"; and "Jews [are] taking over the world." These prompted groups such as Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Phoenix to call on Lake – and other Arizona Republicans who endorsed Jackson – to rescind their endorsements.[71][72] Lake denounced Jackson's comments and said, "I looked at Jarrin's resume as (a) Combat Veteran in Afghanistan. It is impossible to dig into everything someone has said in their life. If his reported comments are true, I obviously rescind my endorsement."[73][74]

On November 7, 2022, Lake's campaign stated that on November 6, a campaign staffer "opened an envelope delivered to our campaign office that contained suspicious white powder. It was one of two envelopes that were confiscated by law enforcement" for testing.[75] On November 11, the Phoenix Police Department said that the Arizona state laboratory had tested the items turned over to them by Lake's campaign, and found "no substance" inside.[76] After this revelation, Lake's campaign stated that there actually had been three envelopes, with the first envelope being opened by the staffer having "a white powdery substance along with a hateful letter", but that the staffer threw the first envelope away, and that the trash was emptied before police were informed, with police being handed the other two envelopes.[77]

In October 2022, Lake twice refused to say that she will accept the result if she lost the election: "I'm going to win the election, and I will accept that result."[78]

Multiple media outlets projected on November 14, 2022, that Lake had narrowly lost the gubernatorial election to Hobbs.[79][80] Lake's reaction to this was tweeting that "Arizonans know BS when they see it."[81] On November 17, Lake still refused to concede her loss, and announced she was assembling a legal team to challenge the results.[82][83]

Arizona's election results were certified on December 5, with Lake losing to Hobbs by a margin of over 17,000 votes: Lake received 1,270,774 votes, while Hobbs received 1,287,891 votes.[84][85] A January 2023 analysis by a trio of election data experts, collectively known as the Audit Guys, concluded that in Maricopa County, over 33,000 voters who voted Republican in down-ballot races chose to vote for Hobbs instead of Lake, while nearly 6,000 Republican leaning voters did not vote in the gubernatorial election or wrote in another candidate instead of Lake; together, these voters could have flipped the result of the election had they voted for Lake.[86] Conversely, the analysis found that Lake received fewer than 6,000 votes from Democrat-leaning voters in Maricopa County.[86] Meanwhile, the Associated Press reported in February 2023 that its survey of over 3,200 voters estimated that 11% of Arizona Republicans had voted for Hobbs, while 4% of Arizona Democrats voted for Lake.[87]

Lake alleged voter disfranchisement due to ballot printing problems and long waiting lines in Maricopa County, which had elections run by local Republican officials.[82][88] In 70 out of 223 Maricopa County polling sites, voting machine ballots were printed too lightly to be read by tabulators; the problem was caused by a printer setting which had not shown widespread issues during prior testing.[82][89] If voters did not want to wait in line for the issue to be fixed, they could leave to vote at another Maricopa County polling site, with wait times for polling sites being shown online, and many polling sites had little to no waiting lines, stated Maricopa County election officials.[82][83][90] Alternatively, voters could drop their ballots into a secure box ("Box 3"), with these ballots being later tabulated at Maricopa County's elections headquarters, under monitoring from observers from both parties; ultimately, around 17,000 Maricopa County ballots were dropped into Box 3.[82][83][91] The Arizona secretary of state's office spokesperson said that "Every voter who went to one of the voting locations affected was still able to cast their ballot", and voting rights experts agreed.[92]

Bill Gates, the Republican chair of Maricopa's Board of Supervisors, partially blamed the long lines on Arizona Republican Party chairwoman Kelli Ward for discouraging voters from using Box 3; she had claimed that Box 3 should not be used as "Maricopa County is not turning on their tabulators downtown today".[82][93] Lake herself told her supporters to stay in line to vote, while a lawyer for Lake's campaign assuaged concerns about using Box 3 to vote.[93] Lake's campaign filed a lawsuit on Election Day to extend voting for another three hours, but Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Tim Ryan declined to do so, stating: "The court doesn't have any evidence that any voter was precluded from their right to vote".[94]

While Lake alleged that Republican-dominated areas in Maricopa County were disproportionately affected by the printing problems, The Washington Post found that the percentage of registered Republicans in affected precincts (37%) was very close to the percentage of registered Republicans across Maricopa County (35%), and also found that some Democrat-dominated areas also faced the printing problems.[89][95] Meanwhile, The New York Times analyzed 45 claims of irregularities reported by voters, finding that in 34 of these 45 claims, the voters were able to cast their vote despite an inconvenience; while for the others, three raised problems with voter registration; seven gave unclear accounts as to what exactly happened; and only one said she had been denied the opportunity to vote, though she acknowledged she had arrived at her polling place at the time it closed.[93] Lake self-identified as a "proud election denying deplorable" in December 2022.[96]

Hobbs was sworn in as governor on January 2, 2023.[97] Later in January 2023, Lake posted on Twitter 16 voter signatures, mostly from 2020, suggesting that these were from illegal ballots because the signatures did not match; Arizona law states that "records containing a voter's signature ... shall not be ... reproduced by any person other than the voter", with the exception of those working for the county recorder.[98] She also posted a false claim that almost 250,000 voting attempts failed during the 2022 Arizona elections, without proving that the votes were not counted; during the elections, votes that could not be initially scanned were later counted at another location.[99]

Lake's campaign has raised $2.6 million from Election Day until the end of 2022, while taking in even more money from a non-profit fundraising group started by Lake's advisers in December 2022; this group became Lake's main fundraising outlet by February 2023, and is not required to publish donation details.[87] The Arizona Mirror found in January 2023 that less than 10% of the funds raised by Lake after the election were paid to lawyers, despite Lake claiming that the funds were meant for contesting election results.[100]

The results of an independent investigation into the 2022 election's printing problems was published in April 2023; the investigation was led by a retired chief justice of the Arizona Supreme Court, Ruth McGregor, who concluded that "the primary cause of the election day failures was equipment failure", and that no evidence gathered gave "clear indication that the problems should have been anticipated". McGregor also detailed: "Two-thirds of the general election vote centers reported no issues with misprinted ballots; approximately 94 percent of election day ballots were not faulty".[101][102]

In April 2022, Lake and Mark Finchem sued state officials, seeking to ban electronic voting machines from being used in her 2022 election.[103] In August 2022, U.S. District Judge John Tuchi dismissed the suit, writing that Lake and Finchem "articulated only conjectural allegations of potential injuries" and thus lacked standing.[104] In his ruling, Tuchi also cited the Eleventh Amendment to the United States Constitution, as well as the Purcell principle.[105][106] In December 2022, Tuchi sanctioned Lake's lawyers in this suit, including Alan Dershowitz, for making "false, misleading, and unsupported" assertions during the case, and making claims without "an adequate factual or legal basis grounded in a reasonable pre-filing inquiry"; he ordered the plaintiffs to pay the defendants' attorney fees.[103] Tuchi said the sanctions would show that the court does not tolerate litigants "furthering false narratives that baselessly undermine public trust at a time of increasing disinformation about, and distrust in, the democratic process".[103] The sanction amount was set by Tuchi to be roughly $122,000.[107]

Finchem and Lake's appeal, aimed at banning electronic voting machines, was rejected in October 2022 by the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, which highlighted that "counsel for plaintiffs conceded that their arguments were limited to potential future hacking, and not based on any past harm", and voiced agreement "with the district court that plaintiffs' speculative allegations that voting machines may be hackable are insufficient to establish an injury".[108]

On December 9, 2022, after Arizona certified the election results, Lake filed a new suit in state court, seeking a court order to either overturn Hobbs' victory and declare Lake as the winner of the election, or redo the election in Maricopa County.[7][109] Lake's complaint alleged that there were hundreds of thousands of illegal votes in the election, but provided no evidence in support of these claims.[110] On December 19, Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Peter Thompson, who was appointed by Republican Governor Jan Brewer, dismissed eight of ten counts of Lake's lawsuit (specifically, her claims of invalid signatures on mail-in ballots, incorrect certification, inadequate remedy, and violations of freedom of speech, equal protection, due process, the secrecy clause, and constitutional rights).[8][111] The judge allowed the remaining two counts (Lake's claim that election officials intentionally interfered with Maricopa County ballot printers and with the chain of custody of Maricopa County ballots) to go to trial,[112] specifying that Lake would need to prove at trial that the allegations were true and that the alleged actions actually changed the election.[113]

During the two-day trial, Northrop Grumman information security officer Clay Parikh, a witness called by Lake, testified that some ballots had printing errors that would cause tabulation issues, but these misprinted ballots would ultimately be counted after duplicates were made.[114][115] On December 24, Judge Thompson dismissed Lake's remaining case,[116][115] writing: "Every single witness before the Court disclaimed any personal knowledge of such [intentional] misconduct. The Court cannot accept speculation or conjecture in place of clear and convincing evidence".[117][118] The judge further ruled that "printer failures did not actually affect the results of the election", noting that a witness called by Lake testified that "printer failures were largely the result of unforeseen mechanical failure."[115][117]

A day after the ruling was issued, Lake's Twitter page attacked the judge in this case, linking to a Townhall article to baselessly claim that "his decision was ghostwritten" by "top left-wing attorneys like Marc Elias.'" No evidence supported the tweet's claim, and the tweet was deleted the next day, after Secretary Hobbs filed a motion to sanction Lake.[119][120][121] On December 27, Judge Thompson ordered Lake to pay Hobbs $33,000 in fees for expert witnesses and a ballot inspector due to the lawsuit, but did not sanction Lake for filing the lawsuit.[122][123] Lake appealed the dismissal and the order directing her to pay $33,000 in fees.[124]

A three-judge panel of the Arizona Court of Appeals unanimously rejected Lake's appeal on February 16, 2023.[9][125] The court found that "Lake’s only purported evidence" that long lines at voting centers "had any potential effect on election results was, quite simply, sheer speculation";[126] that "Lake presented no evidence that voters whose ballots were unreadable by on-site tabulators were not able to vote" (and, indeed, that Lake's own cybersecurity expert testified to the contrary);[125] and that the evidence in the trial record showed that "voters were able to cast their ballots, that votes were counted correctly and that no other basis justifies setting aside the election results".[127]

Lake sought to appeal to the Arizona Supreme Court.[10] On March 22, 2023, the Court denied Lake's request to hear her lawsuit.[128] The Court issued a five-page order ruling that the lower courts had correctly dismissed six of Lake's seven legal claims, determining that these challenges were "insufficient to warrant the requested relief under Arizona or federal law."[11][128] For Lake's remaining legal claim (on signature verification), the Arizona Supreme Court ruled that the lower courts incorrectly interpreted her challenge as pertaining to signature verification policies themselves, instead of the application of such policies, and remanded (sent back) the remaining claim to the trial court.[11] After a three-day trial, Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Peter Thompson ruled against Lake for her remaining claim on May 22, 2023, thus re-affirming Hobbs' election. [12] Thompson wrote that Lake had not provided "clear and convincing evidence or a preponderance of evidence" of misconduct in the election, while there was "ample evidence that — objectively speaking — a comparison between voter records and signatures was conducted in every instance [Lake] asked the Court to evaluate."[12][129] Thompson noted that Lake's attorneys earlier argued that Maricopa County did not perform signature verification, but later argued that signature verification was performed, but done too quickly.[12] Thompson concluded that it was possible for signature verification to be done quickly and properly when "looking at signatures that, by and large, have consistent characteristics".[130] Lake was not sanctioned by Thompson for her final claim, as he ruled that while there was no clear or convincing evidence for this claim, it was not necessarily "groundless".[131]

The Arizona Supreme Court in May 2023 ruled that it was employing "the extraordinary remedy of a sanction" on Lake's lawyers, imposing a $2,000 fine on them for making "false factual statements to the Court".[132][133] Lake's lawyers had falsely claimed in legal filings that it was an "undisputed fact that 35,563 unaccounted for ballots were added to the total of ballots [at] a third party processing facility;[134] in imposing its sanction, the Arizona Supreme Court stated that "no evidence" supported the claim that 35,563 ballots were added, and that Lake's claim had been disputed by the other side, making the claim of an "undisputed" fact "unequivocally false".[132]

During Lake's appeal of Thompson's ruling against her final claim, she tried to appeal directly to the Arizona Supreme Court, which denied her motion to do so in July 2023, citing "no good cause" for Lake to skip appealing to the Arizona Court of Appeals.[135]

Lake announced her candidacy for the 2024 United States Senate election in Arizona on October 10, 2023.[136]