Failed Arizona gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake was widely mocked after she told a crowd of fans how she proved the 2022 election was "rigged" despite losing all of her court cases.
Lake, a contender in the 2022 Arizona governor's race with backing from Donald Trump, faced defeat by Democratic opponent Katie Hobbs but refused to concede. Her legal attempts to challenge certified election results in Maricopa County were dismissed for lack of evidence of misconduct.
Undeterred by her gubernatorial loss, Lake has set her sights on a 2024 Arizona Senate seat, entering a field that may include Democrat Ruben Gallego and possibly incumbent Kyrsten Sinema. Despite Sinema's unconfirmed re-election plans, Lake remains committed to her Senate bid.
Despite losing all of her challenges to the election results, Lake claimed she exposed election fraud in Arizona in remarks to her supporters:
“We have accomplished a lot. We stayed in the fight. We have shown not just Arizona, how they are trampling our sacred vote."
"How they are rigging our elections. How they are sabotaging Election Day. We’ve shown the whole world how they are doing that."
"This is where the battle is, in waking people up to what our elections have become. Because we’ve had the will to stay in the fight, we have continued. Our cases are still moving along.”
You can hear what Lake said in the video below.
People were quick to point out that Lake's efforts have been total failures.
In May, a judge dismissed the sole remaining legal claim in Lake's challenge, stating her failure to substantiate the allegation that Maricopa County neglected to verify signatures on mail-in ballots—an area representing 60 percent of Arizona's voters.
Before this setback, the Arizona Court of Appeals rejected Lake's assertions that specific ballot printing issues stemmed from deliberate misconduct.
Additionally, the state Supreme Court refused to review most of Lake's appeal, citing the absence of evidence to support her claim that over 35,000 ballots were erroneously added to the vote counts. Lake's legal team also faced a $2,000 fine from an Arizona court due to the dissemination of false statements.
The situation took a more adverse turn as the State Bar of Arizona initiated proceedings against three of Lake's attorneys over their conduct. Among them, one lawyer faces an additional complaint regarding an August social media post. In the post, he alleged collusion between the CIA, Department of Justice, and the Arizona Supreme Court in creating a misinformation board.