State Republican Parties Want SCOTUS to Hear Kari Lake Out
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Arizona, Delaware and Georgia Republican parties are urging the U.S. Supreme Court to hear Kari Lake’s (R) fringe voting machines lawsuit, arguing that courts set too high of a standard for election challenges to proceed.
In their “friend of the court” brief filed Thursday, the trio of Republican parties is urging the court to hear Kari Lake and Mark Finchem’s conspiracy-laden challenge to the use of electronic voting machines in the state. Arguing that lower courts’ standards for election cases are too stringent and that it is “nearly impossible for anyone to challenge the manner in which any future election was conducted,” the state GOPs say the Supreme Court should take the case. They also encourage the Court to resolve the issue by the 2024 election.
Previously, the 2022 lawsuit — alleging that Arizona’s use of electronic voting machines violates the U.S. Constitution and Arizona law — was dismissed after a district court judge found that the election-denying duo’s claims were “vague,” “speculative” and ultimately amounted to “conjectural allegations.” The duo was later sanctioned for making false and misleading statements to the court.
The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals agreed with the district court, writing that Lake and Finchem did not show “a plausible inference that their individual votes in future elections will be adversely affected by the use of electronic tabulation.” From there, with help from Mike Lindell of MAGA and MyPillow fame, the election deniers appealed up to the U.S. Supreme Court. Now, Lake and Finchem are asking the Supreme Court to both hear their challenge to Arizona’s use of electronic voting tabulators as well as potentially “order ‘do-over relief” for the 2022 midterms.
Electronic voting machines have been a key focal point for the right as they push election conspiracies. Last year, Fox News agreed to pay nearly $800 million for its false claims about the 2020 election and Dominion Voting Systems. Dominion has also levied an over a billion dollar lawsuit against Lindell for his claims.
Rather than let Lake and Finchem make these conspiracy-backed arguments on their own, state Republican parties — two of which are far from the state of Arizona — are voicing their support for the lawsuit through a different lens. The parties argue it should be easier to bring election challenges and that the rules in Arizona federal court set too high of a bar to bring a case alleging election fraud.
The focus on standing is particularly interesting as the right has rather infamously skirted these requirements with the most recent example being a case challenging LGBTQ+ rights in Colorado going all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court based on an event that did not take place.