The lawsuit brought by Arizona Attorney General candidate Abraham “Abe” Hamadeh will proceed in court and will be adjudicated on the merits. The court thus dispatches with the “Motion to Dismiss” filed by the defendants’ legal team.
Abe Hamadeh officially trails Democrat Kris Mayes in an Attorney General race that was decided by 511 votes — a less than .02 percent margin. On Election Day, there were widespread ballot and tabulation errors in Maricopa County that caused significant disruption to the voting process, and as Republican election challengers argue, disenfranchised thousands of voters.
The Associated Press reported that Hamadeh nonetheless has a “high bar” in proving that he would have won the race if the election were conducted the right way.
Under Arizona law, he faces the high bar of proving not just that election officials erred but that he would have won without their misconduct.
Hamadeh lost to Democrat Kris Mayes by 511 votes out of 2.5 million. His lawsuit alleges that problems with printers in Maricopa County led to a series of issues that disenfranchised voters. He also alleges his race was affected by improper handling of ballots that were duplicated or adjudicated by humans because they could not be read by tabulators.
Much like his fellow Republican challenger Kari Lake in her gubernatorial election contest, Hamadeh will now have the opportunity to conduct an inspection of the cast ballots.
Jantzen said Hamadeh can inspect ballots in Maricopa, Pima and Navajo counties. Mayes won Maricopa and Pima counties, home to Phoenix and Tucson. Hamadeh won Navajo County, though it’s home to a large Native American population that heavily favored Mayes.
Jantzen made no comment on the merits of Hamadeh’s claims, but ruled that he’s entitled to gather witnesses and evidence in an attempt to prove them.
Kari Lake’s legal team recently attained a legal victory when it was granted authority to randomly inspect ballots from Maricopa County’s election as part of her 70-page lawsuit that Lake filed against top state election officials.
The ruling authorized Lake‘s team’s to inspect 50 random ballots cast on Election Day from six polling stations in Maricopa County. During ballot inspection, it was revealed that 48 of 113 ballots reviewed were 19-inch ballots produced on 20-inch paper.
This one-inch discrepancy caused ballot tabulators to reject thousands of votes and sowed chaos on Election Day in Maricopa County.
An expert witness testified there are only two ways for the 19-inch image to have been projected onto the 20 in ballot, which would cause tabulator errors. The witness verified that both methods required an administrator to change and it could not have happened by chance or error. Thus, it is a form of fraud.
The Hamadeh legal team is poised to uncover similar election malfeasance in a race that was decided by a much narrower margin. The trial is set to commence on Friday.
Follow Kyle Becker on Twitter @kylenabecker.
