An Arizona judge has thrown out an election lawsuit brought by state attorney general candidate Abraham Hamadeh and the Republican National Committee (RNC) that sought to challenge the state’s election results.
Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Randall Warner rejected the lawsuit on Wednesday, arguing the lawsuit was filed prematurely, ruling that the parties can not file a lawsuit until the results are certified, according to The Washington Examiner.
“Under these statutes there can be no election contest until after the canvass and declaration of results because, until then, no one is ‘declared elected,’” Warner wrote in his ruling. “It is undisputed that the canvass and declaration of results for the November 2022 election have not occurred.”
Hamadeh does not need to wait until the recount is complete before filing his lawsuit, Warner noted in his ruling. However, he must wait until the statewide certification is official before he can mount a challenge to the election results. Hamadeh has indicated he will refile the lawsuit after the statewide certification is complete.
The Arizona attorney general race is set to go under a recount once the state canvass is complete but one rural county is threatening to derail the process.
Two Republican supervisors in Cochise County, Arizona, voted to delay the county’s election results until Friday. The key issue is that the state is required to certify its election results by Dec. 5th.
The move has triggered legal fights from state officials as they scramble to certify election results statewide, which requires certified results from all 15 counties.
As Great America News Desk previously reported:
“The voters of Arizona demand answers and deserve transparency about the gross incompetence and mismanagement of the General Election by certain election officials,” Hamadeh said. “Pervasive errors by our election officials resulted in the disenfranchisement of countless Arizonans who had their voices silenced.”
According to Maricopa County election officials, at least 60 voting locations experienced issues with their ballot-on-demand printers. The assistant attorney general is demanding an in-depth report addressing those issues, as well as the “check-out” procedures at each polling location and each location’s official ballot report.
Hamadeh and the RNC allege that Arizona officials also wrongly disqualified provisional ballots and mis-marked early voters in the system.
