By Yvonne Wingett Sanchez, The Washington Post (c) 2024
PHOENIX – A year-long defamation case against Kari Lake, who falsely blamed a local Arizona election official for her 2022 defeat for governor and has sowed distrust in American election systems, has been settled.
The details of the settlement are confidential, according to two people familiar with the terms, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a private settlement. A court docket in Maricopa County Superior Court stated Sunday that “an agreed upon settlement disposition has been reached as to all parties and claims.”
Maricopa County Recorder Stephen Richer, who brought the lawsuit against Lake, her husband and others, said in a text message Sunday that “both sides are satisfied with the result.”
Richer, who sued in his personal capacity, had sought a public acknowledgment that many statements against him were untrue, as well as damages and attorney’s fees. He wanted Lake -who made election denialism a centerpiece for her 2022 campaign for the Arizona governor’s race- and her allies to take down all untrue information they posted about him from social media accounts and other websites.
A top adviser for Lake’s 2024 campaign for U.S. Senate declined to comment.
Lake was in Florida over the weekend and attended a Conservative Political Action Conference at President-electDonald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort. Trump, who has admired Lake’s adherence to his false claims of election denialism, gave Lake a complimentary shout-out during remarks Friday, an event attendee said.
The settlement came days after Lake appeared to acknowledge that she had come up short in her Senate campaign, which she lost to Rep. Ruben Gallego (D-Arizona). She has not conceded to Gallego, nor has she contested the outcome.She underperformed Trump, who won the state by a wide margin.
Richer alleged in a lawsuit filed last year that Lake, her 2022 Arizona gubernatorial campaign and an affiliated nonprofit group repeatedly and falsely accused him of causing Lake to lose that election, unleashing a barrage of threats against him and his family. Richer’s complaint sought to hold Lake and her allies accountable for her claims that Richer had “sabotaged the election to prevent Republican candidates, including Lake, from winning.” Lake lost the governorship to Democrat Katie Hobbs by about 17,000 votes.
Earlier this year, in a rare legal maneuver, Lake decided not to defend statements she made about Richer. She requested that the judge set what is known as a default judgment hearing, which essentially bypassed the process for her to defend her comments in court. She instead asked the court to begin determining whether damages were owed to Richer, and if so, the amount.
In an interview with The Washington Post last year, Richer, a lifelong Republican who volunteered for Rudy Giuliani’s 2008 presidential campaign as a student in Illinois, said that lies spread about him by Lake and her affiliates have harmed his relationships with friends, family and past political supporters. He said he saw a direct link between rhetoric by Lake and her affiliates about him and the resulting attacks on him.
At the time he filed the lawsuit, Richer said he pulled back on attending political functions held by grassroots GOP activists, many of whom remained convinced of the false notion that Trump’s 2020 defeat and Lake’s 2022 loss for governor were because of widespread malfeasance by local election officials.
He said the nonstop attacks had taken a mental and physical toll on him. He vigorously sought to defend the work of local election officials and faced death threats and relentless harassment.
Richer lost his reelection campaign in the primary this summer to a Republican attorney and state lawmaker who voted for legislation that grew out of false election theories and who was endorsed by Lake.