LOS ANGELES: Donald Trump loyalist and prominent election denier Kari Lake has lost her bid to be governor of Arizona, US networks projected Monday.
Lake’s defeat by Democrat Katie Hobbs, called by CNN and NBC, adds to the list of candidates supported by the former president who failed to get elected in last week’s midterms, in an increasingly dismal showing by the Republican Party.
“Democracy is worth the wait,” tweeted Hobbs almost a week after polls closed.
“Thank you, Arizona. I am so honored and so proud to be your next Governor.”
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But Lake, who has built her brand on skepticism of the mainstream media and the political establishment appeared to reject the projections.
“Arizonans know BS when they see it,” she tweeted, using a euphemism for nonsense.
If confirmed by election officials, Hobbs’s victory would mark an end to a bitter election campaign in Arizona, which Lake joined in earnest when she quit local broadcast journalism last year.
The former anchor married her made-for-tv smile to the flame-throwing political style of Trumpism, delighting the Make America Great Again wing of her party.
She made denial of the 2020 presidential election win by Joe Biden a key tenet of the campaign, and said that she would not have validated his victory if she had been in the governor’s mansion at the time.
Her caustic attacks on journalists and election officials, including the Republicans heading key departments in hotly contested Maricopa County, earned her plaudits with the base.
But they also led to warnings that she was stoking trouble.
Democratic National Convention chair Jaime Harrison on Monday tweeted his congratulations to Hobbs along with the phrase: “Sanity wins”.
But Trump, who is expected on Tuesday to announce his entry to the 2024 race for the White House, took to his Truth Social platform to denounce the call.
“Wow! They just took the election away from Kari Lake. It’s really bad out there!” he wrote, without explaining who “they” were.
The count in Arizona has been the subject of national fascination as it became increasingly clear that election deniers across the country had fared badly.
Lake was thought of as a leading light in the movement, and Republican Party insiders – as well as media pundits – have noted that she could be well placed for a spot on a future White House ticket.
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