Update: Pro-MAGA gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake reportedly eked out a narrow victory in Arizona’s GOP primary, the Liberty Daily reported.
This is the exact moment @KariLake found out she won the election. pic.twitter.com/3c4LQYgmfF
— Kari Lake War Room (@KariLakeWarRoom) August 3, 2022
Original story below:
() Arizona’s Republican candidate for governor has yet to be settled with Kari Lake and Karrin Taylor Robson in a tight race.
In the early hours of Wednesday morning, Taylor Robson’s nine-point advantage had closed and Lake took a less-than 2,000 vote lead.
Maricopa County election officials said they would return later Wednesday to process the about 125,000 mail-in ballots turned in just before or on election day.
Former television anchor Kari Lake spoke at her post-election party in Scottsdale on Tuesday night, excoriating elections officials for not having clear results in the hours after polls closed.
She told supporters that, even though she was trailing Taylor Robson at the time, the race was over and “we won this race. Period.”
Former Arizona Board of Regents member and small-business owner Karrin Taylor Robson took a measured outlook Tuesday night, telling her supporters the race was far from over despite her early lead.
“Keep calm, keep the faith, and keep us in your prayers,” she told the crowd. “At the end of the day, we’re gonna win this thing.”
Taylor Robson didn’t have Lake’s notoriety but she benefitted from a large, self-funded campaign. She spent $18 million, $15 million of that came from self-funding. Lake had spent less than $4 million as of mid-July. Taylor Robson saw $2.5 million in outside spending from PACs, while Lake benefitted from $1.3 million.
Taylor Robson touted endorsements from term-limited Gov. Doug Ducey, former Vice President Mike Pence, and numerous other establishment GOP figures.
A former FOX10 anchor, Lake resigned from her position in March 2021, saying in a video that she could no longer participate in the direction American media had taken.
She received former President Donald Trump’s endorsement in September 2021.
On the Democratic side, Secretary of State Katie Hobbs easily bested former Nogales Mayor Marco Lopez.
Hobbs was seen as the favorite throughout the race but had been dogged by racial discrimination settlements stemming from her time in the state Legislature and a July revelation that many of her campaign staffers had quit in reaction to a new chief of staff’s alleged tough behavior.
