Girl avoids jail for voting useless mother’s ballot in Arizona

PHOENIX (AP) — A choose in Phoenix on Friday sentenced a girl o two years of felony probation, fines and community service for voting her lifeless mother’s poll in Arizona within the 2020 common election.

However the decide rejected a prosecutor’s request that she serve not less than 30 days in jail as a result of she lied to investigators and demanded that they maintain these committing voter fraud accountable.

The case in opposition to Tracey Kay McKee, 64, is one in every of just a handful of voter fraud instances from Arizona’s 2020 election which have led to fees, regardless of widespread perception among many supporters of former President Donald Trump that there was widespread voter fraud that led to his loss in Arizona and different battleground states.

McKee, who was from Phoenix suburb of Scottsdale but now lives in California, sobbed as she apologized to Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Margaret LaBianca earlier than the judge handed down her sentence. McKee said that she was grieving over the lack of her mother and had no intent to impact the outcome of the election.

“Your Honor, I wish to apologize,” McKee told LaBianca. “I don’t need to make the excuse for my habits. What I did was fallacious and I’m ready to simply accept the results handed down by the court.”

Both McKee and her mother, Mary Arendt, were registered Republicans, though she was not requested if she voted for Trump. Arendt died on Oct. 5, 2020, two days before early ballots have been mailed to voters.

Assistant Legal professional General Todd Lawson played a tape of McKee being interviewed by an investigator along with his office the place she stated there was rampant voter fraud and denied that she had signed and returned her mother’s poll.

“The one approach to forestall voter fraud is to physically go in and punch a poll,” McKee instructed the investigator. “I imply, voter fraud is going to be prevalent so long as there’s mail-in voting, for certain. I imply, there’s no approach to ensure a good election.

“And I don’t imagine that this was a fair election,” she continued. “I do believe there was a lot of voter fraud.”

Tom Henze, McKee’s lawyer, pointed to dozens of circumstances of voter fraud prosecuted in Arizona over the past decade, many for comparable violations of voting another person’s poll, and said nobody received jail time in those cases. He mentioned agreeing with Lawson that McKee should do 30 days jail time would raise constitutional issues of fairness.

“Simply stated, over an extended time frame, in voluminous cases, 67 instances, no one in this state for similar cases, in comparable context ... no person acquired jail time,” Henze said. “The court docket didn’t impose jail time at all.”

However Lawson mentioned jail time was necessary because the kind of case has changed. While in years past, most cases concerned people voting in two states because they either lived in or had property in each states, within the 2020 election individuals had bought into Trump’s claims of widespread voter fraud.

“What we’re listening to is voter fraud is out there,” Lawson instructed the decide. “And basically what we’re seeing here is somebody who says ‘Nicely, I’m going to commit voter fraud as a result of it’s a giant downside and I’m just going to slide in below the radar. And I’m going to do it because all people else is doing it and I can get away with it.’

“I don’t subscribe to that at all,” he mentioned. “And I believe the perspective you hear within the interview is the angle that differentiates this case from the opposite instances.”

LaBianca mentioned that whereas she agreed with Lawson, ordering jail time would give McKee what she instructed the investigator what she needed: going after individuals who committed voter fraud.

“And if there were evidence that this crime was on the rise, and that heightened deterrence may be known as for, the court docket would possibly order jail time,” LaBianca stated. “But the file here doesn't show that this crime is on the rise.

“And abhorrent as it may be for somebody like the defendant to attack the legitimacy of our free elections with none evidence, besides your individual fraud, such statements are usually not unlawful so far as I do know,” the decide continued.