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

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

However the judge rejected a prosecutor’s request that she serve at least 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 of just a handful of voter fraud instances from Arizona’s 2020 election which have led to prices, despite widespread belief among many supporters of former President Donald Trump that there was widespread voter fraud that led to his loss in Arizona and other battleground states.

McKee, who was from Phoenix suburb of Scottsdale but now lives in California, sobbed as she apologized to Maricopa County Superior Court Decide Margaret LaBianca before the judge handed down her sentence. McKee said that she was grieving over the loss of her mother and had no intent to influence the result of the election.

“Your Honor, I want to apologize,” McKee instructed LaBianca. “I don’t wish to make the excuse for my behavior. What I did was wrong and I’m ready to accept the results handed down by the courtroom.”

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

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

“The one approach to stop voter fraud is to physically go in and punch a poll,” McKee informed the investigator. “I mean, voter fraud goes to be prevalent so long as there’s mail-in voting, for positive. I mean, there’s no manner to make sure a fair election.

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

Tom Henze, McKee’s attorney, pointed to dozens of circumstances of voter fraud prosecuted in Arizona over the past decade, many for related violations of voting someone else’s poll, and stated no one bought jail time in these circumstances. He mentioned agreeing with Lawson that McKee ought to do 30 days jail time would elevate constitutional issues of fairness.

“Simply acknowledged, over an extended time period, in voluminous instances, 67 circumstances, no one in this state for comparable instances, in comparable context ... nobody got jail time,” Henze said. “The court didn’t impose jail time in any respect.”

But Lawson mentioned jail time was necessary as a result of the kind of case has changed. Whereas in years past, most instances concerned individuals voting in two states because they either lived in or had property in both states, in the 2020 election individuals had bought into Trump’s claims of widespread voter fraud.

“What we’re hearing is voter fraud is out there,” Lawson advised the choose. “And essentially what we’re seeing right here is someone who says ‘Nicely, I’m going to commit voter fraud as a result of it’s an enormous drawback and I’m just going to slip in underneath the radar. And I’m going to do it as a result of everybody else is doing it and I can get away with it.’

“I don’t subscribe to that at all,” he said. “And I believe the attitude you hear in the interview is the perspective that differentiates this case from the opposite circumstances.”

LaBianca said that whereas she agreed with Lawson, ordering jail time would give McKee what she informed the investigator what she wanted: going after people who dedicated voter fraud.

“And if there have been evidence that this crime was on the rise, and that heightened deterrence could also be called for, the court docket would possibly order jail time,” LaBianca said. “But the report here doesn't show that this crime is on the rise.

“And abhorrent as it might be for somebody like the defendant to assault the legitimacy of our free elections without any evidence, except your personal fraud, such statements usually are not illegal as far as I do know,” the choose continued.