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

PHOENIX (AP) — A judge in Phoenix on Friday sentenced a lady o two years of felony probation, fines and community service for voting her useless mother’s ballot in Arizona within the 2020 general election.

But the judge rejected a prosecutor’s request that she serve no less than 30 days in jail because she lied to investigators and demanded that they maintain those committing voter fraud accountable.

The case against Tracey Kay McKee, 64, is certainly one of just a handful of voter fraud cases from Arizona’s 2020 election which have led to prices, despite widespread perception amongst 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 however now lives in California, sobbed as she apologized to Maricopa County Superior Court docket Judge Margaret LaBianca earlier than the choose handed down her sentence. McKee stated that she was grieving over the loss of her mother and had no intent to affect the end result of the election.

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

Both McKee and her mom, Mary Arendt, have been 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 Lawyer General Todd Lawson played a tape of McKee being interviewed by an investigator together with his office where she stated there was rampant voter fraud and denied that she had signed and returned her mom’s poll.

“The only strategy to stop voter fraud is to bodily go in and punch a poll,” McKee advised 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 manner to ensure a good election.

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

Tom Henze, McKee’s attorney, pointed to dozens of instances of voter fraud prosecuted in Arizona over the past decade, many for comparable violations of voting someone else’s ballot, and stated nobody received jail time in these circumstances. He said agreeing with Lawson that McKee ought to do 30 days jail time would elevate constitutional problems with equity.

“Merely said, over a protracted time frame, in voluminous circumstances, 67 circumstances, no one in this state for comparable instances, in related context ... no person received jail time,” Henze said. “The court docket didn’t impose jail time in any respect.”

But Lawson said jail time was vital because the kind of case has modified. Whereas in years past, most instances concerned folks voting in two states because they either lived in or had property in both states, in the 2020 election folks had bought into Trump’s claims of widespread voter fraud.

“What we’re listening to is voter fraud is on the market,” Lawson advised the judge. “And essentially what we’re seeing here is someone who says ‘Effectively, I’m going to commit voter fraud because it’s a giant drawback and I’m simply going to slip in under the radar. And I’m going to do it as a result of 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 think the perspective you hear within the interview is the perspective that differentiates this case from the other instances.”

LaBianca mentioned that while she agreed with Lawson, ordering jail time would give McKee what she advised the investigator what she wished: going after people who committed voter fraud.

“And if there have been evidence that this crime was on the rise, and that heightened deterrence may be known as for, the court docket may order jail time,” LaBianca said. “However the record here doesn't present that this crime is on the rise.

“And abhorrent as it may be for someone just like the defendant to assault the legitimacy of our free elections without any proof, except your own fraud, such statements are not unlawful as far as I know,” the decide continued.