- A Trump-back candidate in Arizona continues to push debunked claims about the 2020 election.
- CNN host Dana Bash pushed back when Kari Lake claimed there was "evidence" of a rigged election.
Kari Lake, the Trump-endorsed Republican candidate for governor of Arizona, was questioned about her debunked claim that the 2020 election was stolen.
On CNN's "State of the Union" on Sunday, host Dana Bash pushed back as Lake insisted that there is "plenty of evidence" that the election was stolen.
"You called the 2020 election corrupt, stolen, rotten and rigged. And there was no evidence of any of that presented in a court of law or anywhere else that any of those things are true. So, why do you keep saying that?" Bush asked.
"We had 740,000 ballots with no chain of custody. Those ballots shouldn't have been counted," Lake responded before Bash asked again for evidence. "Dana, there's plenty of evidence. You can find it. I'm happy to send it to your team. The problem is the media won't cover it."
"We covered this extensively, and what you just said has been debunked," Bush replied.
—CNN (@CNN) October 16, 2022
Lake, a former news anchor who clinched the Republican nomination for governor in August, has repeated Trump's false claims of voter fraud and aided efforts to stop the use of voting machines in Arizona, Insider previously reported.
On Sunday, Bash asked Lake: "Are you undermining faith in elections by saying that the 2020 election was stolen, when there's absolutely no evidence to support that?"
"We have the right, and it's protected with our First Amendment, to question our government and to question elections," Lake replied. "When you start seeing the media cancel people for questioning their government, that's when we have a problem."
CNN then cut to a montage of Trump's Justice Department officials – including William Barr, Richard Donaghue, and Jeffrey Rosen – who all made statements under oath that there was no substantial voter fraud in the 2020 election.
"These are President Trump's own top Justice Department officials," Bash said. "Why not believe them?"
Lake pointed to the 2022 primary election in August, where she said officials in some Arizona counties ran out of ballots. Bash confirmed those events, noting that officials apologized in an effort to be transparent.
"So, if leaders like you and President Trump are saying that the election was stolen, aren't you participating, contributing, even causing the idea of people thinking that the election is not safe and secure?" Bash asked.
"No," Lake responded.