Pro-Trump election denier Kari Lake refuses to say she’ll accept result of her own Arizona race if she loses

Republican has called 2020 election in Arizona ‘stolen’ despite state’s own audit failing to produce evidence of fraud

Former reporter Kari Lake was on CNN this Sunday facing questions from Dana Bash when she dodged multiple inquiries regarding whether she would accept the result of the election if she lost.

After sparring over Ms Lake’s false claims about the 2020 election for several minutes, Bash pivoted and asked whether Ms Lake would accept the result of next month’s midterms in Arizona, where she is facing Democratic candidate Katie Hobbs in the governor’s race.

Deflecting several time, Ms Lake answered finally: "I'm going to win the election and I'm going to accept that result.”

It’s an important question given Ms Lake’s refusal to accept the results of the 2020 election and her frequent mention of that view on the campaign trail — but the Republican candidate was furious with Bash for bringing it up over other issues like the economy or immigration.

“You want to have me on here and talk 2020 election, and you’re the one who accuses me of constantly talking about it?” she asked.

Bash responded: “I would never bring this up, ever, had you not been bringing this up, consistently, on the campaign trail.”

Arizona was one of the main battlegrounds where Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election in the days, weeks and months after votes were counted played out. In the Grand Canyon state, both members of Mr Trump’s legal team as well as the wife of a sitting conservative Supreme Court justice, Clarence Thomas, secretly contacted Republican lawmakers and sought to convince them to call a special session of the legislature to convene an audit of the election results or just toss them out entirely.

In Arizona and several other states a plot emerged to submit slates of Republican-voting electors to the count of the Electoral College vote, though it did not succeed.

The state’s midterm elections have suddenly taken on national importance as a result given the possibility that Trump-aligned officials could be installed in key state positions and aid in the effort to subvert or otherwise interfere with election results in the future should Donald Trump seek office again in 2024.