Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes announced Thursday that she is dismissing a sprawling criminal case alleging that former President Donald Trump's chief of staff Mark Meadows, former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani and others attempted to overturn Trump's 2020 loss in Arizona. The Democratic attorney general said her office will seek a new indictment from a grand jury.
The decision marks the third fake elector case filed by states to be dismissed. Courts have already thrown out similar prosecutions in Michigan and Georgia, while a special prosecutor dropped a federal case against Trump himself in late 2024 after he won re-election. Cases remain pending in Nevada and Wisconsin.
What the Left Is Saying
Progressive legal advocates and Democrats who supported the prosecution said they were frustrated but not surprised by the procedural dismissal. They argued that the underlying allegations of an attempt to subvert democracy remained serious regardless of Thursday's development. The case had been stalled for well over a year while Mayes pursued an appeal after defense attorneys successfully argued the original grand jury hadn't been shown relevant parts of federal law governing how presidential election results are certified.
Civil rights organizations have long maintained that the fake elector scheme represented one of the most significant threats to democratic norms in modern American history. Supporters of the prosecution say they hope a refiled case can proceed more smoothly under updated legal guidance, noting that Congress amended federal law in 2022 to specify that any given state could put forward only one slate of electors and that governors are responsible for signing off on results.
What the Right Is Saying
Defense attorneys for the 18 defendants have argued throughout the case that their clients acted within the bounds of existing law at the time, which they said allowed for multiple slates of electors to be submitted in case election results were disputed. Trump's allies maintained that the documents signed by Republicans falsely claiming he won Arizona were prepared as a contingency in case court challenges succeeded before Congress' January 6 deadline to certify results.
Republican legal commentators have characterized the prosecution as politically motivated and overly aggressive, noting that similar cases have failed in multiple jurisdictions. The dismissals in Michigan and Georgia, along with the federal case being dropped after Trump's electoral victory, suggest courts remain skeptical of the legal theory underlying these charges. Some defendants said they signed certificates believing they were simply preparing for potential contingencies.
What the Numbers Show
Joe Biden won Arizona in 2020 by 10,457 votes out of more than 3.4 million cast, a margin of roughly 0.3 percentage points. The case was filed nearly three and a half years after that election. Of the 18 defendants, two were former Trump administration aides including Meadows, five were lawyers who worked for the Trump campaign or associated with attorney John Eastman, and 11 were Arizona Republicans who signed the document falsely claiming Trump won the state.
Three defendants have already resolved their cases, including one who pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor. The rest entered not guilty pleas. Two different judges have presided over the case; the first recused himself in late 2024 after an email surfaced in which he told fellow jurists to speak out against attacks on Vice President Kamala Harris's presidential campaign.
The Bottom Line
The dismissal is procedural rather than a victory for defendants, as Mayes has signaled her intent to present evidence to a new grand jury. Her office faces a Friday deadline to begin fresh grand jury proceedings after losing an appeal earlier this month. Twelve separate dismissal requests filed by defense attorneys have slowed progress in the case.
The prosecution has become a factor in Arizona's attorney general race, where Republican challengers have publicly pledged to drop the charges if elected. The outcome of future proceedings will depend on how courts interpret the 2022 federal law changes and whether prosecutors can satisfy legal requirements for grand jury presentation that were found lacking in the first case.