UPDATED, 12:55 p.m. 11/7/22: A Wayne County judge has rejected an effort by Republican Secretary of State candidate Kristina Karamo to place new limits on counting absentee ballots in Detroit.
The judge said Karamo failed to provide any evidence of a dozen alleged election law violations.
The lawsuit targeted absentee ballots turned in by Detroit voters. Karamo said those ballots should be declared invalid if voters didn’t show an ID or if the ballots were deposited in unmonitored drop boxes.
Detroit’s attorneys called the lawsuit “frivolous,” and had asked the judge to reject the request and to order Karamo to pay the city’s legal costs.
The city’s final response in the case said the Karamo legal team offered no evidence that any laws were broken or that any impropriety occurred.
"Instead, Plaintiffs have offered preposterous conspiracy theories. They have misrepresented evidence to this Court. To say their case is based on speculation and innuendo gives speculation and innuendo a bad name," city attorneys wrote in a brief.
Karamo is an election denier who supports the "big lie” that former President Donald Trump won the 2020 election. Her campaign missed the deadline to file a final response brief.
Karamo faces incumbent Democratic Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson on the ballot. Benson is not a direct party in the case.
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