Miguel Torres,Stacey BarchengerArizona Republic
The paperwork-heavy and complex criminal case against individuals accused of attempting to subvert President Joe Biden's 2020 win in Arizona took a step forward Monday in Maricopa County Superior Court.
In a packed courtroom, prosecutors spent the morning presenting their request to limit access to grand jury information. Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes' office filed a motion asking the court to issue a protective order for the grand jury transcript and exhibits. The state wants defense lawyers, entitled to review the grand jury materials, to be restricted from sharing that information.
Prosecutors asked for an order to be imposed that would require the defendants to meet with their lawyers in person to review those grand jury materials rather than allow them to keep their own copies. Prosecutors cited leaks in the Georgia fake elector case as a justification, saying some grand jury members there received death threats after their names were made public.
“The fact that there's 18 and now 16 defendants, it leads to a greater chance of even inadvertent disclosure, which could cause harm to the state grand jurors,” said Krista Wood of the Arizona Attorney General's Office.
The defendants' lawyers all opposed the restrictions. They claimed that curbing their clients' ability to review grand jury information, including grand jury names, would limit their ability to discuss potential legal issues.
“There are several defendants who live out of state. This limitation and this burden of having defendants have to travel from out of state to defense counsel's office is not an appropriate limitation,” said Anne Chapman, who is representing Mark Meadows, former President Donald Trump's chief of staff in 2020. All defendants in the high-profile case attended Monday's hearing, though several, including Meadows, appeared virtually.
Though Judge Bruce Cohen did not rule on the motion, he proposed a compromise of redacting grand jurors' names to protect their identities, making it less risky to give defendants copies of grand jury documents.
Later in the day, lawyers for three of the defendants — Jim Lamon, an Arizona Trump elector in 2020; Rudy Giuliani, an attorney for Trump in 2020; and John Eastman, another Trump attorney — argued for dismissal of the indictment, saying that it did not demonstrate crimes had taken place. They claimed their clients' behaviors outlined in the complaint were not crimes because there were no laws prohibiting their specific actions.
Dennis Wilenchik, Lamon's attorney, told the court that his client had a right to sign as an elector and certify a vote for Trump. If the U.S. Supreme Court had decided to overturn the election via one of the cases being litigated at the time, Lamon and other Trump electors' votes would have become official, he argued. According to Wilenchik, Lamon had no intention of competing with the official slate of elector votes signed by then-Gov. Doug Ducey.
In response, the Arizona Attorney General's Office said that if Lamon's vote was a contingency, he should have made that clear to Congress. Furthermore, prosecutors said whether Lamon and other electors believed their votes were contingent on lawsuits was an issue for trial, not a motion to dismiss.
The state argued the indictment should stand because the defendants were part of a conspiracy to subvert voters' will, and their individual acts needed to be considered in that context.
Cohen did not rule on Lamon, Giuliani and Eastman's motions to dismiss Monday.
Oral arguments on different motions to dismiss the indictment — based on an Arizona law enacted to prevent lawsuits filed as retaliation — began late in the afternoon and were expected to continue Tuesday.
Several defendants have sought to dismiss the case under the law known as an anti-SLAPP statute. SLAPP stands for "strategic lawsuit against public participation," and the law creates a framework for cases to be quickly dismissedif a defendant can prove the case was substantially motivated by retaliationbecause they exercised a constitutional right, like freedom of speech.
Cohen on Monday set a January 2026 trial date.
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Who are the defendants in Arizona's fake electors case?
In April, a state grand jury delivered a nine-count indictment against 11 Arizona Republicans who claimed they were legitimately chosen electors for Donald Trump and seven Trump allies who allegedly encouraged the Arizonans to give Congress a path to stop Biden's win.
Two defendants have resolved their cases since the indictments were revealed.
Jenna Ellis agreed to testify against the other defendants in exchange for her charges being dropped. Ellis was an attorney for Trump who encouraged the Arizona Legislature to change the outcome of the election.
Loraine Pellegrino, one of the Arizonans who signed the false certificate of Trump's win, pleaded guilty to a less severe charge earlier this month and was sentenced to three years of unsupervised probation.
The remaining defendants are:
- Tyler Bowyer,an executive with Turning Point USA and Republican National Committee member
- Nancy Cottle,chair of the Arizona Trump electors
- State Sen.Jake Hoffman,R-Queen Creek
- State Sen.Anthony Kern,R-Glendale
- Jim Lamon,former U.S. Senate candidate
- Robert Montgomery,former chair of the Cochise County Republican Committee
- Samuel Moorhead,former leader of the Gila County Republican Party
- Greg Safsten,former executive director of the Arizona Republican Party
- Kelli Ward,former chair of the Arizona Republican Party
- Michael Ward,Kelli Ward's husband and GOP activist
- Christina Bobb, attorney for the Trump campaign
- John Eastman,attorney for Trump was an architect of the plan to change the outcome of the election in six contested states
- Boris Epshteyn, attorney and adviser to the 2016 and 2020 Trump campaign
- Rudy Giuliani, attorney for Trump and former mayor of New York City
- Mark Meadows, Trump's chief of staff in 2020
- Michael Roman, director of "election day operations" for Trump's campaign, according to the indictment
Miguel Torres is a criminal justice reporter for The Republic. Reach him at miguel.torres@arizonarepublic.com.
Stacey Barchenger is a politics reporter for The Republic. Reach her atstacey.barchenger@arizonarepublic.com.
