Arizona Supreme Court Declines Appeal, Case Back to Jury

The Arizona Supreme Court has declined to hear an appeal from the state’s attorney general, effectively requiring prosecutors to restart their criminal case against 18 individuals accused of participating in a scheme to overturn the state’s 2020 presidential election results. The attorney general’s office announced it will now present the case to a new grand jury.

The original indictment, filed in April 2024, charged a group of Republicans—including former Trump White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, and several attorneys and campaign advisers—with conspiracy, fraud, and forgery. Prosecutors alleged the defendants conspired to submit a false document to Congress declaring Donald Trump the winner of Arizona’s electoral votes, despite Joe Biden’s victory in the state by approximately 10,500 votes. Trump was identified in the filings as an unindicted co-conspirator.

The case was dismissed last year by a Maricopa County judge, who ruled that prosecutors had improperly instructed the original grand jury. The judge found that jurors were not shown the text of the federal Electoral Count Act, a law governing the certification of presidential...