Maricopa County Superior Court Judge John Hannah refused to allow three of Kari Lake's witnesses at her third election trial.
At Thursday's hearing in Arizona, Lake's attorney, Bryan Blehm, sought to have the state release ballot envelopes signed by approximately 1.3 million voters. But the hearing got off to a rocky start when the judge deemed two of Lake's witnesses — forensic document analyst Erich Speckin and software consultant Chris Handsel — irrelevant.
The judge then took aim at witness Shelby Busch, who participated in a voting audit conducted by the Cyber Ninjas firm.
POLL: Should Trump be allowed to hold office again?
"On this one, I'm inclined to go a step further because she's so obviously a medical office manager," Hannah said. "I mean, she's so obviously unqualified that I kind of find a need to make a finding about that, as well as that her testimony is irrelevant. I mean, she's not even in the ballpark."
Blehm argued that Busch had "a lot of work under her belt as someone who does investigations into elections."
"With the ninjas?" the judge asked.
"Yes, she did participate in that audit, Your Honor," Blehm admitted.
With that, Hannah granted the motion to exclude Busch.
