Defeated Republican candidate Kari Lake sued state elections officials on Friday, challenging the counting and certification of the midterm election and asking an Arizona superior court to declare her the winner, Washington Post reported on Friday.

The suit targets Lake’s opponent, Governor-elect Katie Hobbs, who is currently Arizona’s secretary of state, along with top officials in Maricopa County, the report said.

The report, citing a 70-page lawsuit, asks for an order “declaring that Kari Lake is the winner of the 2022 Arizona gubernatorial election,” or alternatively throwing out the results and requiring Maricopa county to conduct a new election.

Lake had been expected to file the suit, which came after Arizona’s election results were certified on Monday, Washington Post said.

During November, Trump-backed Lake lost the governor’s race to Democrat Hobbs following which she refused to concede and continued making unconfirmed claims about election improprieties on her Twitter feed. read more

Lake, a former television news anchor, was one of a string of Trump-aligned Republican candidates who lost battleground state races. read more

SHANGHAI (Reuters) – Chinese authorities said they were cracking down on price gouging of medical supplies and drugs, and seeking to ensure they flow smoothly as fears grow of a massive COVID-19 outbreak after the nationwide dismantling of strict restrictions.

China announced 10 measures on Wednesday that loosened key parts of President Xi Jinping’s signature zero-COVID policy, in a dramatic pivot toward economic reopening. But concerns are increasing of a spike in infections as people scramble for cough medicines, flu drugs and masks.

A working group under the State Council, China’s cabinet, issued a notice late on Friday, urging local governments to ensure smooth transport and logistics to maintain normal living and working order.

“No efforts should be spared to ensure smooth delivery of medical supplies including vaccinations, antigen testing reagents, drugs and masks,” said the notice, published by China’s ministry of transport.

The notice banned unauthorised blockage or closure of highways, waterways, ports, railroad stations and airports, to comply with China’s easing of restrictions.

China’s State Administration for Market Regulation admonished against price gouging in anti-COVID products, citing the need to better protect human lives and health.

In a warning letter posted on Friday, the watchdog banned activities including price inflation, collusion, price discrimination, misleading propaganda and hoarding.

Merchants must not “drastically raise prices when there’s no evident increase in cost, or the cost rise far lags the price rise,” the regulator cautioned.

In addition, they must not hoard anti-pandemic supplies that are in short supply, or spread word of price hikes to disrupt market order, the watchdog said.

The Chinese foreign ministry said China and Germany had reached an agreement on providing “German vaccines” to German nationals in China, after the German Chancellor recently said that BioNTech’s COVID-19 vaccine would be used by German expatriates.

Relevant arrangements will be discussed and determined by the two sides through diplomatic channels, Mao Ning, a spokeswoman at the Chinese foreign ministry told reporters on Friday at a regular press conference.

On Nov. 4, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, on his visit to Beijing, announced an agreement to let expatriates in China use the COVID-19 vaccine from Germany’s BioNTech.

BioNTech’s (22UAy.DE) COVID vaccine would be the first non-Chinese coronavirus vaccine to be administered in China, although to just German nationals, as Beijing had until now insisted on administering domestically produced vaccines.

Grant Wahl, a U.S. sportswriter covering the soccer World Cup, died in Qatar on Friday, his family and U.S. Soccer said.

U.S. Soccer said it was “heartbroken to learn” about Wahl’s death. His wife responded to the U.S. Soccer statement on Twitter, saying she was “in complete shock“.

Wahl, a former Sports Illustrated journalist who later moved to Substack, had been tweeting about the Netherlands-Argentina match earlier on Friday.

He said last month he was briefly detained when he tried to enter a World Cup stadium in Qatar while wearing a rainbow shirt in support of the LGBTQ community in a country where same-sex relations are illegal.

Wahl said in late November that World Cup security denied him entry to the United States’ opener against Wales at the Ahmad Bin Ali Stadium in Al Rayyan and asked him to take his shirt off.

NPR reported he died while covering the Argentina-Netherlands match. Other details surrounding his death were not immediately clear.

He wrote on Monday that he had visited a hospital while in Qatar.

“I didn’t have Covid (I test regularly here), but I went into the medical clinic at the main media center today, and they said I probably have bronchitis,” he said on Substack this week.

The U.S. State Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

“He was a kind and caring person whose passion for soccer and dedication to journalism were immeasurable,” Major League Soccer Commissioner Don Garber said in reaction to news of Wahl’s death.

Imagine a single spool of thread. The spool looks innocuous enough. It’s a blank slate, an innate object. And then it begins to unwind. But it takes time! It has, after all, one million threads. So the unraveling of the spool doesn’t happen overnight.

It’s a process. Slowly, ever so gently, the spool begins to loosen. The threads start to unfurl. As time ticks by, what was once a solid spool becomes more and more unfurled, leaving in its wake an almost unrecognizable change.

What was one solid has now become a disentangled mess. The single spool of thread is no more. It’s a lot like Donald Trump’s freedom. It takes time to jail a traitor. But make no mistake, the results are the same.

Each day that passes brings us closer to Trump’s indictment. And as justice creeps ever closer, the days of Donald trump as a free man – doing whatever the hell he likes are starting to unravel.

And do not think he doesn’t know it. It should be no surprise that his behavior is deteriorating by the day — even by the second. In his latest example of idiocy, Trump hosted an interesting person at his home. That person is Liz Crokin. Who is she? She is a prominent QAnon influencer and conspiracy theorist.

The two even posed for pictures together. How sweet! He really has given up even the slightest pretense of sanity. I think this week AND last week have been two of the worst weeks of Trump’s life. And now, as we creep ever closer to the witching hour (Trump’s indictment), does it feel to you like something in the air has changed?

It does to me. There is an expectant feeling, and I don’t think I’m the only one who noticed it. But it isn’t only that. There is a feeling in the air that Trump is done.

Few care anymore. His “presidential announcement” isn’t even being spoken about much anymore. It’s like finally, there is an acknowledgment that Trump is a has-been – not that he ever was much, to begin with. I think he knows his freedom is on borrowed time. Because once the spool unravels, it can’t be put back together again.

The post Donald Trump’s entire life in unspooling appeared first on Palmer Report.

(NewsNation) — Arizona Republican Kari Lake has signaled on Twitter that she’s filed a lawsuit against Maricopa County over her recent election loss.

Lake, who was endorsed by former President Donald Trump and embraced his baseless claims of widespread election fraud in 2020, has claimed administrative errors in Maricopa County prevented her supporters from casting their ballots on Election Day.

But election officials say all legal ballots were counted, and the delays did not prevent anyone from voting who wanted to.

“If the process was illegitimate, then so are the results,” Lake tweeted. “Furthermore, if the process was legitimate then so are the results. Let’s find out.”

Governor-elect and Secretary of State Katie Hobbs called it a “nuisance lawsuit” and said, “Kari Lake needs attention like a fish needs water.”

The relief a court could offer Lake at this point is uncertain as state leaders, including Republicans, certified the election results Monday.

A U.S. sportswriter covering the World Cup, Grant Wahl, died in Qatar on Friday, media outlet NPR and U.S. Soccer said.

“NPR can confirm the death of longtime soccer sportswriter Grant Wahl. He died today in Doha, Qatar while covering the Argentina-Netherlands World Cup quarterfinal,” an NPR reporter tweeted late on Friday. U.S. Soccer said it was “heartbroken to learn that we have lost Grant Wahl.”

Wahl, a former Sports Illustrated journalist who now publishes on Substack, said last month that he was briefly detained when he tried to enter a World Cup stadium in Qatar while wearing a rainbow shirt in support of the LGBTQ community in a country where same-sex relations are illegal.

He said in late November that World Cup security denied him entry to the United States’ opener against Wales at the Ahmad Bin Ali Stadium in Al Rayyan and asked him to take his shirt off.

He was also tweeting about the Netherlands-Argentina match earlier on Friday. His wife responded to the U.S. Soccer statement on Twitter, saying she was “in complete shock“.

Details surrounding his death were not fully known as the news emerged.

The U.S. State Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The latest wave of Republican infighting is a strong reminder that they’re not particularly good at this. The former guy just inspired a whole lot of people who hate government to get involved in government and a lot of them lost their elections – but it was a midterm election that should have been another wave year – the way 2018 was for the Democrats – or the way 2014 was for Republicans.

Republicans in those years, as now, campaigned on obstructing and sabotaging everything they could. The problem is, since their majority is so narrow in the House, there isn’t much they can propose that won’t alienate moderate voters – while the party leadership will regularly have to cave to the far-right reps in order to appease the base and secure the votes of people like Marjorie Taylor Greene on even the most basic issues – like who will be the next House Speaker.

Kevin McCarthy’s flailing hasn’t gone unnoticed – particularly as Democrats have strengthened their Senate majority. The fact that Democrats control the Senate is a major reason that the GOP’s worst plans will never see the light of day – but Sen. Majority Leader Chuck Schumer took things a step further following Sen. Warnock’s re-election win. He rightly decried the current trajectory the GOP has taken that has cost them elections and offered to work with non-MAGA Republicans.

This could be seen by some as a naive gesture – but in fact it’s a move that can’t hurt Schumer whether or not Republicans take it up. It absolves the Democratic Senate of blame for any of the MAGA foolishness while also forcing the GOP to take a side – to accomplish important legislation as the current Congress and Biden Administration have been doing thus far, or to waste everyone’s time and lose re-election anyway in 2024.

The post The great MAGA meltdown appeared first on Palmer Report.