‘Stop the Steal’ Isn’t Conceding

Updated on November 17 at 11:47 a.m. ET

Outside the Maricopa County tabulation center last weekend, a few dozen outraged Arizonans paced single file along the sidewalk waving KARI LAKE flags. Through megaphones, some of them denounced imaginary corruption schemes and clamored for a “redo” election. Others chanted the Lord’s Prayer, like the musicians on the Titanic playing hymns to calm the passengers.

The noteworthy thing about the Maricopa protest, though, wasn’t the scene. It was its singularity. Two years ago, shouts of “Stop the steal!” could be heard across the country in nearly every state. This year, the refrain was largely limited to one block in downtown Phoenix, where at times reporters outnumbered the demonstrators.

If any state was going to devolve into chaos after a disappointing election for Republicans, it would have been Arizona—ground zero for election denial in 2020, and where this year, primary voters nominated an entire slate of fringe election cranks to all of the state’s major offices. Instead, the midterms delivered a sure blow to the election-denial movement, both there and everywhere else: The most prominent conspiracists, such as the Arizona secretary-of-state candidate Mark Finchem and Pennsylvania’s