![]() ![]() The audit is being funded largely by private money, which keeps taxpayers off the hook but also raises questions of influence and farms out a governmental function to conservative donors.Īt times, officials have been said to be going beyond looking at ballots to pursue bizarre conspiracy theories, like reviewing whether bamboo threads were on ballots, a nod to a claim that boxes of ballots had been flown in from China. That became clear as the audit missed deadlines and outside observers noted not only serious flaws in how the audit was being conducted, but also changes in the procedure on the fly, which undermine the reliability of the count. (Election-security experts bristle at the very use of audit, noting that the term has a specific meaning in both industry parlance and state law, one this exercise doesn’t match.) In addition to Cyber Ninjas CEO Doug Logan’s prejudice on the result, Cyber Ninjas had no experience running an operation of this size. This kind of disorganization has been typical for the Arizona audit, which was troubled from its inception. A spokesperson for the audit, Randy Pullen, told me yesterday the reports have not yet been delivered to the state Senate. The Arizona Mirror reported later that week that no report, partial or not, had actually been delivered. Nonetheless, Fann said she expected the state Senate to begin reviewing a partial report two days later. On August 23, Arizona Senate President Karen Fann said the final report was delayed because members of the Cyber Ninjas team had fallen ill with COVID-19. Officials said late last month that the audit was supposed to be complete. That would be five months after the audit began, nearly 11 months after the election, and four months after the initial scheduled completion date.Īnd who knows if they’ll even meet the new deadline. Finally, on Thursday, a spokesperson for Arizona Senate Republicans said the findings of the audit would be released in a public hearing on September 24. I spent several days this week trying to get answers from several of the principals and couldn’t get any closer to an answer. In fact, it’s been hard for the public to have any sense of what’s going on at all. Now August is past, and Trump hasn’t been reinstated-and neither has the public seen the results of the audit. Graham: Republicans’ phony argument for election audits (Never mind that there remains no evidence of widespread fraud, and that there’s no mechanism for a former president to be reinstated mid-term.) By July, the due date was mid-August.ĭavid A. May turned to June, and Donald Trump was reportedly telling people that he expected to be reinstated to the presidency in August, once the audit proved that fraud had tainted the election results. ![]() But the count missed that deadline, and the process resumed later in May. This was a hard deadline, because the coliseum rented for the count was due to hold another event. The process was originally expected to conclude by May 14. The Senate hired Cyber Ninjas, a firm run by a “Stop the Steal” backer that has repeatedly declined to offer any evidence it is qualified for the job. At times, it seems like the audits’ backers have forgotten about it too.Īrizona state-Senate Republicans launched the process this spring as a response to false claims of election fraud spread by several of themselves, as well as former President Donald Trump. ![]() If you’ve forgotten about the Arizona “audit” of Maricopa County’s votes in the 2020 election, you can be forgiven. ![]()
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