The Rank Dishonesty of Lawless Authoritarian Rethuglicans In The Arizona Senate

Lawless authoritarian Rethuglicans in the Arizona Senate are still pursuing the “Stop The Steal” fever dreams of Donald Trump, Rudy Giuliani and the “Krazy Kraken Lady,” and Kelli “Chemtrails” Ward.

They are trying to subpoena millions of ballots and voting equipment from Maricopa County so the GQP senators can conduct their own “audit” of the already audited and certified election, in a back door attempt to circumvent the courts and to make this material available to Giuliani’s “elite strike force” team of incompetent clown lawyers who lost 63 cases around the nation, including eight here in Arizona.

These GQP senators are demanding that the Republican-controlled Maricopa County Board of Supervisors violate Arizona laws that they enacted, and they are showing disdain for the judicial branch and separation of powers and due process. In their view, legislators are the ultimate authority, damn the courts and the Arizona Constitution which says that the people who sadly elected them are the ultimate authority. Article 2, Section 2.

The Arizona Capitol Times reports (subscription required) Showdown over election audit looms on Monday:

The game of political chicken between the Arizona Senate and Maricopa County supervisors comes to a head Monday as lawmakers weigh holding board members in contempt, opening the door for the apparently unprecedented possibility of county officials being charged with a crime or even immediately locked up.

Senate President Karen Fann told Capitol Media Services on Friday she remains hopeful the supervisors will realize they are obligated to provide what lawmakers are demanding, including access to voting equipment and ballots. Beyond that, she said it makes sense for them to cooperate in what the Prescott Republican says is an attempt to answer questions conspiracy fever dreams from constituents about the accuracy of the results of the Nov. 3 election.

Fann is delusional and a liar. A party subject to a subpoena has the legal right to challenge that subpoena in court, i.e., is entitled to due process, and it is the court which will determine whether the subpoena is enforceable. The Board of Supervisors is not obligated to provide what lawmakers are demanding until a court of law says so – not partisan GQP Arizona senators.

But Fann got her answer as board attorney Steve Tully filed suit late Friday asking a judge to dismiss what he called a “sham subpoena.”

Tully noted the senators are not asking board members to appear to answer questions. In fact, he said, there isn’t a hearing even scheduled.

Instead, he said, the subpoena demands the county give access to the companies they hire to the voting equipment and the 2.1 million ballots cast.

And then there’s the fact that the one firm that Fann has said she is considering, Allied Security Operations Group, was involved in efforts by the Trump campaign to overturn election results in Michigan.

“You don’t just hire a bunch of clowns that run around for Trump,” Tully charged.

This lawsuit has caused Fann to walk back from Giuliani’s clown auditors at Allied Security Operations Group.

If the Senate gets to audit the election, it looks like Col. Waldron and his Allied Security Operations Group may not be involved after all. “My intention at this point is not to hire them,” Senate President @FannKfann told @azcapmedia. https://t.co/kcSjka0CiI

— Jeremy Duda (@jeremyduda) February 8, 2021

The Arizona Mirror adds, Maricopa County asks judge to strike down Senate subpoenas:

In a complaint filed in Maricopa County Superior Court on Friday afternoon, the supervisors argued that the Senate has no legal authority to seek election materials, including 2.1 million ballots, through subpoena. While the Senate does have subpoena power, the county’s lawyers said that authority is limited, and Senate President Karen Fann is far exceeding it with her request.

“This case is not about whether the Arizona legislature has the power to issue subpoenas: it does,” wrote Stephen Tully, an attorney representing Maricopa County. “In short, this case is about sham legislative subpoenas.”

Tully noted that the Jan. 12 subpoenas actually directed the supervisors to show up at a hearing that did not exist. Tully wrote that several county officials arrived at the Senate the next morning and were told that no hearing had actually been scheduled. 

“The Senators apparently only want access to the data and items listed in the subpoena. But that is not how legislative subpoenas work,” Tully argued.

Furthermore, Tully wrote that the subpoenas seek materials that the county cannot legally provide. He cited several state laws pertaining to the handling of ballots after an election. State law requires county treasurers to keep ballots in a secure facility once an election has been canvassed, and only instructs the treasurer to remove them in the event of a recount or court order.

And state statute strictly governs when a recount can occur. The legislature has no legal authority to conduct recounts or to audit election results, wrote Tully, a former Republican state legislator.

Fann and Petersen are also demanding access to the county’s ballot tabulation machines, which Tully said the county cannot provide. He wrote that allowing auditors who aren’t certified by the U.S. Election Assistance Commission to examine the machines could void the machines’ certification, meaning the county would no longer be able to use them for elections. The county is conducting its own audit using two EAC-certified companies.

The county’s filing also notes that post-election audits showed a perfect match between the machine count and hand counts of a limited number of ballots. And Tully pointed out that at least seven lawsuits challenging the election results in Maricopa County have failed.

Hanging in the balance is the extent of the power of state lawmakers to issue subpoenas to poke around into whatever they want.

The supervisors are trying to be careful in what legal fight they pick.

Tully said they acknowledge the Senate does have subpoena power. In fact, he said, the county already has turned over 11 gigabytes of data ranging from the voter registration database to computer logs and ballot tabulation reports associated with the November election.

What they don’t have, Tully said is the authority to now say they want the auditor they hire to go out and poke around to see what the company can find. He now wants Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Joseph Mikitish to rule in the county’s favor.

Fann bristled at questions about whether this all amounts to a fishing expedition.

“A fishing expedition is someone that’s going out there purposely looking for something,” she said, something that is not the case here.

This is exactly what the GQP senators are doing! Fann is a shameless liar. You cannot trust anything she says.

“We are trying to dispel any of the allegations that are out there,” the Senate president said. “We are trying to answer pursue constituents’ questions conspiracy fever dreams about why they think something went wrong here or didn’t go wrong.”

This is not a legitimate foundational basis to support a subpoena. Unsupported conspiracy theories are not a good faith basis for a legal claim to support a subpoena. To wit:

That, however, still leaves the question of whether those questions are due to actual evidence of fraud or the fact that Trump told backers before the election the only way he would lose is if there was cheating and the voting machines were rigged, a theme he continues to repeat.

All that has had an effect. A new OH Predictive Insights poll finds that 26% of Arizonans and 54% of Republicans believe Trump won the election.

Fann said the posturing by Trump and his allies is irrelevant.

The Big Lie of election fraud disinformation that Arizona Republicans keep promoting to undermine public confidence in elections and to destroy our democracy is highly relevant.

“I’m not saying there was any fraud,” she said of this year’s results. And Fann said people keep asking questions because “we haven’t had an audit.”

Like I said, Fann is a shameless liar. You cannot trust anything she says.

It's official. We completed our hand count audit and had a 100% match! Thank you to all 3 Maricopa County political parties, who appointed members to participate! pic.twitter.com/JhBcPYWhY3

— Maricopa County Elections Department (@MaricopaVote) November 9, 2020

That could depend on how one defines an “audit.”

There were “logic and accuracy” tests before and after the election, using pre-marked ballots to see whether the machines recorded the votes that were cast. Those tests, Tully said, came up with a 100% match.

Then, as required by state law, officials from both major parties selected ballots from random voting centers for a hand count. According to the audit report, a review of more than 47,000 ballots showed not a single difference between what the machines recorded and what the hand count revealed.

Separately, a judge [wrongly] let state GOP Chair Kelli Ward, who had filed suit, get a review of several thousand ballots which had to be duplicated by hand after the originals could not be read by machines. While there were some discrepancies, the judge found — and the state Supreme Court affirmed — that if the error rate were extrapolated out over all the duplicated ballots it would have gained Trump no more than 153 votes, far short of the 10,457 vote margin of Biden over the now-former president.

And Ward’s own expert witness was unable to find a single instance of a clearly forged signature on the envelopes of early ballots she reviewed.

Fann was unimpressed, saying if the supervisors have nothing to hide “why are they refusing to let us do this.”

“We’ve offered to pay for this ourselves,” she said. Instead the county has hired two firms for its own review, one of which Fann said is not really qualified to do the kind of audit the Senate believes is necessary.

Maricopa County will contract with two companies, Pro V&V and SLI Compliance, to conduct the audit. Those are the only two auditors certified by the U.S. Election Assistance Commission (EAC), according to county spokesman Fields Moseley. Fann is not proposing to hire either one of these reputable EAC certified companies. Instead she is searching for firms allied with the Trump campaign and Rudy Giuliani’s “elite strike force” team of disreputable conspiracy theorists.

Anyway, she said, the Senate is not asking for the county to physically deliver the ballots or the machines to the Capitol but simply to give access to an auditor the Senate finds acceptable.

That, however, still leaves the question about Allied Security Operations Group and its link to trying to overturn Michigan voting results.

Fann insisted that firm has not yet been hired despite the fact that her attorney, Kory Langhofer, sent the supervisors a copy of a “scope of work” plan from Allied. Fann said she sent that because it was the only proposal she had at the time and that she continues to speak with other companies.

Still, she conceded that the firm’s reputation of trying to help overturn election results for Trump does raise questions. Ya think?

“My intention at this point is not to hire them,” Fann said.

“I do believe that they are qualified [no, they at not. They are not EAC certified], they do have the experience,” she continued. “But the mere fact that the perception is out there that they have ties with Trump or they would be less than totally independent, then it would be very difficult for us to hire them.”

All that comes back to the question of what happens Monday assuming all 16 Republicans vote to hold the board in contempt.

That would empower Fann to send out the sergeant-at-arms to arrest board members.

Before a court has even ruled on the validity and enforceability of the subpoena, a clear violation of separation of powers and due process. GQP authoritarianism writ large.

Option 2 is for Fann to ask Attorney General Mark Brnovich to file criminal charges against board members, as it is a Class 2 misdemeanor, subject to four months in county jail, to disobey a legislative subpoena. That, however, could result in months of litigation and appeal.

What that could leave Fann is what Tully already started: taking the matter to a judge.

Superior Court Judge Joseph Mikitish has not yet set a hearing on that matter.

The lawless authoritarian Rethuglicans in the Arizona Senate are completely out of order.