Arizona’s Maricopa County will conduct a comprehensive forensic audit of its voting system to allay some voters’ concerns about the integrity of the November 2020 election.
The Maricopa County Board of Supervisors voted unanimously at its meeting Wednesday (Jan. 27) to hire two independent firms to conduct the audit, which will include: an investigation into whether the voting machines used by the county are counting votes correctly? Were the voting machines tampered with or hacked?
The Republican-controlled Maricopa County Board of County Commissioners believes the county’s election results were correct, but wants to allay concerns with a full audit of election equipment and software.
It is a fact that the entire process for the 2020 general election in Maricopa County was fair and honest, said Jack Sellers, chairman of the county commission, in a statement. The multiple audits conducted to date have proven this, and multiple court rulings have agreed with this. However, it is also true that a significant number of voters want a full forensic audit of the tabulation equipment to ensure the integrity of the election, especially in light of the misinformation that has circulated since the Nov. 3 election.
According to the Board of Supervisors, a “multi-layered forensic audit” of the software, hardware and finances of the county’s voting system will be conducted, including vulnerability analysis, malware checks and testing to see if tabulators are sending or receiving information over the Internet. In addition, logic and accuracy tests will be conducted on the county’s tabulation equipment to verify that ballots are being counted accurately and that there are no vote exchanges.
Sellers said at the meeting, “For all we’ve done, we do have a number of people right now who have serious doubts about our election process. I really hope that an audit will allay their concerns as well as their questions and convince them that this was an honest and upright election.
But an audit is unlikely to satisfy the Arizona Senate. The state Senate issued subpoenas to county commissioners in Maricopa County last December, asking them to turn over a range of election materials, including images of all mail-in ballots and the machines used to count them, so that the Senate could conduct its own audit.
Arizona Sen. Warren Peterson (D), chairman of the Judiciary Committee, said the Maricopa County audit would not eliminate the need for a Senate audit.
“A county audit does not prevent the state Senate from conducting its own audit,” Peterson told the media. “My concern with the Maricopa County audit is that the audit is only superficial in scope. Because the scope of the audit being requested is so limited, it’s certain that nothing will be found.”
The Maricopa County Council has rejected previous requests for an audit by the state Senate, arguing that they were too broad while attempting to negotiate a solution.
In an effort to boost confidence in the November election, the Maricopa County government on Wednesday released a list of the series of actions the county has taken to ensure the integrity of the election, including a logic and accuracy test of tabulation equipment last October and a manual count audit of election results in November that “found the results to be a 100 percent match to the voting tabulation machines. “
Recent Comments