PHOENIX (AP) — Arizona Local County Approves Midterm Elections Results were obtained Thursday following a judge’s order that ruled that the law was violated as Republican regulators refused to approve the ballot numbers by this week’s deadline.
Two Republicans on Cochise County’s three-member oversight board have been tight-lipped for weeks about certifying the election, even though the deadline passed on Monday. I didn’t mention it. Rather, they say they are not satisfied that the machines used to tally ballots are properly certified for use in elections.
Secretary of State Katie Hobbsfeld Lawsuit On Monday, it called on judges to force overseers to authenticate elections, a process formally known as canvas, as a group of local voters and retirees did. Hobbs has to get statewide certification on Dec. 5, and by law he can only delay it until Dec. 8, Hobbs said.
At the end of Thursday’s hearing, Judge Casey McGinley ordered supervisors to convene within 90 minutes and approve the election canvas by the end of the day.
“I’m not ashamed of what I did,” said supervisor Peggy Judd, one of two Republicans who blocked authentication twice. I feel compelled to follow what the judge has done today because of the ruling and the circumstances that are occurring in my own health and in our lives.”
Another Republican on the board, Tom Crosby, was absent from the meeting.
Two hours ago, Supervisor Ann English, the only Democrat on the board, urged a judge to order the board to certify the election immediately and not wait another day. said Crosby would stage a “smackdown between the secretary of state and election naysayers” at a meeting scheduled for Friday.
“I think it’s a circus that doesn’t need to happen,” said English. “So enough is enough.
The vote will allow statewide certification to proceed as scheduled Monday.
Hobbes, a Democrat who was elected governor in November’s election, had warned that if numbers from Cochise County were not forthcoming, he could have to prove results statewide. was overwhelmed by Republicans.
Board members were represented in court after struggling to find someone willing to take on the case. An elected county attorney, who normally represents the board in legal disputes, refused to handle the case, saying the supervisor had acted unlawfully. I voted to hire a Phoenix area attorney, but he couldn’t speed up before the hearing and didn’t notify the court that he was representing the supervisor.
Just days before the Nov. 8 election, Republican regulators abandoned plans to count all ballots by hand. The court said this was illegal, but last week required the secretary of state to certify that the vote-counting machines were legally certified before authorizing the election. result. On Monday, they said they wanted to hear those concerns again before taking a vote on certification.
There are two companies accredited by the U.S. Election Assistance Commission to test and certify voting equipment, such as the electronic tally machines used to read and count ballots in Arizona.
A conspiracy theory surrounding this process surfaced in early 2021 and focused on what appeared to be an old certification certificate of a company posted online. Federal officials investigated and reported that an administrative error prevented the agency from reissuing a renewed certificate because the company remained in good standing and underwent audits in 2018 and early 2021.
Officials also pointed out that federal law stipulates that the only way a testing company can lose certification is for the board to revoke it, but that didn’t happen.
Meanwhile, a federal judge in Phoenix has imposed sanctions on lawyers who defended defeated Republican gubernatorial nominee Kari Lake and Secretary of State Mark Finkem in lawsuits that require all ballots to be hand-counted. .
President Barack Obama-appointed Judge John Tucci agrees with Maricopa County attorneys, who argue the lawsuit was based on unsubstantiated information and will pay county attorney fees I ordered the lawyer to
Attorneys “made false, misleading and unsubstantiated factual allegations” in the lawsuit, Tuchi wrote. He said the court would not tolerate lawyers “unfoundedly promoting false statements that undermine public confidence” in the democratic process.
Lawyers for Lake and Finchem, including renowned Harvard Law School professor Alan Dershowitz, did not respond to AP’s request for comment. They said in court that their claims were “legally sound and supported by strong evidence.”
____
This article corrects an earlier version that stated Mark Finkem is the Republican candidate for Attorney General. He was a candidate for Secretary of State.
