Arizona: Judge rejects Senate claim some election audit records are private | Howard Fischer/Arizona Daily Star
A judge rejected a state Senate claim that some of its records about the 2020 election audit are not subject to public disclosure. Maricopa County Superior Court Judge John Hannah said Tuesday he would not accept the arguments by Kory Langhofer, the attorney for Senate President Karen Fann, that he should just accept the Senate’s assertions the documents at issue are protected by “legislative privilege.’’ “The court finds that the Senate has not carried its burden of overcoming the legal presumption favoring disclosure,’’ the judge wrote in a 13-page order Tuesday. “The record as it stands does not establish that the documents are privileged and that the Senate is entitled to withhold them from the public on that ground.’’ But Hannah offered Langhofer and the Senate an “out’’ of sorts. The judge told them they are free to give the documents to him. And then he will decide, after reviewing them privately, whether they are public. “Otherwise the Senate must disclose the documents forthwith,’’ he said.
Full Article: Judge rejects Arizona Senate's claim some election audit records are private | Local news | tucson.com
Editorial: Trump Loses Arizona—Again – He still cries ‘fraud’ even after the audit he demanded found none. | Wall Street Journal
Former President Trump claims Arizona’s ballot audit found “massive fraud,” yet the new recount says he actually lost the state by 360 more votes than originally reported. He is now demanding an audit of the 2020 election in . . . Texas, which he won by nearly six points. When are Republicans going to quit playing this game? Arizona’s official results say President Biden won by 10,457 votes. Mr. Trump never accepted the loss, so the GOP state Senate launched an “audit” by hiring Cyber Ninjas, a company without experience reviewing elections. After repeated delays and various pratfalls, here’s the result: A hand recount of Maricopa County’s 2.1 million ballots says that Mr. Biden won the state by 10,817 votes. There’s no reason to prefer this tally over the certified one, given the audit’s erratic process and lack of transparency. For details, see a June report co-written by Trey Grayson, Kentucky’s former GOP Secretary of State, warning that Cyber Ninjas “will not produce findings that should be trusted.” The good news is they don’t need to be trusted, since the result is the same, except with worse numbers for Mr. Trump. True to his nature, Mr. Trump is claiming vindication based on the audit’s analysis of voter files. As the biggest example, he says Arizona’s results include “23,344 mail-in ballots, despite the person no longer living at that address. Phantom voters!” No. Did he read the report? This figure comes from comparing voter records to a commercial database on change-of-address filings, but look at the caveats. Full Article: Trump Loses Arizona—Again - WSJColorado: Hearing Set To Begin In Defamation Lawsuit Filed By Former Dominion Voting Employee Against Trump Campaign | Rick Sallinger/CBS Denver
With its U.S. base in Denver, Dominion Voting has been the target of claims that it was involved in election fraud, which it has denied and challenged in lawsuits. In particular, the vitriol has been directed at now-former Denver employee Eric Coomer quoted as saying, “Don’t worry Trump’s not going to win. I made f…ing sure about it.” That quote comes from Joe Oltmann of Parker who says he overheard it on a left-wing group’s call. He told CBS4’s Rick Sallinger, “I’m not afraid of this lawsuit. I never lied about anything. I lied about nothing.” The former president’s son, Eric Trump, republished the quote on social media. Other media picked it up including the Gateway Pundit represented in the suit by attorney Randy Corporan. Full Article: Hearing Set To Begin In Defamation Lawsuit Filed By Former Dominion Voting Employee Against Trump Campaign – CBS DenverFlorida: DeSantis says state won’t review 2020 election | South Florida Sun-Sentinel
Florida does not plan to review the 2020 election, Gov. Ron DeSantis said Tuesday during an appearance in St. Pete Beach. “What we do in Florida is, there’s a pre- and post-election audit that happens automatically,” DeSantis said. “So, that has happened. It passed with flying colors in terms of how that’s going.” DeSantis was asked about an audit because a growing number of Republicans have pushed for a recount of the election that former President Donald Trump won relatively comfortably in Florida — though he lost nationally. DeSantis noted that Florida took steps to secure the election process after races in 2018, including his own, were closely contested. And he said the state took further actions with a contentious elections bill that the Republican-dominated Legislature passed in April. “Going forward, we did a great election package,” DeSantis said. “And I think some of the things that we did in there to make sure that there’s a voter ID, for not only in-person, but also when you’re doing absentee voting, also making sure there’s no ballot harvesting — that is totally toxic and that really undermines confidence.”
Georgia: Election investigators haven’t found evidence of counterfeit ballots | Stephen Fowler/Georgia Public Broadcasting
Georgia election officials continue to pour cold water on claims of fraudulent ballots in the 2020 election, after investigators failed to find "pristine" counterfeit absentee ballots that were allegedly counted in Fulton County. Republican Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger's office reported results of the investigation in a court document filed late Tuesday in a case that seeks to inspect Fulton's 147,000 absentee ballots to find proof of fake votes. "Based upon interviews with the foregoing witnesses, as well as other witnesses who were interviewed during the course of the investigation, and in the inspection of approximately 1,000 absentee ballots and ballot images, the Secretary's investigators have been unable to substantiate the allegations that fraudulent or counterfeit ballots were counted," the filing read. Investigators looked into claims made by Suzi Voyles, who worked the county's risk-limiting audit and claimed to see a batch of "pristine" ballots that looked suspicious. Voyles is now running for Congress as a Republican in the 6th Congressional District. After interviewing Voyles two separate times, investigators checked several batches of absentee ballots that she claimed were marked by computer instead of by hand. But they found no irregularities or any ballots that appeared to be counterfeits. Full Article: Election investigators haven't found evidence of counterfeit ballots in Georgia | Georgia Public BroadcastingGeorgia election official takes the fight to Trump | Marc Caputo/Politico
Donald Trump never wastes an opportunity to attack Georgia’s top statewide Republican officeholders for failing to help him overturn the 2020 election results in the key swing state. Brad Raffensperger is the only one who refuses to shut up and take it. Raffensperger, who has borne the brunt of Trump’s wrath as the top election official in the state, is running a damn-the-torpedoes reelection campaign that directly confronts the former president — even though it could cost him the GOP nomination. In a party where Trump’s enemies tend to see their political careers abruptly ended, Raffensperger’s approach is being closely watched by Republicans within the state and outside. “The last internal poll I saw said that 87 percent of Republican primary voters felt like the election was stolen,” said former Republican Rep. Lynn Westmoreland (R-Ga.). “With those kinds of numbers, I don’t see Brad getting through the primary.” If Raffensperger isn’t Trump’s top GOP nemesis, he’s close to it. The Georgia secretary of state refused Trump’s requests to alter the state’s vote count and feuded with the former president over Trump’s baseless claims of widespread voter fraud. At one point, Raffensperger’s office secretly recorded Trump trying to persuade the secretary of state to “find” votes to make him the winner — a potential crime by Trump that local prosecutors are now investigating. As a result, Trump has showered him with criticism for nearly a year, going so far as to call Raffensperger an “enemy of the people.”
Idaho bills MyPillow CEO for election audit that showed no fraud | Gino Spocchia/The Independent
MyPillow CEO and Trump ally Mike Lindell has reportedly been billed for his false election fraud claims after officials in Idaho audited ballots to prove him wrong. Idaho’s state secretary, Chad Houck, told a local newspaper that while no fraud was found in his recount of ballots in three of Idaho’s 44 counties, Mr Lindell will be billed roughly $6,500 (£4,700). Mr Houck told the Idaho Statseman on Thursday that after his office recounted a handful of ballots that were “low hanging fruit”, an Idaho resident recommend Mr Lindell be billed. Recounts in three small states were within a percentage of the original tally of 2020’s results, Mr Houck said, and showed that Mr Lindell’s allegations were “fabrications”. “As we looked at how much exposure this particular set of data had gotten in the last several weeks, we felt it was reasonable to, at first, just look at the counties that had no electronic means,” said Mr Houck. Full Article: Idaho bills MyPillow CEO for election audit that showed no fraud | The IndependentMichigan Republicans replace local election officials in ‘unprecedented’ trend | Craig Mauger/The Detroit News
Republican Party leaders across the battleground state of Michigan have quietly worked in recent weeks to replace incumbent county election officials with newcomers, some of whom have sought to undermine the public's faith in the 2020 vote. The trend focuses on four-member county canvassing boards, the bipartisan panels in charge of verifying records and importantly, certifying results. It comes in the midst of an internal party struggle over whether to accept Democratic President Joe Biden's win last year. On Nov. 1, two members of each board — one Republican and one Democrat — will begin new four-year terms. Out of Michigan's 11 largest counties, Republicans have nominated new individuals for the positions in eight, according to a Detroit News investigation. In at least four of the counties — 36%— the incumbent GOP canvasser wanted to be renominated but wasn't. Democrats are concerned that the new canvassers, spurred by former President Donald Trump, will refuse to approve future results or use their positions to interfere in the process. Mark Brewer, former chairman of the Michigan Democratic Party and an elections attorney, labeled the unfolding situation in the state "unprecedented." Full Article: Michigan GOP removes election officials in 'unprecedented' trendMichigan judge denies Secretary of State Benson’s motion in dismissed Antrim County election lawsuit | Mardi Link/Traverse City Record-Eagle
A judge denied a motion from Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson seeking to lift a stay order in a dismissed Antrim County election-related lawsuit to assess whether court-protected images from Antrim County’s voting equipment were shared during a “cyber symposium” hosted by Donald Trump supporter and My Pillow CEO Mike Lindell. A data security expert, Harri Hursti, said in a declaration included with Benson’s motion, he attended the August event where a link to download an image which appeared to have originated from Antrim County was shared on social media by one of the event’s speakers — CodeMonkeyZ — who has nearly 400,000 followers. A December court order signed by 13th Circuit Court Judge Kevin Elsenheimer allowed for a forensic examination of the county’s voting equipment after a local man, Bill Bailey, filed a lawsuit. But the judge’s decision to allow access to voting equipment also placed controls on what could be released to the public. Elsenheimer, responding to Benson’s motion, said that Bailey’s lawsuit — dismissed in May — had been referred to the Michigan Court of Appeals and until that court decided whether to hear the case, he was denying the motion. Full Article: Judge denies Secretary of State Benson's motion in dismissed Antrim election lawsuit | Local News | record-eagle.comNorth Carolina Republicans aren’t fooling anyone with dig at Durham County elections | Raleigh News & Observer
Despite Republicans’ claims over the last year, instances of voter fraud are incredibly rare. Maybe North Carolina Republicans haven’t gotten the memo. On Thursday, state representative Jeff McNeely (R-Iredell) and a handful of other Republican state House members who call themselves “the Freedom Caucus” said they would select one of North Carolina’s 100 counties to inspect their voting machines and determine whether they were connected to the internet during the 2020 election. They “randomly selected” Durham County — a Democratic stronghold with large Black and Latino populations. To this point, Republican state lawmakers in North Carolina have mostly resisted participating in sowing doubts about elections, unlike their colleagues in other states. Such talk threatens to undermine confidence in future elections, when the reality is that multiple safeguards ensure that elections are secure and accurate. The State Board of Elections randomly audited 200 North Carolina precincts from both the 2020 Election Day and early voting, and found only 13 precincts had discrepancies between human and machine counts; each of these precincts had three or less votes affected. Full Article: NC Republicans need to give up election fraud claims already | Raleigh News & ObserverPennsylvania Republican lawsuits over Act 77 election law have Democrats quietly worried | Jonathan Lai/Philadelphia Inquirer
Two years ago this month, Republicans and Democrats in Harrisburg reached a deal on the most significant changes to Pennsylvania election law in decades — including greatly expanded mail voting. But now, a year after a presidential race in which Donald Trump’s lies about mail voting and Pennsylvania’s results sowed distrust of the electoral system among his supporters, some Republicans are intensifying efforts to undo a law their party almost universally supported. The law known as Act 77 is facing perhaps its most serious court challenges yet. Republicans filed two lawsuits this summer saying it violates the state constitution. Democrats had hoped courts would quickly throw them out, but the cases have instead been combined and continue to move forward. The national and state Democratic Party organizations asked Friday to join the litigation in defense of Act 77. During oral arguments in one case, a panel of judges aggressively questioned lawyers representing the state, in what one Democratic observer described as “skepticism and hostility.” The hearing raised fears among Democrats that the state court might soon rule against the law. Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf’s administration would almost certainly appeal a loss to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, where a majority-Democratic bench has generally sided with the state on election issues. But while few believe the Supreme Court would ultimately throw out Act 77, some Democrats and good-government advocates worry that even a temporary loss could create significant challenges.
Full Article: Pennsylvania Republican lawsuits over Act 77 election law have Democrats quietly worriedPennsylvania GOP wants personal voter data to root out fraud, but state already uses a more secure system | Danielle Ohl/Pittsburgh Tribune-Review
Pennsylvania has spent nearly half a million dollars over the past six years to find and remove outdated registrations from its voter database, a process Senate Republicans now want to take up in a partisan-driven review at added expense to taxpayers. In the weeks since approving a far-reaching subpoena seeking access to sensitive voter information, GOP lawmakers in favor of the effort have claimed the vast troves of data are necessary to identify voters who shouldn’t have cast a ballot in either the November 2020 or May 2021 elections. The senators in charge of the investigation have not defined how they will prove a voter is “illegal” if they suspect fraud, nor have they acknowledged that Pennsylvania has already spent $403,904 for access to a sophisticated voter list maintenance program that regularly performs the analysis Republicans say they are seeking. Senate Republicans, in justifying the investigation, have claimed there is a need to investigate the “validity” of ballots cast during the previous elections, despite several court cases that found no evidence of widespread fraud. They have often pointed to a 2019 auditor general report identifying potential birthdate inaccuracies and duplicate information in fewer than 1% of voter registrations. The Department of State at the time pushed back on the auditor general’s analysis, saying it had “incorrectly flagged thousands of records as potential concerns.” Full Article: GOP wants personal voter data to root out fraud, but Pa. already uses a more secure system | TribLIVE.comSouth Dakota: Lincoln County voter confusion delays talks of buying iPads for polls | Nicole Ki/Sioux Falls Argus Leader
Lincoln County commissioners have decided to delay discussions about adopting a new electronic poll-book system, following public outcry at Tuesday's meeting about last week's election. The new digital system would implement iPads at polling locations countywide to streamline the process of signing in voters through KnowInk, the nation's leading provider for digital poll books. "I'm actually appalled that you would bring up having poll pads after last Thursday's referendum election," said resident Karla Lems at the commissioner's meeting. "Some of the Sioux Falls polling places weren't changed, and not once were voters notified that they had a new polling place to go to." ... Adopting electronic poll books would increase efficiency at polling locations by cutting the time poll workers would spend manually going through voter registration information. "Usually, we sit there for 40 hours at least, and scan every barcode to update people's voter information," said Lund. "This would plug into the poll pad into the computer, and within 24 hours we would have the election [how many voters were there]."
Full Article: Lincoln County voter confusion delays talks of buying iPads for pollsTexas: Republicans Are Laying The Groundwork For Endless Election “Audits” That Go Long Past Trump | Sarah Mimms/BuzzFeed
Republicans are laying the groundwork for candidates to follow former president Donald Trump’s election-denying playbook, creating the potential for vote “audits” up and down the ballot for years to come. Of most concern to election experts and voting rights advocates is Texas’s SB 47, a bill Republicans are currently fast-tracking through the state legislature. It would allow any candidate or party chair to force multiple inquiries into anything they view as an election “irregularity.” These inquiries would not require any burden of proof and could be pursued for potentially years after an election is over, all at the expense of taxpayers. Roughly one-third of Americans believe Trump’s continued lies about widespread voter fraud in the 2020 election. Now add in the potential for similar claims from dozens of losing candidates in every single primary and general election race — not to mention county and state party chairs and committees supporting ballot measures, all of whom can also force a look into a past election — and you have the nightmare outcome of a bill like Texas’s SB 47. “It was the single most concerning bill I have seen all legislative session,” Sarah Walker, executive director for the national, nonpartisan election integrity group Secure Democracy, said this week. The bill, which passed the state Senate Tuesday, still needs a vote in the House, but it is getting an aggressive PR campaign from Trump, in part because it also includes an audit of the 2020 election. Trump has spent weeks putting intense pressure on Gov. Greg Abbott, who is up for reelection next year, to do a “strong and real” audit (and rejecting the post-election audit the state is already doing in response to his complaints as “weak”) despite winning the state by 6 points. Abbott’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Source: Election Audits In Texas Could Go On For YearsWisconsin: Head of GOP election inquiry compares Milwaukee newspaper to Nazi propagandist | Lucas Robinson/Wisconsin State Journal
Former state Supreme Court Justice Michael Gableman, who is leading a Republican-ordered investigation into the 2020 election, compared the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel to Adolf Hitler’s propaganda chief after the newspaper and other outlets reported that Gableman had backed off from calling on city officials to testify in his probe. Gableman directed his comments to a Journal Sentinel story in which one of his own aides said city officials will not be required to sit for interviews about last year’s election. The interviews were requested under subpoenas issued to city officials across five cities this month. “What they’re doing over at the Journal would make Joseph Goebbels blush,” Gableman told Dan O’Donnell, the host of a conservative talk show on WISN-AM. “What they’re doing over at the Journal would make Joseph Goebbels blush,” Gableman told Dan O’Donnell, the host of a conservative talk show on WISN-AM. Goebbels served as Hitler’s propaganda minister during the Nazi regime. An antisemite pivotal in creating Hitler’s cult of personality, Goebbels helped mastermind the most infamous moments of Hitler’s rule, from book-burnings and rallies to Kristallnacht, a pogrom against Germany’s Jewish community.
US election reviews have not appeased those who think the game is rigged | Sam Levine/The Guardian
Back in May, I spent some time with a small group of people who had gathered outside of Veterans Memorial Coliseum in Phoenix to express their support for the investigation into the election results in Maricopa county, the largest county in Arizona. Sitting under a tent in the desert heat, several people said the two official audits Maricopa county had authorized already weren’t sufficient. I asked the group if they would accept that Biden was the winner if that was what the audit showed. “Personally, I would, yes,” said Kelly Johnson, a 61-year-old who traveled to Phoenix from southern California. I’ve been thinking a lot about that conversation as I watched the Arizona review conclude, finding no evidence of fraud and affirming Biden’s win. And I found myself returning to that conversation as I reported this week on similar efforts to investigate election results that are unfolding in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Texas. Those supporting the reviews have offered similar assurances that an inquiry can only lead to more trust in the election results. If people have questions, what harm can come from looking under the hood to make sure everything is OK? “If there are things called into question, and there is not full confidence in the electoral process, providing audits and research and evidence that in fact these processes and procedures and the election results you can have confidence in, only supports that position where you can have confidence and here is why,” Wisconsin state senator Kathy Bernier told me last week.
Full Article: US election reviews have not appeased those who think the game is rigged | US news | The GuardianNational: Behind the Curtain of Post-Election Canvassing, Audits, and Certification | Matthew Weil and Christopher Thomas/Bipartisan Policy Center
Debates about voting policy tend to center on the parts of the process voters interact with most, such as the number of days of early voting or availability of mail voting options. It is, however, the way states approach the period that begins as polls close that can shape whether voters have confidence in election results. The canvassing and certification period is a black box for most Americans who rarely think about what goes into counting, certifying, and auditing ballots once they are cast. During an era of close contests and hyperpolarization, there is minimal room for error and ample opportunity for misinformation and misunderstanding. In 2021, the perceived need for further analysis of election results gave rise to a series of semi-private, unofficial audits.1 These audits cast doubt on the American voting process, despite being unable to find any evidence to support their claims of fraud. Perhaps the greatest threat to American elections is not any particular of election administration itself, but the decoupling of reality from perception. As the gap between the reality and perception of elections grows, we see private audits haphazardly attempt to achieve what election officials already do in the aftermath of each election: confirm the accuracy of the results. Yet unlike the official certification processes already in place, these circus-like audits are intended to usurp rather than instill voter confidence. Furthermore, many of the audits failed to uphold security best practices and threatened the integrity of voting systems – forcing some jurisdictions to invest millions in new technology, an unnecessary waste of already limited election office resources. Full Article: Behind the Curtain of Post-Election Canvassing, Audits, and Certification | Bipartisan Policy CenterNational: ‘Subverting Justice’: Senate panel details the 9 times Trump pressured Justice Department to overturn election results | Kevin Johnson/USA TODAY
On the very day that Attorney General William Barr left office in late December, then-President Donald Trump and top White House aides began a "relentless" pressure campaign aimed at interim Justice Department leaders, including acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen, to overturn the results of the 2020 election, according to a new Senate committee report. The effort included "near-daily outreach" to the department, such as nine calls and meetings with Rosen and acting Deputy Attorney General Richard Donoghue, a Senate Judiciary Committee investigation found. The White House push continued right up to the assault on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, when a mob of Trump supporters sought to block Congress' certification of President Joe Biden's election. According to the committee, then-acting Assistant Attorney General Jeffrey Clark repeatedly sought to "induce Rosen into helping Trump’s election subversion scheme" by telling Rosen that he would decline Trump's offer that he take Rosen's place if Rosen agreed to join. The report said Mark Meadows, Trump's chief of staff, pressured Rosen on "multiple occasions" to launch election fraud investigations, "violating longstanding restrictions on White House intervention in DOJ law enforcement matters." According to the report, Meadows attempted to push Rosen to meet with Trump’s outside lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, who was waging a parallel legal campaign in the courts, where he pressed debunked allegations of voter fraud in multiple states.
Full Article: Senate details Donald Trump's push at DOJ to overturn 2020 electionNational: Report Cites New Details of Trump Pressure on Justice Dept. Over Election | Katie Benner/The New York Times
Even by the standards of President Donald J. Trump, it was an extraordinary Oval Office showdown. On the agenda was Mr. Trump’s desire to install a loyalist as acting attorney general to carry out his demands for more aggressive investigations into his unfounded claims of election fraud. On the other side during that meeting on the evening of Jan. 3 were the top leaders of the Justice Department, who warned Mr. Trump that they and other senior officials would resign en masse if he followed through. They received immediate support from another key participant: Pat A. Cipollone, the White House counsel. According to others at the meeting, Mr. Cipollone indicated that he and his top deputy, Patrick F. Philbin, would also step down if Mr. Trump acted on his plan. Mr. Trump’s proposed plan, Mr. Cipollone argued, would be a “murder-suicide pact,” one participant recalled. Only near the end of the nearly three-hour meeting did Mr. Trump relent and agree to drop his threat. Mr. Cipollone’s stand that night is among the new details contained in a lengthy interim report prepared by the Senate Judiciary Committee about Mr. Trump’s efforts to pressure the Justice Department to do his bidding in the chaotic final weeks of his presidency. The report draws on documents, emails and testimony from three top Justice Department officials, including the acting attorney general for Mr. Trump’s last month in office, Jeffrey A. Rosen; the acting deputy attorney general, Richard P. Donoghue, and Byung J. Pak, who until early January was U.S. attorney in Atlanta. It provides the most complete account yet of Mr. Trump’s efforts to push the department to validate election fraud claims that had been disproved by the F.B.I. and state investigators.
National: ‘The intelligence was there’: Law enforcement warnings abounded in the runup to Jan. 6 | Betsy Woodruff Swan/Politico
On Dec. 24, a private intelligence company that works with law enforcement issued a grave warning: Users of a pro-Trump internet forum were talking about turning violent on Jan. 6. “[A] supposedly violent insurrection by [Trump’s] supporters has ‘always been the plan,’” read a briefing by that company, SITE Intelligence Group. SITE sent this bulletin and others to its numerous subscribers, including U.S. federal law enforcement. That briefing is among a host of previously unreported documents that circulated among law enforcement officials in the weeks before Jan. 6 — laying out, some with jarring specificity, the threats that culminated in the attack on the Capitol. They showed just how much of a danger far-right extremists posed to federal buildings and lawmakers. And they bolster the argument that Jan. 6 was not an intelligence failure. “A potpourri of communities overtly strategized to storm the Capitol building and arrest — if not outright kill — public officials and carry out a coup,” said Rita Katz, the founder and executive director of SITE, which supplied many of the most detailed and specific warnings ahead of Jan. 6. She said Jan. 6 represented the most “profound failure to act” she has ever seen in decades of sharing intelligence with the U.S. government. “Law enforcement officials were alerting their superiors and other agencies to the threats SITE had identified—many of which ended up manifesting that day, just as they were written,” she said. “These warnings were distributed by the FBI and other agencies well before January 6.”
Full Article: ‘The intelligence was there’: Law enforcement warnings abounded in the runup to Jan. 6 - POLITICONational: Christian Conservative Lawyer Had Secretive Role in Bid to Block Election Result | Eric Lipton and Mark Walker/The New York Times
One of the nation’s most prominent religious conservative lawyers played a critical behind-the-scenes role in the lawsuit that Republican state attorneys general filed in December in a last-ditch effort to overturn the election of President Biden, documents show. The lawyer, Michael P. Farris, is the chief executive of a group known as Alliance Defending Freedom, which is active in opposing abortion and gay rights. He circulated a detailed draft of the lawsuit that Ken Paxton, the Texas attorney general, ultimately filed against states including Pennsylvania, Georgia and Wisconsin in an effort to help President Donald J. Trump remain in office. Mr. Paxton filed the lawsuit on Dec. 7, after making some changes but keeping large chunks of the draft circulated by Mr. Farris. An additional 17 Republican attorneys general filed a brief with the Supreme Court supporting Mr. Paxton’s lawsuit. Within four days, the matter was rejected by the court. But Mr. Farris’s role highlighted how religious conservatives supported Mr. Trump’s unsuccessful attempts to retain power by blocking certification of Mr. Biden’s victory.
National: Trump allies did little to investigate election fraud claims, court documents show | Tierney Sneed and Katelyn Polantz/CNN
Allies of former President Donald Trump testified under oath that they did little to check out some of the uncorroborated claims they made about 2020 election fraud before amplifying them on the national stage, according to newly available court records reviewed by CNN. While the bogus fraud claims have long been debunked, these latest revelations are being made in sworn depositions and highlight how little vetting was done by certain Trump allies seeking to spread doubt about the integrity of the presidential election results. The more than 2,000 pages of documents reviewed by CNN provide the most significant look yet at evidence collected in several defamation cases brought against top Trump mouthpieces. In this lawsuit, former Dominion Voting Systems executive Eric Coomer alleges he was defamed by the Trump campaign, Rudy Giuliani, Sidney Powell and prominent conservatives. According to the account that Giuliani gave in the case, he spent less than an hour reviewing allegations that Coomer was part of a plot to rig the election before publicly making those claims at a November press conference.
Arizona: Maricopa County officials blast election review’s ‘spread of disinformation’ | Diannie Chavez/Cronkite News
Maricopa County supervisors told a congressional committee Thursday that the state Senate’s review of the county’s 2020 election results amounted to a “staggering refusal to follow the will of the voters.” The remarks came during a House Oversight and Reform Committee that asked whether the Arizona election probe and copycats springing up in other states are a threat to American democracy. The four-hour hearing was sometimes tedious, sometimes fiery, but it did not appear to change any minds. Democrats on the committee called the six-month, multimillion-dollar Cyber Ninjas’ “audit” of the election little more than an attempt to erode confidence in the electoral process by raising multiple conspiratorial questions. And Republicans insisted that more questions need to be asked. “We have identified there are some things we can do better in our elections in Arizona,” said Ken Bennett, the former Arizona secretary of state who was the Senate’s liaison to Cyber Ninjas. “I hope the Legislature and the governor will follow through and … introduce bills to tighten things up.” Bennett said people on both sides of the issue should “understand that there’s nothing wrong with auditing elections.” Full Article: Maricopa officials blast election review's 'spread of disinformation' - Cronkite News - Arizona PBSColorado: Mesa Clerk was given detailed instructions on how to back up election files | Charles Ashby/Grand Junction Sentinel
Before Colorado Secretary of State and Dominion Voting System technicians came to Mesa County in May to conduct a software update of its elections system, Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters was given a step-by-step guide on how to back up election files and told just who could be present during that computer upgrade. In an April 30 email to all county clerks in the state obtained by The Daily Sentinel, Jessi Romero, voting systems manager in the Secretary of State’s Office, laid out the details on how to prepare for its “trusted build” software update, something the state and county clerks have done once a year since 2005. In it, Romero wrote that “only authorized staff, county elections staff and Dominion staff may be present during trusted build,” and asked each clerk to agree to the terms of the upgrade to preserve the security of election equipment, which included limiting the number of people who could be present, all of which had to have passed criminal history background checks. Peters agreed to those terms, but only after state officials declined Peters’ request to allow others into the office to view that upgrade, according to the Secretary of State’s Office. “The onsite installation of the trusted build is not the time for members of the public, representatives from the local parties or county officials other than the clerk and recorder to observe or ask questions about the process or any of the disinformation being pushed about the election,” Romero wrote. “If, when we arrive or during the process, there are others present beyond Dominion, county election staff that have been authorized and the clerk and recorder in the area where the trusted build will take place, we will move on to the next county,” Romero added. “It will then be the responsibility of the clerk and recorder to ship equipment to Denver so it may be upgraded at a time that works for Dominion and the (SOS office).” Those computer upgrades have to be done in person because county election systems are not accessible via the internet, the Secretary of State’s Office says.
Full Article: Clerk was given detailed instructions on how to back up election files | Western Colorado | gjsentinel.com
Florida: Lake County GOP demands election audit, despite Trump’s win | Steven Lemongelloand Gray Rohrer/Orlando Sentinel
Lake County Republicans are the latest GOP group to echo former President Trump’s false claims of election fraud by demanding a statewide forensic audit of Florida, a state Trump won by almost 372,000 votes. In a letter and two resolutions unanimously approved last week and sent to Florida GOP leaders, the Lake County Republican Executive Committee claimed “a majority of citizens doubt that the November 3, 2020, election was conducted openly and fairly” and “doubt the number of legal votes cast for each candidate equals the reported and certified results, in Lake County, the State of Florida, and the United States.” The Lake County GOP said it “demands” that the Legislature conduct an “immediate, open, transparent and independent full forensic audit, including a hand recount” of Lake County and the entire state, “at least as thorough as the audit being conducted in Maricopa County, Arizona.” Trump received almost 60% of the vote in Lake County over President Biden in 2020, and won Florida by 51% to 48%. Despite DeSantis’ praise for how the state conducted the election, he later called for and signed a controversial election law that significantly reduced drop boxes and added new restrictions for mail-in ballots and canvassing.
Georgia: Criminal inquiry into Trump’s election interference gathers steam | Peter Stone/The Guardian
Donald Trump is facing increasing legal scrutiny in the crucial battleground state of Georgia over his attempt to sway the 2020 election there, and that heat is now overlapping with investigations in Congress looking at the former president’s efforts to subvert American democracy. A criminal investigation into Trump’s 2 January call prodding Georgia’s secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, to “just find” him 11,780 votes to block Joe Biden’s win in the state is making headway. The Georgia district attorney running the inquiry is now also sharing information with the House committee investigating the 6 January attack on the Capitol in Washington DC. Meanwhile, a justice department taskforce investigating threats to election officials nationwide has launched inquiries in Georgia, where election officers and workers received death threats or warnings of violence, including some after Trump singled out one official publicly for not backing his baseless fraud claims. Despite these investigations, Trump is still pushing bogus fraud claims in Georgia. Trump wrote to Raffensperger in September asking him to decertify the election results, which is impossible, and with an eye on the 2022 elections is trying to oust Raffensperger, as well as the state’s governor, Brian Kemp, and other top Republicans who defied his demands to block Biden’s win. Former justice department officials and voting rights advocates say Trump’s conspiratorial attacks on Georgia’s election results, and the threats to public officials, need to be investigated diligently, and prosecuted if warranted by law enforcement, to protect election integrity and public officials.
Full Article: Criminal inquiry into Trump’s Georgia election interference gathers steam | Georgia | The GuardianIdaho wants MyPillow CEO to pay for costs to refute his false election fraud claim | Hayat Norimine/Idaho Statesman
After MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell falsely claimed election fraud occurred in Idaho, Secretary of State officials audited three counties to disprove that claim. Now, the state plans to send Lindell a bill. Idaho Chief Deputy Secretary of State Chad Houck confirmed to the Idaho Statesman that the office plans to bill the CEO for the costs associated with auditing the three counties, a total estimated at about $6,500. Houck announced the bill on CNN on Thursday. In Idaho, former President Donald Trump handily won in the 2020 presidential election with 63.8% of the votes. But Lindell, in a widely circulated document titled “The Big Lie,” alleged that presidential election results in all 44 Idaho counties were electronically manipulated to switch votes from Trump to Joe Biden. Seven Idaho counties have no electronic means to count votes, Houck said. Houck said the suggestion to bill Lindell came from a citizen, and that totaling the expenses and sending the bill will likely take at least another two weeks. Full Article: Idaho plans to send MyPillow CEO a bill after election audit | Idaho StatesmanMichigan: Macomb County clerk pursues forensic audit of election server | Carol Thompson/The Detroit News
Macomb County Clerk Anthony Forlini said Tuesday he plans to hire a cyber security firm to conduct a forensic audit of the county's election server to "restore the confidence of our election processes in Macomb County." "I cannot say with certainty whether or not we will find something from the past, but I can say that Macomb will lead the state in election integrity in the future," Forlini said in a statement. "We are in the process of establishing best election practices that we will continually look at and modify as laws and technology change." Former President Donald Trump beat Democrat Joe Biden 53%-45% in Macomb County last year, the second consecutive time the Republican won the county. But Biden won the state by about 154,000 votes or 3 percentage points, and Trump has made unsubstantiated claims fraud cost him the election. Forlini said he has no reason to doubt the results in Macomb County. The audit will build public confidence in the local election system and assuage some residents' fears about outsiders' ability to interfere in the results, he said. "I'm trying to establish all the best practices for good, clean elections," Forlini told The Detroit News. "Not to say they weren't clean before; I'm not trying to allude to that. I'm trying to say that I want to be able to answer in the affirmative that, from a technology standpoint, we have clean elections."
Full Article: Macomb County clerk pursues forensic audit of election server