by Corinne Murdock | Jan 18, 2023 | News
By Corinne Murdock |
Maricopa County might become four counties, per a new resolution seeking to break up the fourth-largest county in the nation.
HCR2018 wants to shrink Maricopa County, then divide the remaining land into three counties named after Native American tribes that once populated the Valley and southern area of the state: Hohokam, Mogollon, and O’odham. The bill sponsor is State Rep. Alex Kolodin, cosponsored by State Reps. Joseph Chaplik, David Marshall, and Barbara Parker.
Kolodin told AZ Free News that the initiative is a continuation of a bill run last year; however, since this year’s version is a resolution it will ultimately be up to the voters to decide Maricopa County’s fate. Kolodin shared that voters discussed breaking up Maricopa County with him often on the campaign trail last year. The dissent to the proposal that he did hear concerned an increase in costs, but Kolodin said he thinks the opposite would be true.
“It’s never been my experience in government that having it smaller and more conservative increases costs,” said Kolodin. “There’s an optimal size for counties, and that’s not having a county board of supervisors that oversees over three-quarters of a million people. That’s more than a congressman.”
Kolodin noted that Maricopa County residents’ grievances with their current administration aren’t a shared experience by residents of other counties. In fact, he observed other counties having a positive relationship with their board of supervisors during his travels as a lawyer.
Kolodin argued that county officials should be able to pick up the phone and talk to constituents — a far-fetched concept for Maricopa County residents. The county has a population of about 4.5 million; Arizona has a population of around 7.4 million.
“Besides the problems of unaccountable government, people joke about the ‘great state of Maricopa.’ I think there’s lots of Democrats in Pima County that would agree that Maricopa County has an outsized presence. Counties should be relatively coequal entities,” observed Kolodin.
Kolodin said that the restructuring would also improve elections administration. Maricopa County experienced massive Election Day failures stemming from their printers.
“One thing we’ve learned from this last cycle is that Maricopa County is too big to effectively run itself anymore,” said Kolodin. “It completely screwed up the 2022 election. It’s too hard for them to run it.”
We also asked Kolodin to weigh in on community feedback regarding Maricopa County’s rebranding unveiled last week. Some noted that the new logo intended to depict an orange cactus looked like a middle finger.
“All I can say is these guys have spent the past several years demonstrating utter contempt for their constituents,” said Kolodin. “I’ve been involved in politics for a while, and the constant feeling is [that Maricopa County residents] don’t feel like they’re heard. You never hear that about the State House, ‘Oh these guys are so distant, they’re so inaccessible.’ You might disagree with us, but you would never feel that we don’t care about our constituents. People feel like members of the board of supervisors don’t care about their constituents, and they just feel like they’re not heard.”
Maricopa County has struggled to fulfill basic functions like public record requests or, most recently, complying in a timely manner with an Arizona Senate subpoena.
“They’re trying to run a state with a county’s infrastructure. It just doesn’t make any sense,” said Kolodin. “It gives rise to both arrogance and incompetence. The arrogance is they think they can thumb their nose at the state legislature. It upsets the constituents.”
Corinne Murdock is a reporter for AZ Free News. Follow her latest on Twitter, or email tips to corinne@azfreenews.com.
by AZ Free Enterprise Club | Jan 18, 2023 | Opinion
By the Arizona Free Enterprise Club |
From their pulpit at press conferences, they shrugged off questions and concerns about the potential for long lines on election day and whether they would have their voting centers properly equipped. For weeks, the mainstream media blasted out to Arizonans that they are competent election officials, about to implement the “safest, most secure” election in history.
Then it all came crumbling down in what was one of the worst election days in recent history. Long lines, yes. But more importantly, critical equipment failures resulted in the complete inability to tabulate ballots at dozens of voting locations for several hours. It didn’t stop there. The issues persisted in the coming weeks for Maricopa County, who responded to requests for information with hostility. And then, we found out Pinal County (following major problems in their primary election) had miscounted hundreds of ballots, shrinking the already miniscule gap between the candidates for attorney general.
Two months later, these issues are still being litigated. But regardless of how the election contests being pursued by Kari Lake and Abe Hamadeh turn out, nothing changes the fact that Maricopa and Pinal Counties bungled the election.
Going forward, Arizona must learn from what happened, craft meaningful solutions, and focus efforts on productive goals ahead of 2024…
>>> CONTINUE READING >>>
by Corinne Murdock | Jan 11, 2023 | News
By Corinne Murdock |
Maricopa County is investigating the mass failures of Election Day ballot-on-demand (BOD) printers resulting in issues for over 17,000 voters.
In a press release last Friday, the county shared a joint statement from Board of Supervisors Chairman Bill Gates and Vice Chairman Clint Hickman. The duo shared that former Arizona Supreme Court Chief Justice Ruth McGregor would lead the investigation. The duo also appeared to mistakenly state that the BOD printers “read” the ballots.
“This Board of Supervisors has always been committed to continuous improvement. When things don’t work, we find out why,” stated the pair. “[We will] find out why printers that read ballots well in the August Primary had trouble reading some ballots while using the same settings in the November General. Our voters deserve nothing less.”
McGregor is tasked with hiring a team of outside experts to investigate why there were mass printer failures. McGregor previously investigated allegations of unethical conduct within Arizona State University’s economics department concerning, specifically a quid pro quo agreement between the university and an education and technology company. McGregor’s investigation quickly proved the allegations to be false.
McGregor also investigated Arizona Department of Corrections safety issues pertaining to malfunctioning cell doors and locks. The report resulted in improvements to the malfunctioning security measures.
GOP gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake, who is challenging the midterm election results in an ongoing lawsuit, questioned why Gates and Hickman stated that the BOD printers “read” ballots.
During the county’s canvass of the election results, several poll workers testified that they witnessed election machine issues prior to Election Day. The county also disclosed that only certain BOD printers experienced failures during their preliminary investigative efforts: “Oki” model printers retrofitted to be BOD printers. According to the county at the time, 71 of 211 sites were impacted.
The timing of the county’s investigation aligns with its other actions to address voter concerns. A few hours before the state certified the election results, the county issued a survey asking voters how they felt about the midterm election.
The county also delayed its compliance with the Arizona Senate’s subpoena for election records for over a month. The legislator leading the charge to obtain the records, former State Sen. Kelly Townsend, did receive the records earlier this month.
Townsend hasn’t published the records on a public forum yet. She stated that she couldn’t post the documents on the State Senate website.
Governor Katie Hobbs announced the creation of an Elections Task Force over the weekend. The task force must issue a report by Nov. 1 with recommendations to improve Arizona’s election laws, after which point it will be terminated.
In her press release, Hobbs took aim at Ducey. She indicated that him not launching a similar initiative showed a lack of leadership.
The order is one of the latest issued by Hobbs under her “First 100 Days Initiative.”
Hobbs also reinstated the Arizona Commission on Homelessness and Housing, which Ducey abolished in 2020, and banned gender identity discrimination from state employment.
REVIEW HOBBS’ EXECUTIVE ORDERS HERE
Corinne Murdock is a reporter for AZ Free News. Follow her latest on Twitter, or email tips to corinne@azfreenews.com.
by Corinne Murdock | Jan 2, 2023 | News
By Corinne Murdock |
On New Year’s Day, Kari Lake asked the Arizona Supreme Court to take up her case challenging the 2022 midterm election. The request for special-action appellate review marks a final effort to prevent transition of power proceedings ahead of Governor-Elect Katie Hobbs’ inauguration on Thursday.
Lake’s team filed their appeal with the Arizona Court of Appeals last Wednesday, alleging that suppressed and illegal votes outnumbered Hobbs’ 17,100 lead. Lake is pushing for a new election.
“A new governor is scheduled to be seated under a cloud of electoral uncertainty and impropriety,” stated Lake.
The embattled GOP candidate’s team cited “extraordinary circumstances” as the reason for their request, characterizing the Election Day tabulator-printer fiasco as a “targeted attack” on voters as well as citing the upcoming swearing-in ceremony.
Lake’s appeal insisted that the court should distinguish the election content standards: namely, clear-and-convincing versus preponderance-of-evidence, the use of latches for the right to violate laws in future elections, and that unconstitutional elections would qualify as misconduct.
Lake asserted that Maricopa County officials offered “changing and conflicting testimony” that they alleged was proof of intentional malfeasance on Election Day, including chain of custody violations and improper signature review for mail-in ballots. The appeal included a remark made by the county’s counsel, Thomas Liddy, in his closing argument.
“You reap what you sow,” said Liddy, in reference to Election Day voters.
Lake claimed that controversy over this most recent election jeopardizes the republic: a seeming counter to Democrats’ claim that scrutinizing elections jeopardizes democracy.
“A significant majority of voters no longer trust the outcomes of elections in Arizona. A functioning republic cannot exist for long in these circumstances,” read the appeal.
Polls support Lake’s claim concerning election distrust. Rasmussen Reports found that 72 percent of likely voters agreed with Lake’s claims that Election Day problems resulted in disenfranchisement, with 45 percent strongly agreeing.
Tufts University polling conducted the week after the midterm election discovered that distrust in elections correlated with age. Younger voters tended to trust the legitimacy of elections more greatly than older voters, especially concerning the 2020 election. Their polling also discovered that younger generations were far less likely to identify with one specific political party, but didn’t view Democrats as “too extreme” compared with older generations.
Although Hobbs’ team points to Monday as the inauguration day, the official ceremony remains on Thursday.
Corinne Murdock is a reporter for AZ Free News. Follow her latest on Twitter, or email tips to corinne@azfreenews.com.
by Corinne Murdock | Dec 26, 2022 | News
By Corinne Murdock |
Kari Lake plans to appeal her lawsuit against governor-elect Katie Hobbs in her capacity as secretary of state and Maricopa County.
Maricopa County Superior Court declared in a ruling issued on Christmas Eve that Hobbs was governor-elect because Lake presented no “clear and convincing evidence” of election misconduct or fraud.
“[Election workers performed] their role with integrity. Not perfectly, as no system on this earth is perfect, but more than sufficient to comply with the law and conduct a valid election,” wrote Thompson.
On Monday, Maricopa County sought sanctions against Lake and her attorneys, Brian Blehm and Kurt Olsen. The trio could owe up to $696,000 to cover attorneys’ fees and costs incurred by the county and secretary of state’s office. The county asserted that Lake kept up a “sustained attack on Arizona’s elections” long before this recent election, and filed her lawsuit in bad faith.
The county cited a since-deleted tweet from Lake, which shared a report compiling claims from “legal experts” that Judge Peter Thompson’s ruling was “ghostwritten” by the likes of top Democratic election attorney and principal Russiagate figure Marc Elias and others.
Lake would be far from the first facing sanctions for disputing an election in recent years. There are at least three other parties with outstanding sanctions.
READ MARICOPA COUNTY’S SANCTIONS REQUEST HERE
Prominent among Lake’s claims of election malfeasance were missing chain of custody documentation for Election Day ballots in violation of the Election Procedures Manual (EPM) and inducing Ballot On Demand (BOD) printer issues by using 19” instead of 20” ballots.
Thompson preceded his 10-page court ruling by acknowledging voters’ “anger and frustration” over the “inconvenience and confusion” at vote centers, but issued a reminder that his duty was to weigh Lake’s claims and the actions of Maricopa County and the state against the law.
“[T]his Court’s duty is not solely to incline an ear to public outcry,” wrote Thompson.
In order to prevail, Lake needed to prove that alleged misconduct such as EPM violations and BOD irregularities were intentional, conducted by an officer making or participating in a canvass, intended to change the election outcome, and resulted in a change in the election outcome.
The ruling reviewed the testimonies of Lake’s witnesses: Mark Sonnenklar, a Republican National Committee election attorney; Heather Honey, a supply chain auditor and consultant; Clay Parikh, a Northrup Grumman cybersecurity expert; David Betencourt, a temporary technical election support employee (“T-Tech”) with Maricopa County; and Richard Baris, director of Big Data Poll.
With the exception of Honey, Thompson determined that these witnesses completely failed to relay personal knowledge of intentional or unintentional election misconduct. Honey testified that Runbeck Election Services employees introduced about 50 ballots of family members into the stream.
However, Thompson determined that Honey’s claims were insufficient to meet the burden of proof because these ballots weren’t clear and convincing evidence of affecting the election outcome. Thompson noted that Maricopa County in its testimony clarified that it only granted Runbeck permission to submit general public ballots, not those family member ballots.
“Every single witness before the Court disclaimed any personal knowledge of such misconduct. The Court cannot accept speculation or conjecture in place of clear and convincing evidence,” wrote Thompson.
Thompson declared further that Lake didn’t offer sufficient evidence to contradict the testimonies of Election Day director Scott Jarrett or County Recorder Stephen Richer.
READ THE CHRISTMAS EVE RULING HERE
In response to the ruling, Maricopa County Board of Supervisors Chair Bill Gates declared that Lake sought media attention, not a remedy to the election.
“Plaintiff Lake’s lawsuit was never about well-pled facts and evidence. Instead, it was the continuation of a made-for-TV tirade from a candidate who cannot or will not accept the fact that she lost,” said Gates. “Arizona courts have made it clear that frivolous political theater meant to undermine elections will not be tolerated.”
During a Turning Point USA event earlier this month, Lake pledged to take this case “all the way to the Supreme Court.”
Corinne Murdock is a reporter for AZ Free News. Follow her latest on Twitter, or email tips to corinne@azfreenews.com.
