While Maricopa County released a report on the election failures of the 2022 elections, Arizona election lawsuits continue as 2022 GOP nominees Kari Lake and Mark Finchem file motions for reconsideration in their respective races for governor and secretary of state.
On Monday, Maricopa County released a report by former Arizona Supreme Court Chief Justice Ruth McGregor on the causes of the ballot printer issues that occurred at more than 70 vote centers on Election Day last year, which resulted in long lines as many voters’ ballots were unreadable by tabulator machines.
According to the report, the county expanded the length of the ballots from 19 inches during the primary election to 20 inches in the general election in order to include all of the required information. The increased ballot size in combination with the use of 100-pound ballot paper, the report concludes, was too great a strain on some older printers that were used.
Regarding the issue of ballots being printed for 19-inch paper rather than 20-inch, the report concluded that “ballots were re-sized as ‘fit to page,’ a process that entirely changed the location of the timing marks on the ballots and assured that neither the on-site tabulators nor the central count tabulators could read the ballots.”
It couldn’t be determined whether the reason for this change was “from a technician attempting to correct the printing issues … or a problem internal to the printers,” according to the report. However, during the investigators’ “testing, four printers randomly printed one or a few ‘fit to page’ ballots in the middle of printing a batch of ballots. None of the technical people with whom we spoke could explain how or why that error occurred.”
Maricopa County Board of Supervisors Chairman Clint Hickman said regarding the report, “now that we have a better idea of the factors involved, we’ll make changes to best serve voters, starting with replacing some equipment.”
These and other failures that marred the November election prompted Lake’s election lawsuit, which she originally filed in December.
Lake, the Arizona GOP gubernatorial nominee, fell about 17,000 votes short in the 2022 election. She is suing current Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs, Secretary of State Adrian Fontes, and Maricopa County election officials and is requesting that the election results be invalidated or that she be declared the winner.
Lake’s case was reviewed by the Arizona Supreme Court, which remanded one of her seven counts to trial court and allowed sanctions against her to be considered.
Maricopa County Superior Court is supposed to rehear Lake’s count on Maricopa County’s alleged violations of its signature verification practices but is waiting on the high court to determine if she must pay sanctions to Hobbs and Fontes regarding her claim of 35,563 unaccounted early ballots being added to Maricopa County’s final tally.
On Wednesday, Lake’s lawyers filed her opposition to sanctions with the Arizona Supreme Court and a motion to reconsider hearing the count regarding the 35,563 unaccounted early ballots.
“We took the sanctions briefing ordered by the [Arizona Supreme Court] and flipped it into a request for reconsideration of the 35K ballot injection issue at Runbeck,” Lake told The Arizona Sun Times regarding the filing.
In Lake’s lawsuit, she had claimed there were 35,563 early ballots added to the total number of ballots scanned at Runbeck Election Services. However, the high court found that the “record does not reflect that 35,563 unaccounted ballots were added to the total count.”
In Lake’s new motion, her lawyers note that while “the number of early ballots recorded on the Runbeck Receipt of Delivery forms dated November 8-9, 2022, totaled 263,379 ballots,” there were “298,942 Election Day early ballots recorded on the Runbeck Scan Receipts, that is a discrepancy of 35,563 more ballots scanned than ballots received.”
Meanwhile, Finchem, a former Arizona state representative, filed a motion for reconsideration of his election lawsuit against Fontes on March 29. Finchem’s lawsuit requested the election results in his race be set aside and ballots be inspected to determine which votes were legal before determining the winner. Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Melissa Iyer Julian dismissed Finchem’s lawsuit in December and sanctioned him over his lawsuit, finding it “groundless and not brought in good faith.”
In Finchem’s new motion, he included an affidavit from Bob Hughes, an Arizona resident with “50 years of experience in the printing industry” at various companies and “16 years of experience printing ballots for Maricopa County Elections,” according to Hughes’ sworn declaration. Hughes also “helped establish the auditing criteria for the printing and paper portion of the 2020 Maricopa County ballot audit” by the Arizona state Senate.
On March 6, 2023, Hughes led a team that reviewed and copied “the Logic and Accuracy reports for the 2022” elections in Maricopa County, according to the affidavit. He “physically inspected the ballots at MCTEC that were used in the testing of the election tabulators … reviewed the certification reports for each Maricopa County Voting Center used in the 2022 Election” and reviewed “the Tabulator reports that are printed by the machines during their testing.”
Hughes noted that “every machine and every voting center report showed that every test was passed without any failures.”
According to Hughes’ affidavit, only 20-inch ballots for the November 2022 election were created at the Maricopa County Tabulation and Election Center (MCTEC). Since Maricopa County uses ballot-on-demand printers, after a voter checks in at a voting center on an e-poll book, the correct ballot style prepared at MCTEC for the voter in that precinct is sent to the printer.
“This indicates that it was not possible that a BALLOT STYLE other than a 20″ PDF could have been used, even by accident for the 2022 election,” Hughes wrote. “Yet, on Election Day a substantial number of wrong sized ballots were printed. This clearly indicates that the interference caused by 19″ ballots had to have been by someone from MCTEC or by someone hacking into the MCTEC system.”
Hughes found that the ballots printed on Election Day were “photographically reduced” and the possible ways that could occur are by: “A command changing the printer to ‘print to fit’ with a ½” top and bottom margins; A change in paper settings to 19″ paper resulting on a reduced image; [or] A change in the paper tray to smaller paper resulting in a reduced image.”
Hughes concluded: “An intentional change was made to the printers affecting the DAY OF Election ballots.”
Hughes told Just the News on Monday regarding McGregor’s report to Maricopa County: “The fact that she says these machines all failed the exact same way by reducing the size of the ballot” because the printers were working “so hard” that they “just independently decided” to have the same issues is “ridiculous.”
Screw elections! It’s time for the National Divorce or the 2nd civil war. I’ll take either but the latter would rid the continent of an assload of undesirables and is preferred.
I’m going to have to agree with this one. There really is only one way to fix this whole charade and we all know exactly what that is. The left does NOT understand “nice language” but they are horrified at the thought of bullets flying their way because they know in their heart of hearts that they’re going straight to hell to rot and burn forever. Obviously we’re all too afraid to say it like it is because the stakes are high and conservatives stand to lose a lot (especially their jobs and families).
After escaping a communist country and seeing this garbage, I know that there ain’t no pretty solution to this one. The wise thing would be for conservatives to not start anything, but if the other side starts it, then we ought to finish the job.
Hell yes, im ready to start digital executions trainings. Yeah i need to freshen up a little. Lot of variety out there these days. Anybody else ready for strategic combat duty? You need to sign up for a crash course. We dont have time for full hands on training. So be ready for hands on contact. You better be quick learners.
Come 2024, we need an ENTIRE new slate of people elected down to the dog catchers. There is only one way to wipe the slate clean and start again, and that doesn’t happen from the top down – it starts all the way from the LOCAL elections, folks that have been in place for term after term, they’ve become complacent and don’t want to rock the boat or the good thing they have going. I’m going to take my ballot, Google EVERY name on it and NOT vote for any incumbents on the Local, State and certainly Federal Level. I find is odd how they word the Judge’s on the ballots “Should Judge Hatchett retain their seat” – Yes/No. Well, as we have seen here in FL there are enough low-hanging fruit Judges that are a part of the Cabal and it is time to send them ALL packing. IF they have been in place for 8+ years, then they were in place during Obama/Biden – then Trump – then Biden and have YET to stand up for the People (as apparent when they all seem to deny that the Election 2020 of Trump fraud was IGNORED)……It’s time to collectively WIPE all Incumbents out of ALL positions from 2022 and forward unless WE did our homework and intentionally got Kari Lake elected (we don’t want to wipe her off, or Trump). We can get to their appointees IF we do this all together. Once these folks are in; they spread their tentacles of poison like an octopus with Election Commissioners, School Administrations etc. TIME TO CLEAN HOUSE, at least 80% must be shown the door. Let DJT point to WHO he feels is best; he knows the players well and he knows who would work best with him – WE need to hand select a team (no different than Owners/Coaches picking best QB, Wide Receivers, etc to make the best NFL team)…. We all also need to volunteer or join “clubs” and infiltrate in not only Republican but Democrat “groups”. There is enough high-tech cameras and spyware hidden gadgets that can be used to CATCH them on video and audio when they discuss their nefarious plans ahead of time. WE Must Catch Them in the 1000 ways they cheat the System and send them to Gitmo forever on treason! Continued Prayers for Kari Lake – I love her tenacity and I have asked Our Father, to keep her safe, keep her healthy, keep her strong – – along with Mike Lindell, Donald J. Trump and a handful of others who are willing to Fight Satan for each and every one of us. God Bless America ~ We sure need your Guidance & Help.
Katie Hobbs is in serious trouble. WOW! SHE EVEN CERTIFIED HER OWN ELECTION. THAT ITSELF IS A CRIME. YES, she’ll be charged with election interference. And yes she will serve time. Kari Lake is your true winner. Hobbs ans Soros are cheaters. KARI WON’ SHE BEAT KATIE LIKE YESTERDAYS RUGS.
They can cheat and get by with it just like with the Election of 2020 {Period don,t you believe your Lying EYES either