There were already a truckload of reasons why the Arizona GOP’s windmill-tilting audit of election results in Phoenix and the Valley of the Sun should outrage any fair-minded American. Well, add another to the list: It’s likely that none of the voting machines can ever be used again—and Arizona taxpayers could be on the hook for replacing them.
Arizona Secretary of State Katie Hobbs—who currently has a round-the-clock security detail due to a raft of death threats—recently wrote the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors to warn them that a number of issues may require every machine subpoenaed for the audit to be replaced.
From Raw Story:
"I have grave concerns regarding the security and integrity of these machines, given the chair of custody, a critical security tenet, has been compromised and election officials do not know what was done to the machines while under Cyber Ninjas' control," she explained.
Hobbs says she consulted with experts and the Department of Homeland Security's Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency and "each unanimously advised that once election officials lose custody and control over voting systems and components, those devices should not be used in future elections."
Garrett Archer, the political data analyst at Phoenix ABC affiliate KNXV-TV, got his hands on the letter. Read it here.
When Ben Giles, a reporter at Phoenix NPR member station KJZZ, saw this letter, he recalled that the Arizona state senate Republicans had indemnified Maricopa County for the cost of any machines that would need to be replaced.
Which means that taxpayers could be on the hook for replacing the machines when all is said and done. And how much could that bill run? Well, Archer may have an estimate.
So in the name of promoting the Big Lie, Fann and the other clowns who pushed for this misbegotten audit could potentially stick their constituents with a seven-figure bill. There’s only one way to describe this—swampy.
By all rights, Cyber Ninjas, Fann, state Republican chairwoman Kelli Ward, and the rest of what passes for leadership in the Arizona GOP ought to be the ones paying that bill at the end of the day. Disgraceful.