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Maricopa County’s new leadership will move immediately to commission an independent audit of the county’s election system, incoming supervisors announced at their first meeting Monday, but they promised that it will not be a repeat of the partisan, chaotic review of the county’s 2020 election results.
The announcement came as the county swore in three new Republicans on the five-member board of supervisors. Minutes after being elected chairman, returning Supervisor Thomas Galvin affirmed that supervisors would soon hire what he described as a reputable firm to do a “comprehensive review” of election procedures and recommend improvements.
The decision signals a shift in the board’s perspective on election administration, from staunchly defending the county’s practices to examining and questioning them. The newly elected supervisors campaigned on a platform of election integrity, and one of them, Mark Stewart, ran on the idea that the county’s system needed fixing. They are replacing Republican officials who became known nationally for defending the county’s elections.
The county’s new recorder, Justin Heap, defeated Recorder Stephen Richer after claiming that the county’s elections were a “laughingstock.” It’s unclear whether Heap, or his office, will be involved in the new audit, or help pay for it. Galvin said he has had no discussions with Heap about the audit, and Heap didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
Audit is limited to checking processes
Galvin, a Republican, said after the meeting that the county will not reexamine the results of any past elections, or review any cast ballots. The scope of the audit will be limited to examining processes, he said.
But the county has already done such reviews of its election system — at length and at great cost — including two separate independent audits. The supervisors commissioned one in early 2021, of the county’s use of voting machines during the 2020 election. And the other, more notorious review occurred that same year after the state Senate’s Republican leadership handed all 2.1 million ballots cast in the election, and the county’s voting machines, over to Cyber Ninjas, a firm that had been working with allies of Donald Trump to try to overturn his 2020 loss. The reviews both confirmed the 2020 presidential election results showing that Joe Biden won the county.
Officials then spent millions of taxpayer dollars to replace the county’s voting machines that Cyber Ninjas took apart. Asked if the new audit is worth the added expense, Galvin said he thought it would be a “waste of taxpayer dollars not to do anything, to be complacent and to think everything is absolutely perfect.”
Supervisor Steve Gallardo, the only Democrat on the five-member board, said after the meeting that he didn’t “know what we are looking for” with the new audit.
“Our elections since 2020 have been audited more than any other election in the history of the state of Arizona, and they continue to find out that our elections are safe, secure and accurate,” Gallardo said.
But, Gallardo said, if the audit makes people feel more comfortable, and it’s aimed at improving processes rather than making life difficult for election officials or voters, he could get on board.
‘There will be no Cyber Ninjas here’
Galvin tried to distance the new election review from the Cyber Ninjas’ work.
That review took months, and was disorganized and inaccurate. While it eventually confirmed Biden’s win, the final report included many misrepresentations of county data that showed the auditors did not understand county procedures.
Galvin even took issue with calling this new review an “audit,” saying the word is associated with the Cyber Ninjas review, and maintaining that “it’s irresponsible to make a comparison of the two.”
“There will be no Cyber Ninjas here,” he said.
This time, Galvin said, the county will look for a company that has expertise in elections to do the review.
Supervisor Debbie Lesko, who left her role as a congresswoman to take the county spot, said that she contacted the U.S. Election Assistance Commission for recommendations.
Votebeat could not immediately obtain the full list provided to Lesko, but it appears the EAC recommended at least two, Pro V&V and SLI Compliance. These are the only two firms in the country accredited to certify U.S. voting machines, and the county paid them more than $100,000 to conduct the 2021 voting machine audit.
Lesko said she wants a more comprehensive look at the county’s entire system, including security and ballot tracking.
Four years ago, Lesko was one of the Republicans in Congress who voted against certifying Arizona’s 11 Electoral College votes for Biden, even though he carried the state. On Monday, she said she did not want the county’s coming review to rehash past election results.
“My motives are very pure,” she said. “I want to make sure that everything is run right.”
Galvin has stood by his position that the county’s past elections were fair, and he reiterated on Monday that claiming widespread fraud or stolen elections was “destructive and irresponsible.”
But he said, “I think there are ways we can do better, and I think no one can argue with that.”
Jen Fifield is a reporter for Votebeat based in Arizona. Contact Jen at jfifield@votebeat.org.
