Arizona GOP Congressmen Call for Audit of Maricopa County Ballots

(L-R) Chairwoman of the Arizona Republican Party Kelli Ward, Representative Debbie Lesko,
Brendan Smialowski/AFP/Getty Images
Joshua Caplan

A trio of Arizona Republican congressmen — Reps. Andy Biggs, Paul Gosar, and David Schweikert — have called for a “100% audit” of all ballots in Maricopa County due to what the lawmakers described as issues raised regarding the “integrity” of the Grand Canyon state’s “election systems.”

Reps. Biggs (pictured, left), Gosar (pictured,r ight), and Schweikert sent a letter last week to the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors to request the would-be audit’s results to be compared to the current vote totals.

“Americans and Arizonans must have full confidence in our election processes and systems in order to maintain the bedrock of our constitutional republic,” Biggs said in a statement Monday. “Although Arizona conducts elections with far more transparency and accountability than other states, there have been some issues raised about the integrity of some of our election systems within the state. For this reason, I am calling on the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors to go above and beyond to assure the public of the integrity of Maricopa County’s elections. Let’s leave no stone unturned in the pursuit of accountability and transparency.”

The development comes after the Arizona Republican Party filed a lawsuit requesting a hand recount of votes by precinct, accusing Maricopa County of violating the law.

Breitbart News reported Thursday:

The lawsuit, announced on Thursday, demands a hand recount of votes by sampling precincts rather than “voting centers,” which Maricopa County provided in this year’s presidential election. Voting centers allow voters from any precinct to cast their ballots. “There is a fundamental difference between sampling ‘polling centers’ and ‘precincts,’ most notable being the fact that there were only around 175 voting centers in this election but there were 748 precincts,” the Republican Party of Arizona said in a statement, announcing the legal challenge. […] In other words, the Arizona GOP does not believe a hand-count audit of two percent of 175 voting centers is sufficient. Rather, there should be a hand-count audit covering two percent of the 748 precincts.

Dr. Kelli Ward, chairwoman of the Republican Party of Arizona, issued a statement on the lawsuit.

“In the past, voters were assigned a polling place inside their precinct. The Secretary of State Katie Hobbs wrote an election procedures manual stating that now we’re going to a voting center model,” said Ward. “The fact of the matter is, we have to determine whether state statute as it exists is actually supreme to a manual written by a member of the executive branch.”

She added: “We are getting close to recount territory here and we are working — the Republican Party of Arizona with the Trump campaign, with the RNC — to ensure that every legal vote cast is counted in the way that the voter intended. We are fighting for you.”

Former Vice President Joe Biden leads President Donald Trump by 11,038 votes in Maricopa County.

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