State Senator Paul Boyer Withholds Vote to Enforce Subpoena Against Maricopa County, Arizona Election Officials, Says Auditors Are ‘Inexperienced, Partisan’

Corinne Murdock

 

State Senator Paul Boyer (R-Glendale) won’t hold Maricopa County election officials in contempt for noncompliance with the Senate’s subpoena for election equipment and materials needed to complete the audit. This was revealed by Senate President Karen Fann (R-Prescott) after Senate Liaison Ken Bennett shared that one of sixteen Republican senators wouldn’t hold the county accountable.

The auditing company, Cyber Ninjas, explained in a hearing last week that they still lack the splunk logs, chain of custody documents, portable media and external drives, router configuration files or data, network diagram, backups of election management data, digital copies of all election policies and procedures utilized, files transmitted for duplicating or spoiling ballots, records of all paper distributed to vote centers, information and guidelines on adjudication of ballots, the total count of all ballots sent to eligible voters on the state’s voter information portal (UOCAVA), and a full backup copy of the database of voter rolls.

Bennett explained that since the Senate issued the subpoena and not a court, the Senate must agree on holding the county accountable. Otherwise, they will have to submit another subpoena.

“[A]t the moment, and for several weeks now, one of the sixteen senators in the Arizona Senate has been unwilling to hold the county in contempt of the senate, not in contempt of the court,” explained Bennett. “Without that sixteenth vote, it’s left to ask and try to re-subpoena[.]”

Christian Lamar, a state representative candidate, had asked Fann to confirm or deny that Boyer was the one Republican refusing to hold the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors in contempt.

“.@FannKfann is it true AZ State Senator Paul Boyer refuses again to hold the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors in contempt?” asked Lamar. “Ken Bennett […] said 1 of 16 Republicans is stopping it. Pls confirm. LD20 voters will take action against Boyer again!”

Fann confirmed. She explained that Boyer refused to cooperate in enforcing the subpoena. She didn’t tag Boyer in her response.

“Senator Boyer agreed to proceed with audit but when Maricopa BOS refused to cooperate, Boyer would not vote with us for the resolution of contempt which leaves us one vote short,” wrote Fann.

About an hour later, Boyer responded that Fann had withheld information that would’ve impacted his support for the audit originally. He added that he lacked confidence in Cyber Ninjas due to their inexperience and openly partisan views, noting that he wasn’t the only one who would’ve acted differently had he known about the company previously.

“You told us in closed caucus the ‘audit’ would not cost taxpayers more than 150k and you wouldn’t divulge who you were hiring,” wrote Boyer. “Had you told us it was an inexperienced, partisan firm, I wouldn’t have been the only one to object.”

In response to criticisms of his decision, Boyer insinuated that the senators continuing to support the audit were fools indulging in a folly.

“Answer not a fool according to his folly, lest you also be like him. Answer a fool according to his folly, lest he be wise in his own conceit,” quoted Boyer from the Bible.

As of press time, Boyer hasn’t issued any further updates indicating that he would change his vote to support the resolution of contempt.

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Corinne Murdock is a reporter at The Arizona Sun Times and the Star News Network. Follow her latest on Twitter, or email tips to [email protected].

 

 

 

 

 

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