Maricopa County officials tapped former Arizona Supreme Court Justice Ruth McGregor to investigate the printing problems in the 2022 election, and on Monday, the county released her report blaming the thickness of the ballot paper. Jennifer Wright, who was the Election Integrity Unit civil attorney for the Arizona Attorney General’s Office during the election and who performed her own investigation of Maricopa County’s election problems going back to the 2020 presidential election, told The Arizona Sun Times the report was “meaningless” since it did not include an analysis of the printer logs.
Wright tweeted on Monday, “The report proves printers failed, but doesn’t identify WHY some Oki printers experienced more problems than others. It seems to ‘exonerate’ MC without determining the ROOT cause of failure. It’s surface level stuff. It’s embarrassing. It would fail cross-examination.”
She further explained, “When a report simply confirms a problem exists but can’t explain why — it isn’t an investigative report, it’s an incident report. Would an insurance company end an investigation after determining the brakes failed? No! They’d find out why. Maintenance? Defect? Sabotage?”
Wright disagreed that the thickness of the paper was the problem. “Note the report confirms WILDLY different error rates on seemingly identical machines,” she tweeted. “If the root cause was simply paper thickness and ballot length, you’d expect substantially similar error rates. This report would not be enough to prove causation in a basic tort claim.”
She called it a “lackluster” investigation, stating, “Transcribing interviews is not an independent investigation,” and “You can’t find what you don’t look for.”
She also expressed concern that the report did not look into other aspects of the problem: on-site tabulator logs, system logs, and actual Election Day ballots in 2022.
The report proves printers failed, but doesn’t identify WHY some Oki printers experienced more problems than others.
It seems to “exonerate” MC without determining the ROOT cause of failure.
It’s surface level stuff.
It’s embarrassing.
It would fail cross-examination.
4/4— Jen Wright (@JenWEsq) April 11, 2023
During the printer stress test in September before the election, McGregor said the 100-pound paper was used with a 20-inch ballot instead of a 19-inch ballot since the ballot size had increased to accommodate all the contests. She said the printers performed fine with the larger size — but their settings were for heavy paper.
19-inch ballots were used during the primary election, and lighter-weight paper was used in 2020 and previous elections. Election workers discovered on Election Day after encountering problems that once the media weight settings were changed to “heavy,” the printers performed a little better. McGregor’s report concluded that using 20-inch ballots on 100-pound paper pushed the printers to their limits, so the 100-pound paper should not be used in future elections.
McGregor said she was “also asked to review the chain-of-custody policies affecting BOD printers and consider whether the election day issues resulted from human error or process and equipment issues.” However, she did not investigate why the printer settings on Election Day were not set for heavy paper. There has been speculation that a rogue actor could have adjusted them remotely.
Wright skeptically considered McGregor’s reference to “Sharpiegate,” where the county handed out markers to voters that bled through the ballots, a red herring. McGregor implied that perhaps the heavier paper had been used to avoid bleed-through.
“The gratuitous reference to ‘Sharpiegate’ seems to imply voter concerns in ’20 over bleed through somehow caused MC to deploy error-prone inadequately tested printers in 2022,” Wright tweeted. “The report feels like another victim-blaming, ‘you reap what you sow’ lecture from MC.”
McGregor listed numerous experts, county employees, and other election workers to whom she spoke with, but none were whistleblowers or anyone who had complained about election problems.
Kari Lake, who is still contesting the results of her election loss to Democratic Arizona Governor Katie Hobbs, condemned the report. “Maricopa County has released the results of their internal investigation & has SHOCKINGLY found themselves not guilty of any crime,” the Kari Lake War Room account tweeted. “We told you this was a farce. These people don’t think your vote or your opinion matters. And anyone who takes the results of this ‘investigation’ seriously is part of the problem.”
Lake added from her personal Twitter account, “Maricopa County will figure out who screwed up their election just as soon as OJ Simpson finds the real killer.”
Wright is now working as Abe Hamadeh’s attorney challenging his close election loss to Democratic Attorney General Kris Mayes due to Mayes “targeting” her. Hamadeh issued his own statement about McGregor’s report.
“They refused to extend voting hours, lectured the most skeptical voters, sought sanctions for anyone challenging the election, withheld evidence, hired an ‘independent’ investigator that to no one’s surprise absolves them of any responsibility,” Hamadeh tweeted. “Time and time again when given the opportunity to do the right thing or coverup their failures they’ve chosen the option that avoids any criticism and scrutiny.”
– – –
Rachel Alexander is a reporter at The Arizona Sun Times and The Star News Network. Follow Rachel on Twitter. Email tips to [email protected].
Photo “Jennifer Wright” by Jennifer Wright. Background Photo “People Voting” by Ben Schumin. CC BY-SA 3.0.
[…] did not find any evidence of intentional misconduct involving Election Day ballots.” That report was inconclusive about the cause of the printer issues on Election Day. Jennifer Wright, who was […]
[…] did not find any evidence of intentional misconduct involving Election Day ballots.” That report was inconclusive about the cause of the printer issues on Election Day. Jennifer Wright, who was […]
[…] did not find any evidence of intentional misconduct involving Election Day ballots.” That report was inconclusive about the cause of the printer issues on Election Day. Jennifer Wright, who was […]
[…] did not find any evidence of intentional misconduct involving Election Day ballots.” That report was inconclusive about the cause of the printer issues on Election Day. Jennifer Wright, who was […]
[…] found no evidence of intentional misconduct involving ballots cast on Election Day.” He report There was inconclusive opinion regarding the cause of printer problems on election day. Jennifer […]
[…] didn’t discover any proof of intentional misconduct involving Election Day ballots.” That report was inconclusive about the reason for the printer points on Election Day. Jennifer Wright, who was […]
[…] didn’t discover any proof of intentional misconduct involving Election Day ballots.” That report was inconclusive about the reason for the printer points on Election Day. Jennifer Wright, who was […]
[…] didn’t in finding any proof of intentional misconduct involving Election Day ballots.” That report was once inconclusive about the reason for the printer problems on Election Day. Jennifer Wright, […]
If you look at how many registered voters there was BEFORE the election and days AFTER the election you would be shocked. Katie Hobbs webiste BEFORE election said we had about 1,500,000 voters. 11 days AFTER the election the site said there was over 2,100,000 voters. Any bets that number will revert back to 1,500,000 now that election over? How could this happen? reverse engineer the votes via RunBeck election system. Counts the votes in Pinal and Pima county, then reverse engineer the Democrat only votes and count them again in Maricopa county. It’s not only possible but probable. Thus the reason Katie Hobbs never knew how many votes outstanding, but talking on Twitter don’t worry Maricopa County working hard. Sorry Biden didn’t get votes than Trump, Obama, Hillary neither did Mark Kelly, just like they did for him in 2018 and 2020. Just a theory not an accusation.
Do they really expects us to believe the thickness of the paper was what caused the problem?
C’mon people. We are not stupid. We know what happened, what you did. Stop the coverup.
What is not being said is that according to ARS 16-449 (B) & (C) it clearly states the following:
B. Electronic ballot tabulating systems shall be tested for logic and accuracy within seven days before their use for early balloting pursuant to the instructions and procedures manual for electronic voting systems that is adopted by the secretary of state as prescribed by section 16-452. The instructions and procedures manual shall include procedures for the handling of ballots, the electronic scanning of ballots and any other matters necessary to ensure the maximum degree of correctness, impartiality and uniformity in the administration of an electronic ballot tabulating system.
C. Notwithstanding subsections A and B of this section, if a county uses accessible voting equipment to mark ballots and that accessible voting equipment does not independently tabulate or tally votes, the secretary of state in cooperation with the county officer in charge of elections may designate a single date to test the logic and accuracy of both the accessible voting equipment and electronic ballot tabulating systems.
Having said this, there can be no other conclusion than this was a deliberate act perpetrated by the MCBOSs, Stephen Richer and Katie Hobbs. The statute clearly states that the machines used HAVE to be tested and verified for logic and accuracy. It is plainly obvious they were not; otherwise all these issues would have been identified and appropriate action taken to correct it. One cannot disallow the simple fact that paper weight or print size would not have been identified and corrected.
in essence their report is damning in its content if one KNOWS the statute and the law. The election was compromised and the acts for it to happen by the very nature of their report show it was deliberate.
There can be no other conclusion drawn – especially IF the statute had been followed and the necessary corrections made as required to prevent it. was done prior to the election cycle. There is NO EXCUSE for the problems encountered, and they cannot be explained away had they followed the statutes and verified the operation for both logic and accuracy.
So in actuality they are admitting to a KNOWN problem in direct violation of ARS 16-449 whereas it clealy states in sctions B % C :
B. Electronic ballot tabulating systems shall be tested for logic and accuracy within seven days before their use for early balloting pursuant to the instructions and procedures manual for electronic voting systems that is adopted by the secretary of state as prescribed by section 16-452. The instructions and procedures manual shall include procedures for the handling of ballots, the electronic scanning of ballots and any other matters necessary to ensure the maximum degree of correctness, impartiality and uniformity in the administration of an electronic ballot tabulating system.
C. Notwithstanding subsections A and B of this section, if a county uses accessible voting equipment to mark ballots and that accessible voting equipment does not independently tabulate or tally votes, the secretary of state in cooperation with the county officer in charge of elections may designate a single date to test the logic and accuracy of both the accessible voting equipment and electronic ballot tabulating systems.
Therefore since the paper weight was wrong, the ballot printing area was wrong and the outcome was wrong and has been well documented; then their actions cannot be labeled anything but deliberate.
You cannot read the law two ways – Either the machines and all equipment met the standards for accurate tablulation or they didn”t; and they didn’t for thee 2020 and 2022 election cycles,
How can you have a clear adission of guilt and claim it wasn’r a crime? So what Arizonans are being told is that our laws are only a suggetion and there is not, nor ever will be justice in this stae. Where else can you knowingly and willfully violare elections laws and than say there is no crime?
Crooked Democrat Arizona election as well as legal personnel standing on their heads to prevent information supporting stolen election from being investigated.
All all the printer problems were there jut to make sur democrats won the election, including the governorship. After all, Hobbs was Secretary of state and responsible for what went on in the election. Still do not see how she could run for governor.
Jovan Pulitzer has also done tremendous work on the Arizona election.
I highly recommend you watch this video – although long, it outlines how this process of election theft has been so widespread.
https://rumble.com/v2ato8w-arizona-senate-elections-and-house-oversight-deep-dive-w-supporting-forensi.html
If you haven’t watched or listened to the video Mary-Jo has listed, you need to. There’s a lot of information in it. A lot of proof of what has happened in the elections. There’s too many crooks. We need term limits.
Thank you!
This country is going to hell because of stolen elections. Our democracy didn’t elect these whacko tyrants.
What it would conclude if a real report were to be done is that it wasn’t failure it was sabotage.