Arizona Election Fraud: Supervisors Accept County Shenanigans, Reject a Proper Audit

J.T. Waldron

The Pima County Board of Supervisors refused to conduct a proper hand-count audit of the 2012 general election ballots. This decision was made despite seasoned statisticians and computer experts in its own Election Integrity Commission indicating that the county's elections are not verifiable in their current state.

The primary reason? Timing. Pima County's use of this rationale is ironic because it appears that the county was in complete control its timing. As EIC member Mickey Duniho states in reference to Pima County Administrator Chuck Huckelberry:

"Mr. Huckelberry unilaterally postponed the recommendation without consulting or informing the Election Integrity Commission. This violated the Commission’s right to advise the Board of Supervisors without interference, and it also violated basic rules of courtesy."

This postponement plays a role in solidifying the board's argument that 'it's too late'.

Huckelberry's recent memo, which is rife with distortions and errors, states that it's impossible to do a hand count audit. Such hyperbole was thoroughly eviscerated by Mickey Duniho's point by point response to the erroneous memo. Duniho provided his rebuttal in writing to each member of the board of supervisors.

"Your elections are being run by a sociopath," said EIC member Jim March. Elections Director Brad Nelson was held under a burning magnifying glass in the most recent Board of Supervisors meeting as March leveled a series of new charges against Nelson. First, March states that Nelson had his county-issued credit card yanked for fraud, yet he still keeps his job.

Other charges had to do with Nelson's management style with his employers. According to March, employees are willing to recall how they were retained because it was easy for Nelson to "make them cry" and "that's something he needed to do on occasion". Finally, March accused Nelson of breaking the law as he states that Nelson would ask temporary staff and poll workers to switch their party allegiance so that he can continue to retain these employees for future tasks.

Jim March's history of careful, meticulous analysis  before calling any one person's reputation into question adds significant weight to these charges.  We can only hope that an independent investigation into Brad Nelson's activities will take place. 

The only Supervisor concerned about having verifiable elections for this elections cycle was Ray Carroll, a Republican who has consistently moved to transcend party affiliation and improve transparency.

Arizona solidifies its national reputation as the 'meth lab of democracy' because those who can intervene refuse to make direct, immediate, substantive changes to the elections process.

Arizona Election Fraud: Mickey Duniho and Jim March Report Election Shenanigans to Pima County's Board of Supervisors

 County Board of Supervisors Comment for 11-13-2012

I have not spoken in this forum since I was appointed to your Election Integrity Commission four years ago. A sequence of events has brought me here today.

* * * * * * * *

The first event: In November 2011 the state added new election requirements, including one that counties must sort early ballots by precincts for the hand count audit. John Moffatt was involved, and reported to your commission on changes proposed and made – but did not report this new requirement to your commission.

The second event: In June and July 2012, Brad Nelson applied for and received a waiver from this requirement. Mr. Nelson neither consulted nor informed your commission of this action.

The third event: On October 26, with statistical evidence suggesting potential fraud nationally in computerized vote counting, an emergency meeting of your Election Integrity Commission unanimously approved a recommendation for today’s meeting that you order the sorting of early ballots and a precinct-based hand count audit to confirm the honesty of Pima County elections.

The fourth event: In response to a lawsuit the County included copies of two letters which revealed the existence of the new early ballot sorting requirement and Mr. Nelson’s successful request for a waiver of that requirement.

The fifth event: Without informing or consulting your Election Integrity Commission, your staff postponed your consideration of our recommendation to November 20.

The sixth event: In response to a query about why your Commission’s recommendation was missing from the November 13th agenda, Mr. Moffatt attributed the delay to ballot counting and possible recounts and challenges. The reasons given are clearly not relevant to delaying your consideration of our recommendation, and serve only to tighten the time frame in which to organize people to implement a precinct-based hand count audit before the ballots are moved to the Treasurer’s vault.

This sequence of events raises the question whether there is genuine importance or credence given to election integrity in our county. Your staff has been disrespectful to your Election Integrity Commission and by implication insubordinate to you.

The question now is whether you will take any action to address these acts of disrespect to you and the Election Integrity Commission you created four years ago, after listening to two years of public concern about the conduct of elections in Pima County, and after Pima County lost, at great taxpayer expense, a lawsuit having to do with election transparency.

If there is no election fraud to mask, there is no reason for Pima County’s continued tolerance of the obvious anti-transparency efforts demonstrated by your staff.

Thank you for your attention.

Michael A. Duniho

Former Rep. Ted Downing Recalls Efforts to Exclude Audit of County Races

Pima County has not only fought over the plain meaning of various election and public records laws, it has actively intervened in drafting of election laws.

Specifically, in 2006, former Representative Ted Downing and former Senator Karen Johnson authored SB 1557 in the State legislature to mandate random auditing and hand counting of ballots. Pima County Election Director Brad Nelson told Downing that including county races in the bill would be a "deal breaker". Nelson said that he and the Maricopa County Election Director would oppose the entire bill if the County elections were covered by the mandatory hand count. Because of that threat, SB 1557 was passed into what became A.R.S. §16-602 and County races were not included.

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Retired NSA Analyst Mickey Duniho Testifies in Arizona Election Integrity Trial

Mickey Duniho testified in yesterday's election integrity hearing held in Tucson, Arizona.  Duniho is one of thirteen plaintiffs suing Pima County to get them to comply with existing election laws.   He provides an excellent summary of the problems verifying elections counted on electronic voting machines.

Pima County is notorious for fighting measures for election integrity and  have spent millions of taxpayer's dollars to prevent disclosure of public election records. 

The aim of the lawsuit against Pima County is to get the court to:

1. Issue an injunction requiring the Defendants to instruct poll workers to include, in every Official Return Envelope, a copy of the signed “tally lists” or results tape as required by A.R.S. §16-615.

2. Issue an injunction mandating that the Defendants separate the vote by mail ballots by precinct.

3.  Issue and injunction ordering Pima County to conduct sufficient randomly selected hand count audits of the vote by mail ballots, according to the procedure outlined in A.R.S. 16-602.  County races must be included in the audit.

This suit also requests the recovery of legal fees incurred.

A ruling on this case is expected today.

Donna Branch-Gilby Talks About Why She Ran Against Supervisor Sharon Bronson

Arizona:  In light of Pima County Supervisor Sharon Bronson's campaign season shots at Republican rival Tanner Bell over money and politics, the public is slowly starting to learn that the real question should be "Who's your sugar daddy?"

Tom and Terry: Sunday’s comic bonus

Arizona Daily Independent

By L Hunnicutt

Tom Horne was found this past week to have violated campaign finance laws.
The public outcry is nearly non-existant.

Both Attorney General Tom Horne and former Attorney General Terry Goddard failed to provide shed light on the RTA election.

Thr public outcry has been nearly nonexistant.

Crickets……