Audit results aren't in yet, so none of these claims have been made. Let's wait until the audit results come in and then discuss. By the way, you are legitimizing the audit with your constant attacks.Let's take a look at reality with the fact check from today...
Fact check: Arizona audit hasn't found 275,000 fraudulent votes
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news...ot-found-275-000-fraudulent-votes/5391659001/
The claim: The Arizona election audit has found 275,000 potentially fraudulent votes in one county
After three months, an audit of Arizona's 2020 election results has surfaced no evidence of widespread voter fraud. Former President Donald Trump and his supporters say otherwise.
Since the audit began in late April, misinformation about its findings has spread on social media. Trump and his allies have falsely claimed an entire election database was deleted, that more than 70,000 mail-in ballots counted in Maricopa County – home of Phoenix – were never sent, and that the audit found 250,000 fraudulent ballots.
Now the number has ticked up to 275,000.
"Already the Arizona Audit has found 275,000 potential fraudulent ballots – in just ONE county!" reads the caption of a July 26 video with more than 4,600 likes on Instagram.
The video shows Trump spokeswoman Liz Harrington speaking with host Bret Baier on Fox News. During the clip, which Harrington tweeted July 26, she spells out how she arrived at 275,000.
"That includes 168,000 (ballots) that were printed on thin paper outside of the regulations of Maricopa County," she said. "You have 75,000 ballots that were supposed to be mailed out but they have no record of them ever being sent. You also have 18,000 voters who were purged from the voter rolls, who voted in the election but were purged after the election."
Harington also said 3,981 people voted in Maricopa County despite registering after the deadline, meaning the county "certified false results." Trump himself made similar claims in a couple of mid-July statements.
But those numbers – and the claims of voter fraud – don't add up.
"This was not a stolen election," Stephen Richer, the Republican recorder of Maricopa County, told Baier after Harrington's appearance on Fox News.
USA TODAY reached out to Harrington and the Instagram user who shared the video for comment.
Number of 'fraudulent ballots' doesn't add up
In her Fox News appearance, Harrington cited the findings of an ongoing audit in Maricopa County. But those findings don't support her claim about 275,000 potentially fraudulent ballots.
In March, the Republican-dominated Arizona Senate hired Florida-based firm Cyber Ninjas to lead the audit. Cyber Ninjas has no prior experience with election audits, and its CEO, Doug Logan, has previously promoted election fraud conspiracy theories on social media.
The numbers Harrington cited refer to statements Logan made during a recent Arizona Senate briefing. However, Logan never said auditors had found 275,000 potentially fraudulent ballots.
Maricopa County officials and independent fact-checking organizations have also disputed the figures.
Fact check:Biden CNN town hall crowd smaller than Trump Phoenix speech because it was invite-only
"My best guess for the 275,000 number is that she's adding up all the various Cyber Ninja claims ... to arrive at a total number of ballots she considers suspect," Jason Berry, a spokesperson for Maricopa County, told USA TODAY in an email. "This is not based in fact."
Let's take a closer look at each number in Harrington's claim.
'You have 75,000 ballots that were supposed to be mailed out but they have no record of them ever being sent'
This isn't accurate – USA TODAY rated a similar claim false.
During the July 15 briefing, Logan said auditors had found "74,243 mail-in ballots where there is no clear record of them being sent."
Maricopa County officials previously told USA TODAY it's unclear where exactly that figure came from. But in a Twitter thread, the county wrote that it appeared the auditors were conflating mail-in ballots with all early votes, which include votes cast in person. In-person early votes wouldn't involve anything being mailed.
In a follow-up tweet, the county wrote that, of 2,364,426 requests for mail-in ballots, 1,918,024 were returned.
168,000 ballots 'were printed on thin paper outside of the regulations of Maricopa County'
County officials and fact-checkers have debunked this claim.
During the Senate briefing, Logan raised concerns about ballots where the printing was slightly offset between the front and back, which he said could cause ink to bleed through and change selections. Logan said auditors saw the issues in about 168,000 ballots printed at voting centers.
That claim echoes the debunked "SharpieGate" conspiracy theory, which falsely said ballots filled out with permanent markers bled through and were invalidated. Maricopa County has said bleed-throughs don't affect ballot counting, and Sharpies were actually preferred at voting centers.
During his Fox News appearance, Richer said there's nothing untoward about slight differences in the thickness of ballots.
"Some of our ballots are printed at the precinct-based polls or at the voting centers, and others are mailed out by the central place here in Arizona where they are printed," he said. "So yes, some of them might be a little bit different, but (it's) absolutely false that they are somehow fraudulent."
'You also have 18,000 voters who were purged from the voter rolls'
This claim is off the mark. And it's not evidence of voter fraud, as Harrington makes it seem.
"We have roughly 20,000, I think it was actually about closer to 18,000, (people) who voted in the election and then showed as being removed from the voter rolls soon after the election," Logan said during the Senate briefing.
Fact check:Altered Hunter Biden photo falsely claims Trump won the 2020 election
Logan noted there "could be a good, logical explanation for that." Turns out, there is.
On its website, the Maricopa County Elections Department says there were 13,320 voters who were removed from the rolls between Nov. 3 and Jan. 2. The majority of the removals were because voters died or moved out of the county. Other removals were the product of felony convictions and voter requests.
"Maricopa County has over 2.6 million registered voters and it is not unusual for there to be tens of thousands of changes to the voter rolls each month," the department wrote.
'3,981 people voted despite registering after the Oct. 15 court-ordered deadline'
This is wrong, according to Maricopa County officials.
"Based on the registration information that we found in the voter rolls, we have 3,981 individuals who show as having voted in this election ... however, they were registered after Oct. 15," Logan told the Arizona Senate.
The Maricopa County Elections Department debunked that claim on its website, saying its analysis "found no evidence of any ballot counted from a voter registered after the voter registration deadline" of Oct. 15. Elections officials finished processing voter registration forms around Oct. 23.
About 6,200 voters cast provisional ballots, which Maricopa County elections officials say they had the legal right to do.
"Somebody might have filled out the paperwork by Oct. 15, but that person might have had to vote a provisional ballot because that paperwork wouldn't have been processed until later," Richer said on Fox News. "But as long as they filled it out before Oct. 15, then it's still a valid voter and that vote should count."
No evidence of fraud in Arizona
There is no evidence of widespread fraud affecting the election outcome in Arizona, where Joe Biden beat Trump by more than 10,000 votes.
Multiple hand counts, as well as a forensic audit of voting machines, have confirmed Maricopa County's election results. Of the more than 3 million ballots cast in Arizona, elections officials have found fewer than 200 cases of potential voter fraud, the Associated Press reported.
"Maricopa County stands by the results reported by its elections professionals, confirmed by hand counts, two independent audits, and several court challenges, and certified by the Secretary of State, Governor, and Congress," Berry told USA TODAY.
USA TODAY reached out to Logan and Ken Bennett, the Senate's liaison to the audit, for comment.
Our rating: False
Based on our research, we rate FALSE the claim that the Arizona election audit has found 275,000 potential fraudulent votes in one county. The audit has not uncovered evidence of widespread voter fraud affecting the state's election outcome. The 275,000 figure relies on a mix of misinterpreted data, conspiratorial claims about paper ballots, and misconceptions about Arizona's election administration. Maricopa County officials – including some Republicans – have pushed back against claims that the audit has uncovered fraudulent votes.
The Arizona "Audit"
- Thread starter gwb-trading
- Start date
Audit results aren't in yet, so none of these claims have been made. Let's wait until the audit results come in and then discuss. By the way, you are legitimizing the audit with your constant attacks.
All sorts of conservatives groups making false election claims financial backed the "fraudit".
Maricopa election audit donor list released
https://news.yahoo.com/maricopa-election-audit-donor-list-025800199.html
Cyber Ninjas, the firm leading the Arizona Senate's audit of Maricopa County's 2020 election, released a list of its "sponsors" on Wednesday after months of criticism over a lack of disclosures about the sources of funding for the controversial review.
Doug Logan, the CEO of Cyber Ninjas, said the audit effort received $3.25 million from the America Project, nearly $1 million from America's Future, over $600,000 from Voices and Votes, $550,000 from Defending the Republic, and $280,000 from LDFFTAR/EIFFTAR.
All of the supporters listed are conservative groups, some with Trump allies such as retired Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn and attorney Sidney Powell attached to them, a review by the Washington Examiner found. One America News Network host, Christina Bobb, helped raise funds through the nonprofit group Voices and Votes, even as she reported on the audit. Not provided was a breakdown of who gave money to the groups.
The more than $5.7 million in donations was added to the $150,000 paid by the GOP-led state Senate to conduct the inquiry, which has been criticized by Maricopa County officials and Arizona Secretary of State Katie Hobbs.
"As we continue our commitment to transparency, we want to take this opportunity to publicly thank and disclose those organizations that have supported us during this audit," Logan said in a statement. "The American Project has provided over 56% of the total proceeds received to date and America's future has brought in 17%."
"We couldn't have done this without everyone's help," he added.
Earlier in the month, Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Michael Kemp questioned Kory Langhofer, an attorney for Senate President Karen Fann, who has resisted releasing donor names. The judge noted Fann hired Cyber Ninjas, an outside firm, to conduct the audit, adding the Prescott Republican has said the inquiry is an "important constitutional duty."
"Isn’t the public entitled to know who’s paying for this, besides the $150,000 the Senate has already appropriated?" the judge asked Langhofer at a hearing in Phoenix.
"That’s a great political argument. They should talk to the Legislature about it," Langhofer responded.
Langhofer indicated the donor records were held only by Cyber Ninjas, not the Arizona legislature. She argued this separation put the state Senate outside of the scope of the state's public records disclosure law.
"The public has a right to know the information that's covered by the Public Records Act but doesn't have a right to know all the information it deems important," Langhofer told the Washington Examiner. "Particularly if that information is not in the custody of the government."
American Oversight, a left-leaning watchdog group, sued the Arizona Senate for records of the audit in May.
“If President Fann had kept her promise to run a transparent process, we wouldn’t be forced to go to court today,” Austin Evers, the executive director of American Oversight, said in a statement. “Instead, President Fann is playing a legal shell game — insisting that the audit is official state business when it needs to issue subpoenas, then keeping it at arm’s length to duck transparency laws.”
Officials involved with the audit have predicted a report on the review's findings will be released later this summer.
Maricopa election audit donor list released
https://news.yahoo.com/maricopa-election-audit-donor-list-025800199.html
Cyber Ninjas, the firm leading the Arizona Senate's audit of Maricopa County's 2020 election, released a list of its "sponsors" on Wednesday after months of criticism over a lack of disclosures about the sources of funding for the controversial review.
Doug Logan, the CEO of Cyber Ninjas, said the audit effort received $3.25 million from the America Project, nearly $1 million from America's Future, over $600,000 from Voices and Votes, $550,000 from Defending the Republic, and $280,000 from LDFFTAR/EIFFTAR.
All of the supporters listed are conservative groups, some with Trump allies such as retired Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn and attorney Sidney Powell attached to them, a review by the Washington Examiner found. One America News Network host, Christina Bobb, helped raise funds through the nonprofit group Voices and Votes, even as she reported on the audit. Not provided was a breakdown of who gave money to the groups.
The more than $5.7 million in donations was added to the $150,000 paid by the GOP-led state Senate to conduct the inquiry, which has been criticized by Maricopa County officials and Arizona Secretary of State Katie Hobbs.
"As we continue our commitment to transparency, we want to take this opportunity to publicly thank and disclose those organizations that have supported us during this audit," Logan said in a statement. "The American Project has provided over 56% of the total proceeds received to date and America's future has brought in 17%."
"We couldn't have done this without everyone's help," he added.
Earlier in the month, Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Michael Kemp questioned Kory Langhofer, an attorney for Senate President Karen Fann, who has resisted releasing donor names. The judge noted Fann hired Cyber Ninjas, an outside firm, to conduct the audit, adding the Prescott Republican has said the inquiry is an "important constitutional duty."
"Isn’t the public entitled to know who’s paying for this, besides the $150,000 the Senate has already appropriated?" the judge asked Langhofer at a hearing in Phoenix.
"That’s a great political argument. They should talk to the Legislature about it," Langhofer responded.
Langhofer indicated the donor records were held only by Cyber Ninjas, not the Arizona legislature. She argued this separation put the state Senate outside of the scope of the state's public records disclosure law.
"The public has a right to know the information that's covered by the Public Records Act but doesn't have a right to know all the information it deems important," Langhofer told the Washington Examiner. "Particularly if that information is not in the custody of the government."
American Oversight, a left-leaning watchdog group, sued the Arizona Senate for records of the audit in May.
“If President Fann had kept her promise to run a transparent process, we wouldn’t be forced to go to court today,” Austin Evers, the executive director of American Oversight, said in a statement. “Instead, President Fann is playing a legal shell game — insisting that the audit is official state business when it needs to issue subpoenas, then keeping it at arm’s length to duck transparency laws.”
Officials involved with the audit have predicted a report on the review's findings will be released later this summer.
More information about the "fraudit" donors...
Arizona’s GOP-backed ballot review has raised more than $5.7 million in private donations, organizers say
https://www.washingtonpost.com/poli...b093c6-f010-11eb-bf80-e3877d9c5f06_story.html
A private contractor conducting a Republican-commissioned review of 2020 presidential ballots in Arizona’s largest county announced late Wednesday that it has collected more than $5.7 million in private donations to fund the process.
The controversial ballot review, which included a hand recount of Maricopa County’s nearly 2.1 million ballots and a review of ballot tabulating machines, has been underway since April. It was ordered by the state’s Republican-led Senate, which agreed to spend $150,000 in taxpayer money to fund the audit. But the Senate allowed Cyber Ninjas, a Florida-based firm hired to lead the process, to collect donations as well.
It has been clear for months that the lengthy ballot review, which was conducted by dozens of workers, some working nearly round-the-clock, was being largely financed by allies of former president Donald Trump. The newly released figures put that fact in sharp relief: More than 97 percent of the audit’s costs have so far been shouldered by donations from five organizations led by people who have promoted the false claim that the election was stolen.
In a statement, Cyber Ninjas indicated that $3.25 million came from the America Project, a group led by former Overstock chief executive Patrick Byrne.
Byrne became a key player in challenging the legitimacy of the election after the November vote, joining former national security adviser Michael Flynn and pro-Trump attorney Sidney Powell in a raucous December meeting with Trump in the Oval Office. During the meeting, the trio urged Trump to appoint Powell as special counsel to investigate voting machines in key counties across the country. Flynn now serves as a paid adviser to the group.
In June, Byrne told The Washington Post that he had personally donated $500,000 to the Arizona effort and that his group was raising money from others, too. Byrne also produced a movie alleging massive fraud in the election that featured interviews with Doug Logan, the head of Cyber Ninjas.
Another $605,000 came from Voices and Votes, a group led by One America News host Christina Bobb. Bobb has used on-air appearances for the pro-Trump network to solicit donations for the group.
The Post has reported that Trump’s political PAC raised about $75 million in the first half of this year, using his false claims that the election was stolen to motivate donors, but has given no money to finance the Arizona ballot review.
The announcement from Cyber Ninjas came as Arizona Senate President Karen Fann announced Wednesday that the audit has concluded its public efforts — ballots will be returned Thursday to Maricopa County. The county’s Republican-led board of supervisors has been deeply critical of the effort.
Fann has said a final report of Cyber Ninjas’ findings is expected in August.
Arizona’s GOP-backed ballot review has raised more than $5.7 million in private donations, organizers say
https://www.washingtonpost.com/poli...b093c6-f010-11eb-bf80-e3877d9c5f06_story.html
A private contractor conducting a Republican-commissioned review of 2020 presidential ballots in Arizona’s largest county announced late Wednesday that it has collected more than $5.7 million in private donations to fund the process.
The controversial ballot review, which included a hand recount of Maricopa County’s nearly 2.1 million ballots and a review of ballot tabulating machines, has been underway since April. It was ordered by the state’s Republican-led Senate, which agreed to spend $150,000 in taxpayer money to fund the audit. But the Senate allowed Cyber Ninjas, a Florida-based firm hired to lead the process, to collect donations as well.
It has been clear for months that the lengthy ballot review, which was conducted by dozens of workers, some working nearly round-the-clock, was being largely financed by allies of former president Donald Trump. The newly released figures put that fact in sharp relief: More than 97 percent of the audit’s costs have so far been shouldered by donations from five organizations led by people who have promoted the false claim that the election was stolen.
In a statement, Cyber Ninjas indicated that $3.25 million came from the America Project, a group led by former Overstock chief executive Patrick Byrne.
Byrne became a key player in challenging the legitimacy of the election after the November vote, joining former national security adviser Michael Flynn and pro-Trump attorney Sidney Powell in a raucous December meeting with Trump in the Oval Office. During the meeting, the trio urged Trump to appoint Powell as special counsel to investigate voting machines in key counties across the country. Flynn now serves as a paid adviser to the group.
In June, Byrne told The Washington Post that he had personally donated $500,000 to the Arizona effort and that his group was raising money from others, too. Byrne also produced a movie alleging massive fraud in the election that featured interviews with Doug Logan, the head of Cyber Ninjas.
Another $605,000 came from Voices and Votes, a group led by One America News host Christina Bobb. Bobb has used on-air appearances for the pro-Trump network to solicit donations for the group.
The Post has reported that Trump’s political PAC raised about $75 million in the first half of this year, using his false claims that the election was stolen to motivate donors, but has given no money to finance the Arizona ballot review.
The announcement from Cyber Ninjas came as Arizona Senate President Karen Fann announced Wednesday that the audit has concluded its public efforts — ballots will be returned Thursday to Maricopa County. The county’s Republican-led board of supervisors has been deeply critical of the effort.
Fann has said a final report of Cyber Ninjas’ findings is expected in August.
They have much more money that they can raise. When the money stops, the audit will end.
Riddle:
If you pay a bunch of clowns, by the hour, to screw in one light bulb, how long will it take them to complete the task?
UNTIL THE MONEY RUNS OUT!!
Cyber Ninja's audit funded by a wretched hive of scum and villainy.
Michael Flynn, Lawyer Sidney Powell, OAN Reporters Behind Arizona Vote Audit Funding
Revelations about the funders raises even more red flags over the secretive Cyber Ninjas presidential election recount.
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/ariz...rick-byrne-funding_n_6104afcde4b0048f361d70b1
Nonprofit groups run by a crew of radical right-wing conspiracy theorists are paying millions of dollars to fund much of the sham Arizona vote audit launched by Republican state senators, according to records released following a lawsuit demanding transparency in the process.
Groups headed by former President Donald Trump’s ousted national security adviser Michael Flynn (nearly $1 million), conspiracy lawyer Sidney Powell ($550,000) and two correspondents from One American News Network ($605,000) — who gushed about the audit operation while paying for it — are among the top funders of the controversial recount by the inexperienced Cyber Ninjas company, according to the records.
The unveiling of the people bankrolling the audit appears to further undermine any remaining credibility in the operation.
The America Project ($3.2 million), run by former Overstock furniture company CEO and QAnon acolyte Patrick Byrne, also chipped in, making a total of some $5.7 million paid by Trump supporters who backed his lie that Joe Biden won the presidency only because of widespread election fraud. The Arizona Senate, which hired Cyber Ninjas, has allocated only $150,000 for the process.
The funding numbers and documents provided by Cyber Ninjas didn’t cleanly add up, reported The Arizona Republic.
Cyber Ninjas revealed funders’ identities after the Republic sued for records on the audit of 2.1 million Maricopa County votes run by CEO Doug Logan. Logan, a QAnon conspiracy theorist, was convinced before he looked at a single Arizona ballot that “hundreds of thousands” of additional votes would inevitably be found for Trump.
Among multiple questionable practices, the Ninjas have exposed ballots to infrared light in a hunt for “bamboo fibers,” which organizers claim would prove interference from China. Last month, copies of voter data were spirited out of Phoenix and taken to an isolated cabin in Montana, some 1,300 miles away.
The Ninjas’ recount deadline was May 14, but a report on findings has yet to be released. Logan now plans to send out workers to knock on residents’ doors to grill them about their Nov. 3 votes.
Critics say that the operation hasn’t turned up a shred of evidence of Trump’s “big lie” of a rigged election and that the company is stalling for time and desperately grasping at anything to justify the multimillion-dollar contract.
The Arizona vote was certified more than six months ago by Republican Gov. Doug Ducey after Biden beat Trump by 10,457 votes in the state, and several recounts failed to find any irregularities.
Michael Flynn, Lawyer Sidney Powell, OAN Reporters Behind Arizona Vote Audit Funding
Revelations about the funders raises even more red flags over the secretive Cyber Ninjas presidential election recount.
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/ariz...rick-byrne-funding_n_6104afcde4b0048f361d70b1
Nonprofit groups run by a crew of radical right-wing conspiracy theorists are paying millions of dollars to fund much of the sham Arizona vote audit launched by Republican state senators, according to records released following a lawsuit demanding transparency in the process.
Groups headed by former President Donald Trump’s ousted national security adviser Michael Flynn (nearly $1 million), conspiracy lawyer Sidney Powell ($550,000) and two correspondents from One American News Network ($605,000) — who gushed about the audit operation while paying for it — are among the top funders of the controversial recount by the inexperienced Cyber Ninjas company, according to the records.
The unveiling of the people bankrolling the audit appears to further undermine any remaining credibility in the operation.
The America Project ($3.2 million), run by former Overstock furniture company CEO and QAnon acolyte Patrick Byrne, also chipped in, making a total of some $5.7 million paid by Trump supporters who backed his lie that Joe Biden won the presidency only because of widespread election fraud. The Arizona Senate, which hired Cyber Ninjas, has allocated only $150,000 for the process.
The funding numbers and documents provided by Cyber Ninjas didn’t cleanly add up, reported The Arizona Republic.
Cyber Ninjas revealed funders’ identities after the Republic sued for records on the audit of 2.1 million Maricopa County votes run by CEO Doug Logan. Logan, a QAnon conspiracy theorist, was convinced before he looked at a single Arizona ballot that “hundreds of thousands” of additional votes would inevitably be found for Trump.
Among multiple questionable practices, the Ninjas have exposed ballots to infrared light in a hunt for “bamboo fibers,” which organizers claim would prove interference from China. Last month, copies of voter data were spirited out of Phoenix and taken to an isolated cabin in Montana, some 1,300 miles away.
The Ninjas’ recount deadline was May 14, but a report on findings has yet to be released. Logan now plans to send out workers to knock on residents’ doors to grill them about their Nov. 3 votes.
Critics say that the operation hasn’t turned up a shred of evidence of Trump’s “big lie” of a rigged election and that the company is stalling for time and desperately grasping at anything to justify the multimillion-dollar contract.
The Arizona vote was certified more than six months ago by Republican Gov. Doug Ducey after Biden beat Trump by 10,457 votes in the state, and several recounts failed to find any irregularities.
Let's let the audit play out and wait to pass judgement until the results are announced.
Fact checkers creating a narrative
First they list the claim as a myth to start with, then they conclude either true or false
Their counterpoints are mostly statements from the election committee which they accept as fact. There is no empirical evidence to back their statement, they don't show it
The Manhattan District Attorney now has his tax returns and those of the Trump organization.
They are currently planning indictments.
Another way to look at it...they are going to cut off the head of the snake to remove the threat to Democracy. Republicans are scrambling to get the followers of Trump prior to any criminal investigations / convictions.
Catering to the BIG LIE is a great way to get the followers of Trump.
wrbtrader