Arizona’s Maricopa County won’t reuse voting machines after GOP ‘audit’ compromised their security

Maricopa County Board of Supervisors to replace equipment after partisan review broke chain of custody

Officials in Arizona’s Maricopa County will replace all voting machines handed over to a Republican-led “audit” of 2020 presidential election results after warnings that the partisan review may have compromised their security.

In May, Arizona Secretary of State Katie Hobbs said that the “chain of custody, a critical security tenet, has been compromised and election officials do not know what was done to the machines” while under control of Cyber Ninjas, a Florida cybersecurity firm ordered by Arizona’s Republican-controlled state legislature to perform an “audit” of election results.

The firm did not have previous elections experience, and its founder amplified “Stop the Steal” conspiracy theories alleging Donald Trump’s re-election was “stolen” from him and his supporters.

On 28 June, the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors responded to Ms Hobbs, affirming that the county “will not use the subpoenaed equipment in any future elections”.

The county “will never use equipment that could pose a risk to free and fair elections”, the board wrote.

Officials had previously warned about potential security risks in February, prompting Maricopa County to procure new equipment.

“With the backup equipment and the other certified tabulation equipment not subpoenaed, the Board of Supervisors, Elections Department and Recorder’s Office are working with our current vendor to replace the subpoenaed equipment so we will be able to serve voters for the November 2021 election,” the board wrote.

In February, two independent audits confirmed there were no irregularities in the county’s election results, and a statewide hand recount confirmed Joe Biden’s win.

Republican state lawmakers – emboldened by nationwide attempts to undermine the results of 2020 elections and Donald Trump’s legal challenges to toss out millions of ballots – acquired Dominion Voting Systems machines and more than 2 million ballots from November’s presidential election through a subpoena for information for the GOP audit.

Arizona’s secretary of state, voting rights advocates, the US Department of Justice and the president have condemned the partisan probe, warning that it could undermine voter confidence in the electoral process and risk exposing voter information.

In remarks announcing his agency’s commitment to reviewing post-election audits and Republican-backed legislation that restricts ballot access, US Attorney General Merrick Garland said that the justifications for those efforts have “relied on allegations of voting fraud in the 2020 election that have been refuted by … every court, federal and state, that has considered them”.

Justice Department officials also have warned Arizona officials that the audit is violating federal civil rights protections.