Democrats are doing everything in their power to stop the audit in Arizona. So far, their efforts have failed, and rightfully so. Recently, the Biden-led Department of Justice sent a letter setting forth several concerns about the audit taking place in Arizona. While the concerns raised in the letter should be addressed, it is somewhat ironic that Democrats were unwilling to consider, or even raise, such concerns during the 2020 election. This, of course, is yet another sign of the Left’s shameful hypocrisy.
According to multiple news outlets, the DOJ Civil Rights Division recently sent a letter to Arizona State Senator Karen Fann in which it voiced several concerns regarding the audit. As reported by abc15:
The first issue brought up by the DOJ relates to the audit itself and how it is being handled. Principle Deputy Attorney Pamela Karlan writes that “reports suggesting that the ballots, election systems, and election materials that are subject of the Maricopa County audit are no longer under the ultimate control of state and local election officials, are not being adequately safeguarded by contractors at a secure facility, and are at risk of being lost, stolen, altered, compromised or destroyed.”
The second concern deals with reports that the scope of work that Cyber Ninjas, the group running the audit, put together “indicates that the contractor has been working with a number of individuals to identify voter registrations that did not make sense.”
The department says the description of reports surrounding canvassing 2020 voters may constitute “intimidation of persons for voting or attempting to vote.”
How convenient! While these concerns should definitely be addressed and corrected, if necessary, it is somewhat ironic that Democrats, collectively, were silent during the 2020 elections, the results of which were riddled with possible violations, rampant impropriety, and potential fraud.
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Based on recent reporting, the Biden-led DOJ is concerned with who has control of the ballots and election materials in Maricopa County. As reported by NPR, federal law requires state and local election workers to store and safeguard federal voting records. They are also apparently concerned that “plans for door-to-door canvassing may also violate federal laws aimed at preventing voter intimidation.” According to Deputy Attorney Pamela Karlan:
The Senate’s contract with Cyber Ninjas states the firms plan to “identify voter registrations that did not make sense, and then knock on doors to confirm if valid voters actually lived at the state address.” Auditors also plan to ask voters about their voting history to determine “whether the individual voted in the [November] election.”
“Past experience with similar investigative efforts around the country has raised concerns that they can be directed at minority voters, which potentially can implicate the anti-intimidation prohibitions of the Voting Rights Act. Such investigative efforts can have a significant intimidating effect on qualified voters that can deter them from seeking to vote in the future.”
If these concerns are genuine and legitimate, they should definitely be addressed. After all, any audit should be transparent, thorough, unbiased, and should not give the appearance of impropriety. Moreover, to the extent possible, an audit should not include any type of conduct that could result in voter intimidation or suppression.
Given what transpired in 2020, the fact that these concerns were only raised during the course of a major audit (which some Democrats, including Raquel Terán, chair of the Arizona Democratic Party, refer to as a “sham”), raises some questions. Why didn’t Democrats voice the same concerns when millions of people voted by mail or via absentee ballot without providing identification and/or without signature verification? Why didn’t Democrats voice serious concerns with the use of unsupervised drop boxes in various cities and towns throughout the county, or when ballot harvesters took ballots from unsuspecting voters? How about the instances where votes were still being “found” and “counted” well after the election? Weren’t they concerned with safeguarding or voter intimidation then? How about election integrity?
Predictably, Democrats will allege that no such evidence exists, or point to left-wing news reports or court decisions that prematurely dismissed various election-related lawsuits. The point of the matter is that Democrats were not concerned about such issues when such alleged actions served to benefit their interests, but only when such actions could potentially harm their cause. They did not call for investigations. They also didn’t encourage the various state legislatures to do their job and to thoroughly investigate the various claims. To the contrary, they discounted them as frivolous Republican talking points.
This is a classic left-wing strategy. Simply stated, the “rules” of the game are entirely based on whether Democrats are on offense or on defense. If the former, they make the rules. If the latter, compliance is mandatory. Remember Robert Mueller’s Russia “investigation?” Democrats supported that witch hunt despite the lack of any credible evidence allegedly tying President Trump to any Russia collusion. They attacked and smeared Justice Brett Kavanaugh and his family despite the absence of any credible evidence supporting the allegations. They also impeached President Trump (solely for political purposes) based on a perfectly legitimate phone call with the president of Ukraine. Most recently, they overlooked a recent report involving John Kerry and allegations that he leaked top secret information involving Israel to Iran. As Senator Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) recently stated, “I’m going to stand by John Kerry.”
The audit in Arizona is part of a concerted effort to ensure election integrity. Clearly, any audit should be performed in a manner that is fair and unbiased so that the results are valid and reliable, yet there are many questions that need to be answered, justifying an audit. For example, were there any irregularities in the way that the election was conducted? Was there any fraudulent conduct? Was everyone’s vote counted? Were votes counted that should not have been counted? Based on the findings, what areas and/or laws could use improvement, and how could they be improved?
The answers to these questions should garner bi-partisan support. Clearly, this is not the case, as Democrats are fighting feverishly to stop the audit, which raises the question: Why? Why try to stop an audit of the results of an election that Democrats claim was fair and square, and free from any impropriety? As previously reported by the Chicago Tribune, in 2020, Schumer dismissed Trump’s challenges as “frivolous” and opined that Biden won the election “fair and square.”
Why, then, are Democrats so worried about this audit, the goal of which is to improve and to make the nation’s elections safer in the future?
Perhaps the results of the audit will provide some answers to these questions.
