Arizona Election Fraud: Is Arizona's Secretary of State Feigning Ignorance Over Terry Goddard's RTA Investigation?

J.T. Waldron

Arizona's Secretary of State's office has issued a surprising answer to Supervisor Ramon Valadez's request for ballot scanning.  Contrary to what has been publicly revealed and analyzed in Arizona Attorney General's public recount of the 2006 RTA election, Arizona's Secretary of State's office issued a memo citing the "accuracy" of Goddard's recount as a reason to forego graphic scanning of ballots.

The key quote in the document is as follows:

"The Secretary of State's office has viewed the idea of ballot scanning as a way to further audit our elections process. However, recent events (the Prop. 112 recount, Attorney General Goddard's evaluation of the RTA election, and the 2012 hand count results) have once again demonstrated that our election machines are incredibly accurate and reliable. Therefore, at this time, I don't believe that it is prudent to spend resources on creating an audit for a process that is already audited."

Perhaps they aren't aware of the chimpanzee hacking the very same GEM's elections system, but we do know that it's incredibly naive to suggest that the need for election audits could only be defined by the potential accuracy and reliability of the machines - not the people running the machines.

So why would the Secretary of State choose to mislead the public with a letter alluding to "accuracy" in Arizona Attorney General Terry Goddard's RTA investigation?

It was Goddard's ill-faited recount of the 2006 RTA election that became part of the legal argument for prospective relief in rigged elections which won an appellate court decision in 2010.   

There were so many problems with Terry Goddard's investigation that election integrity groups AUDITAZ and Voters Unite! issued a twelve page report outlining significant discrepancies between the County's canvass and Goddard's hand count. By what measure does the Secretary of State cite Goddard's hand count as sufficiently accurate to forego meaningful audits? We know that federal guidelines require accuracy within a tolerance of 1 in 500,000. Goddard's recount had:

159 precincts missing 1,541 ballots
126 precincts that had 389 ballots too many
1,152 total ballots missing.

Goddard proclaimed in his press conference that they did such a good job, they found 63 additional ballots. Evidently, this was supposed to distract the public from the fact their count was missing four precinct's worth of ballots.

Goddard's investigation was so bad it garnered national attention on the Mike Malloy show once it was discovered that over a third of the poll tapes (that Goddard refused to inspect) were missing.

The missing poll tapes strongly correspond with electronic records of the RTA election showing memory card re-uploads characteristic of an attempt to pre-program memory cards.

From the perspective of a statistical analysis, one only has to consider the odds of the same precincts experiencing the same re-upload errors correlating to the same missing poll tapes.

Goddard had also refused to perform a forensic exam of the ballots, despite a previous move by the county to compromise court evidence. On the day of his press conference, Goddard acknowledged to the public on the John C. Scott show that he was aware of Pima County violating a court order by compromising evidence in the county vault.

Adding to the need for a forensic exam, court testimony indicated that no adequate protection of the stored RTA ballots took place until a court order was issued in 2011.

Attorney General Terry Goddard clearly moved beyond what is considered 'executive discretion' and served in some capacity to ensure Pima County's right to commit election fraud.

When the Secretary of State's office cites Goddard's work as cause to forego graphic scans as a safeguard against election fraud, they are placing themselves in the same camp, especially when Pima County is now the main obstacle to a forensic exam of the RTA ballots.

John Moffatt's name is all over the I-Beta report.
Moffatt represents the suspect in this investigation.

Terry Goddard's investigation into the RTA election showed early signs of compromise as the suspects in the investigation (Pima County) were given the opportunity to shape the investigation. This took place through Pima County employee John Moffatt, who was afforded the opportunity to make himself an inextricable part of the report created by the independent data firm, I-Beta. Moffatt was also named in the I-Beta report providing many ineffectual tests that were certain to be meaningless in the first half of Goddard's investigation. Since Goddard stated in public that he was aware of Moffatt being caught with his hand in the 'evidence cookie jar',the decision to include Moffatt in this process demonstrates highly questionable judgment. By this time, it was clear that John Moffatt, working directly under Pima County Administrator Chuck Huckelberry, was responsible for the convoluted logic that ultimately cost Pima County over one million dollars in legal fees resisting disclosure of public records.

Goddard continued coddling the suspects as he refused to provide the results of the I-Beta report to those who filed the initial complaint, but let the suspect (Pima County) receive a copy and subsequently instructed the suspect not to provide a copy to those who filed the initial complaint.

These conflicts of interest were so widely publicized it would be difficult for the Secretary of State's office to make a credible claim of ignorance.

The Secretary of State's office should direct its attention to the money being wasted by Pima County as they use every legal measure permissible to stave off a forensic exam of the RTA ballots.

Pima County's Superior court judges have been ruling in defiance of the 2010 appellate court decision granting jurisdiction for prospective relief in rigged elections.

Before any court orders affecting election procedures are issued, the hearing for prospective relief needs to complete the fundamental tasks ignored by Attorney General Terry Goddard. The court must allow for the actual audit of the ballots (comparing, for the first time, one set of numbers to another set of numbers) and a forensic examination of the ballots. In fact, if the audit and forensic exam do not turn up evidence of foul play, the court does not have sufficient cause to issue orders for prospective relief. That outcome would end the case.

So why is Pima County the primary obstacle to this investigation?

All local media outlets fail to articulate this inescapably simple resolution that Pima County avoids. Everyone endowed with basic cognitive skills is left with the uncomfortable realization that Pima County has been caught cheating and they are staving off the inevitable with taxpayer's dollars.

If the Secretary of State's office is so confident in Terry Goddard's investigation of the 2006 RTA Ballots, they should encourage Pima County to stop wasting taxpayers dollars and to stop obstructing the appellate court ruling for prospective relief.  That way, the Secretary of State's office could demonstrate leadership in state elections instead of what appears to be an elections 'circle jerk'.

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: Pima County Issues Memo with Numerous Factual Errors

Memo King
Chuck Huckelberry

Pima County Administrator Chuck Huckelberry's primary PR activity occurs through the construction of memo's addressed to various department heads within his own purview.  These memos, of course, wind up in the hands of specific local press outlets.  Local  outlets provide nice fluff pieces favoring Pima County in exchange for continued access and future reservations at Pima's own PR staff's trough after ad sales for these less than substantive reports hit the dumpster.

In his latest offering, Huckelberry seems to have outdone himself with the number of distortions, omissions, and factual errors.  This latest memo is part of an exchange with the public as it learns about Pima County's efforts to circumvent its own Election Integrity Commission to obtain a waiver from sorting early ballots by precinct.   The following is retired NSA analyst Mickey Duniho's correction of factual errors in Huckelberry's memo:

(1)  Mr. Huckelberry stated that “one member” of the Pima County Election Integrity Commission “has championed the concept of sorting early ballots by precinct,” implying that only one member of the Commission really cares about such matters. He omitted the fact that the October 26 EIC recommendation was approved by a 7-0 vote of the EIC members.

(2)  In describing 300-400 staff hours to sort early ballots as an impossible task, Mr. Huckelberry omitted the fact that 300-400 hours of work by a dozen people could be accomplished in three days, and that the cost of 300-400 hours of work would be on the order of $2,000-$3,000. Mr. Huckelberry’s estimate of time required to sort the ballots also omitted any reference to F. Ann Rodriguez’s offer to provide lists of precincts represented in the various batches, which would enable workers to extract ballots for a few precincts rather than sort all precincts. After extracting ballots for the chosen precincts from a batch, workers could move on to the next batch of ballots. This could shorten the time and reduce the effort required to select a small number of precincts for hand counting. With Ms. Rodriguez’s assistance, the time required might be only two days, since the three-day estimate is based on sorting all 288 precincts instead of just selecting a few precincts for the audit.

(3)  Mr. Huckelberry’s estimate of $256,137 for hiring Runbeck to sort the ballots is factually incorrect. First, he based his estimate on 261,364 ballots, the total number of early ballots received at the time he wrote his memo; the EIC recommendation only referred to less than 200,000 early ballots received and processed by Election Day. Second, Runbeck’s price of $.98 per ballot is 100 times what it should be; it would make no sense for Pima County to pay Runbeck $200,000 to do a job that can be done in-house for $2,000. For $200,000, Pima County could buy several sorting machines.

(4)  Mr. Huckelberry’s estimate of $300,000-$500,000 to buy a sorting machine is a multiple at least five times too high. I asked Pitney Bowes about an earlier estimate of $125,000 given out by John Moffatt and was told that Pima County could buy a top-of-the-line Pitney Bowes sorting machine for “significantly less” than $125,000. The person I talked with, at Pitney Bowes Sales Headquarters, said the cost would depend on which features were included but that the cost would be on the order of $65,000.

(5)  Mr. Huckelberry’s distinction of sorting ballots in the envelopes versus out of the envelopes is incorrect. The sorter can handle ballots either way with equal ease.

(6)  Mr. Huckelberry disputed my report last week that the EIC members were not informed of the postponement of our proposal on the BOS agenda. He stated that we were notified on Nov 9. In fact, the EIC was informed only after we demanded an explanation of why the agenda published on Nov 8 did not contain the EIC recommendation. 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.

(7)  Mr. Huckelberry’s statement that sorting early ballots is “impossible” is incorrect. The task is not impossible, merely tedious to do by hand. Mr. Huckelberry gave six reasons (the second two were actually the same reason, restated in different words) for avoiding the sorting of early ballots. None of these reasons is actually a valid argument for rejecting the EIC recommendation.

a.     The first reason: The fact that Pima County had already counted 100,000 ballots when the EIC made its recommendation is true but logically irrelevant to the current discussion.

b.    Reasons two and three: The risk of handling ballots in the face of a possible recount is listed as a reason for not sorting ballots but is logically erroneous. At this point, we are reasonably certain there will be no recounts and no legal challenges. In any case, an accusation of mishandling ballots would not be allayed by the County claiming that it did not touch the ballots while in its custody. A charge could easily be made that County election personnel manipulated the ballots while they were “in storage.” Sorting the ballots and performing a hand count audit by precinct is the only way to positively demonstrate that the ballots were counted honestly and that no manipulation of votes took place while the ballots were in Election Department custody.

c.     Reason four: That the audit should take place between the Hand Count Audit and the Canvass is true but logically irrelevant to your decision unless your decision is delayed until the date of your approving the Canvass, which it appears has been Mr. Huckelberry’s strategy all along.

d.    Reason five: The difficulties encountered by counters in the Hand Count Audit are well-known but not logically relevant to this discussion; they are manageable problems.

e.     Reason six: The difficulties of extracting early ballots for a precinct-based audit are real but manageable, and were considered manageable by the Election Integrity Commission before its recommendation was submitted to you.

(8)  In describing the sequence of events leading up to Pima County’s obtaining a waiver from the state requirement to sort early ballots by precinct, Mr. Huckelberry omitted the fact that Brad Nelson neither consulted nor even informed the EIC of the requirement or the waiver. In addition, Mr. Nelson’s arguments in his letter to the state that sorting is impractical are factually erroneous. Mr. Nelson claimed he could do a better hand count audit by not sorting the ballots but, in fact, the early ballot audit as currently performed is worthless in terms of confirming a lack of fraud in vote counting. It is also noteworthy that the Secretary of State’s Elections Director granted the waiver BEFORE Mr. Nelson wrote his justification letter, suggesting an improper sequence of events.

(9)  Mr. Huckelberry cited a successful hand count audit as proof that no further audit is needed, another distortion of fact. He touted the fact that Pima County counts four percent of polling place ballots; he omitted the fact that polling place ballots in this election made up only 27% of all the ballots cast; 70% of voters cast early ballots, and therefore a proper hand count audit of early ballots is needed to confirm the integrity of the overall election. Mr. Huckelberry also omitted the irrelevance of the current early ballot hand count audit to confirming a lack of fraud. [I might point out that the law requires an audit of 1% of all the early ballots issued (1% of 261,545 ballots would be 2,615 ballots) but Pima County only hand counted 1,985 early ballots. Not that it makes any difference, since the current early ballot hand count audit is useless for confirming an election’s honesty.]

(10)             In his concluding recommendation:

a.     Mr. Huckelberry said the election tabulation “is expected to continue for another 4 to 7 days.” In fact, processing of the ballots which your EIC recommended sorting and hand counting was completed by Election Day.

b.    Mr. Huckelberry referred to the physical impossibility of accurately selecting, sorting into precincts and auditing nearly 200,000 early ballots. In fact, the EIC’s recommendation could be satisfied by selecting and auditing approximately 2,000 ballots.

c.     Mr. Huckelberry reiterated the “risk of handling ballots when faced with possible recounts.” In fact, it appears there will be no recounts, and Pima County would be in a better position to defend itself against charges of malfeasance if it adopted a more transparent policy, following the state requirement to sort early ballots and audit by precinct instead of secretly obtaining a waiver from the state requirement.

d.    Mr. Huckelberry claimed the positive outcome of the present hand counts as a reason to not adopt the EIC recommendation, but the EIC took that into account when it made the recommendation. The present early ballot audit is worthless in terms of certifying the election’s integrity.

How does a community allow an institution like Pima County's government to display such arrogance with so many lies to the representatives?

Just to give you an idea of how absurdly simple it is to build a system that is far more verifiable than what we currently have, here is the ballot scanning presentation produced by CBS Miami:

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

Provisional Ballots Spoiled By Restrictive State Law, ACLU of Arizona Says

ACLUAZ
Jon O'Neill

PHOENIX – A restrictive Arizona law helped invalidate thousands of ballots cast in the 2008 election, a new report by the ACLU of Arizona shows. The disfranchised voters, more than 13,000 of them, used provisional ballots, an option meant to help people who, for many reasons, wind up at the wrong precinct on Election Day. But Arizona law requires that even a provisional ballot be cast in the right precinct. All voters leave the polls expecting their ballots to be counted. But for one in every 10 Arizona voters who cast a provisional ballot in 2008, they didn't.

The ACLU report, found here, which surveyed Maricopa, Pima, Pinal, Yavapai and Coconino counties, shows:

There were 131,476 provisional ballots cast in 2008 in the five respective counties. Of those, 39,741 were spoiled. The number one reason that ballots were invalidated – with 13,467 spoiled ballots – was because they were cast in the wrong precinct.

More than 10 percent of voters casting provisional ballots probably left the polling place feeling as if they had voted, when in fact their ballots were never counted.

One of every 14 Maricopa County voters cast a provisional ballot in 2008. The county then rejected 29,531 provisional ballots, nearly a third of which might have counted had the voter been directed to the correct polling location.

Those who voted with a provisional ballot in Pima County in 2008 had a greater than one-in-six chance that their votes did not count because they were cast in the wrong polling place.

"Arizona's requirement disfranchises the very people provisional ballots are supposed to help," said Alessandra Soler Meetze, executive director of the ACLU of Arizona. "Therefore, we are calling on lawmakers to rescind the requirement – but until it is, it will be up to voters to prevent wrong polling place rejections."

A recent nationwide study showed that while 30 states have laws similar to Arizona's, 15 other states have rules that are less restrictive and allow voters to use provisional ballot in the way they were intended to be used.

In response to concerns raised in the report and to help alleviate problems at the polls, the ACLU Voting Rights Project also issued new Arizona-specific Voter Empowerment Cards that include tips on where to vote, what to bring to the polls and who to call to report Election Day problems. The cards can be downloaded here.

The ACLU of Arizona is also urging people to make sure they’re registered by Monday, October 4 to vote in the November election, and to take advantage of early voting by requesting an early ballot by 5 p.m. on October 22nd.

"By remaining informed about precinct changes and the limits of provisional ballots, Arizonans can protect their right to vote and ensure their ballots are counted on Election Day," added Laughlin McDonald, director of the ACLU Voter Rights Project.

Over 600,000 Votes in Az have NOT Yet Been Counted

AZ Central
Dennis Wagner

Voters across the Valley encountered a series of problems when they tried to cast their ballots on Tuesday at their polling places.

Many complained about long waits for provisional ballots, which are given to those who don’t show up on the poll roster or fail to produce proper identification.

Officials with Promise Arizona in Action, an organization that advocates immigration reform and fights discrimination, said they are concerned that poll workers were given pre-election instructions that may have forced the huge number of provisional ballots. They also said numerous voters reported their names were not on lists used by precinct workers.

Petra Falcon, executive director of Promise Arizona, said she was told that 200,000 provisional ballots were cast, as well as 200,000 early ballots. She said counting of those votes will not even begin until this morning and she feared the Maricopa County sheriff’s race would be called before then. And it was, with Sheriff Joe Arpaio beating Democrat Paul Penzone to win his sixth term in office.

“Four hundred thousand ballots — that’s a lot,” Falcon said. “Even if it’s an Arpaio win, those votes should be counted.”

Roopali Desai, Promise Arizona’s attorney, said the number of provisional ballots is “unprecedented” in Arizona — or anywhere. “Nobody can explain it,” she added. “We’re trying to get to the bottom of it.”

Desai said the explosion in provisional ballots appears to be a Maricopa County phenomenon that produced long lines and may have caused some qualified voters to walk away out of frustration or confusion. Desai added that the surge in provisional balloting seemed especially strong in minority neighborhoods. If that suspicion is verified, she added, “it won’t look good for the county.”

The problems appeared to be widespread, though. The Mitchell Park precinct in Tempe reportedly ran out of provisional ballots. It took about two hours to get additional ones to the location, prompting many voters to leave without voting.

Maricopa County Recorder Helen Purcell said polls ran out of provisional-ballot envelopes, not the actual ballots. She urged “a whole lot of patience.”

“We have a number of precincts throughout the Valley — I can’t tell you how many — that still have lines. Some of them may have lines for a while,” Purcell said after polls had closed Tuesday night. At least one precinct, in Mesa, “had 200 people in line” by closing time, she reported.

“It’s going to be awhile until we see all the precincts come in,” Purcell said. “From what we hear from precincts today, there were a number of provisionals. I’m thinking it will probably take us 10 to 12 days to finish up our process.

In Glendale, Ray McGuran said he waited ²¹/₂ hours in line to cast a provisional ballot.

“I ended up dragging a folding chair around with me,” the 67-year-old said. “The time it took was unnecessary.”

When Jason Whiteside, 32, showed up to vote at the Gathering Place church in Phoenix, he was told he could not fill out a regular ballot because his name was on a list of voters who had requested an early ballot by mail. Whiteside didn’t recall ever receiving the early ballot. To vote, he had to fill out a provisional ballot.

Maricopa County Elections Director Karen Osborne said the county had an unusually large number of provisional ballots cast at polling places because many voters ordered an early ballot but went to the polls to vote without it. Provisional ballots ensure people don’t vote twice — at the polls and by early ballot.

Pima County Judge Refuses Citizen's Request that Pima County Elections Follow the Law

J.T. Waldron

Pima County Judge James E. Marner denied every request by citizens concerned about election integrity in Pima County.  Parroting the previous Pima County judges' claims about the lack of jurisdiction, Marner has paved the way for Pima County to continue subverting efforts to improve election integrity.   Key auditing functions like the simple placement of election returns receipts in election returns envelops (A.R.S. §16-615), incorporating sufficient quantities for hand count audits and the separation of early ballots by precinct will fall outside of any meaningful law enforcement.  One of the main obstacles to improving elections in Pima County is the county's choice to simply adhere to what is legally permissible instead of what truly achieves election transparency.

The appellate court, which looms just above Pima County's insular legal structure, ruled in favor of the court's jurisdiction to intervene when the legislative branch and the executive branch fail to provide an adequate remedy in a constitutional crisis. As Brad Roach stated in his closing arguments in last Thursday's hearing, "To say you don't have the authority because there already been some rules that passed, it fails. It has to fail, because that's what court systems do is make sure state executives and state legislatures follow the state law."

In his analysis, Judge Marner refers to Judge Kyle Bryson's previous ruling over jurisdiction. He attempts to clarify the previous judge's ruling against what the appellate courts ruled:

"Judge Bryson's order does not find that he lacked jurisdiction to hear challenge and, as evidenced by his detailed analysis of the arguments before him, he obviously accepted jurisdiction to hear the contest. However, as indicated below, the nature of the requested relief by the Plaintiff does not raise a question of where this court's jurisdiction ends."

Citizens concerned about rigged elections know that jurisdiction "ends" once elections are truly verifiable and transparent. Local citizens have introduced very finite measures for this outcome.

The only hope for citizens to restore the integrity of elections within the system is to once again appeal to a higher legal authority. The previous case heard by Judge Kyle Bryson is currently back in the appeals court and will be one of few options for straightening out elections within Pima County.

Closing arguments in last Thursday's hearing (Pardon the dirty tape heads):






Various figures of Pima County's legal establishment helping the county preserve their right to cheat in elections. Includes the five judges (Borek, Miller, Marner, Harrington and Bryson) that have juggled the hot potato of election integrity.  Can anybody guess what the green monster represents?

Related:

Pima County Circumvents It's Own Election Integrity Commission to Get a Waiver that Removes Proper Audit of County Election


Arizona Citizens Sue Pima County to Enforce Existing Election Laws

Pima County Circumvents It's Own Election Integrity Commission to Get a Waiver that Removes Proper Audit of County Elections

J.T. Waldron

A key document has surfaced in a recent lawsuit in Pima County, Arizona, that suggests much more activity affecting the reliability of elections took place in secret meetings with Arizona Secretary of State Ken Bennett. When the 2011 revision of the state elections manual added a sentence requiring presorting of early ballots by precinct, the County secretly went to the Secretary of State and got a waiver, without any disclosure to their own Election Integrity Commission. This activity certainly falls within the purview of the Commission and presorting had been frequently discussed by the Commission.

Although Bennett is familiar with Pima County's Election Integrity Commission, he may or may not be aware that the meetings took place without the knowledge of the other Commission members. Pima County employee John Moffatt and staunch county supporter Benny White were the two members of Pima County's Election Integrity Commission (EIC) that sought changes to the Secretary of State’s Election Procedures manual. One key substantive auditing provision, to sort early ballots by precinct, was removed without the knowledge of the rest of the EIC.

The letter from the Secretary of State, dated June 29th of 2012, acknowledges the request made by Pima County Elections Director Brad Nelson to avoid presorting early ballots by precincts and grants an exemption for the upcoming Fall election. At no point was this change mentioned at any of the commission meetings. Retired NSA analyst Mickey Duniho, Computer expert Tom Ryan, and Black Box Voting member Jim March are among the members of Pima County's EIC that strongly recommended presorting the early returns by precinct.

The process for revising the Secretary of State’s Election Procedures manual begun in 2011 when Ken Bennett formed a commission consisting of Pima County employee John Moffatt and Benny White. Although Brad Nelson is the recipient of the exemption, it is unknown whether he participated in that committee. During the time in 2011 when that committee was meeting, John Moffatt and Benny White regularly reported to the Pima County Election Integrity Committee about the changes that were being recommended. At no time did they mention the Secretary of State's intention of requiring presorting of early ballots by precinct. At almost every EIC meeting, however, Mickey Duniho and other members frequently discussed with the board the importance of presorting early ballots by precinct before conducting the hand count audit.

Citizens filed a lawsuit against Pima County and held a hearing earlier this week over presorting early ballots along with other auditing procedures provided by Arizona Statutes. They filed this lawsuit absent any knowledge that this provision was added by the Secretary of State and later exempted at the request of Pima County. Had it not been for the current lawsuit to get Pima County to follow existing election laws, we would have never discovered this activity taking place behind the backs of the rest of the Election Integrity Commission. Such trickery seems to involve far more work and effort than actually negotiating the logistics of presorting early ballots by precinct.

It appears that County Attorney Chris Straub has reported this change and the accompanying waiver to the court in this recent trial. This disclosure is likely required to avoid potential sanctions, even possible disbarment, for withholding information from the court that is pertinent to the case.

Those who knew that the Election Integrity Commission was being circumvented are obviously Benny White and John Moffatt. Brad Nelson and Chuck Huckelberry would also have a difficult time claiming ignorance over withholding information and secretly obtaining a waiver from Ken Bennett to avoid compliance with the new rule. Every EIC meeting has transcripts and are sufficient to show that Moffatt and White were falsely representing what took place with the Secretary of State.

Was Benny White's role in working with the Secretary of State to enhance the impression of the EIC's participation in the revision of the Secretary of State’s Election Procedures manual? Pima County has no doubts over Benny White's loyalty to those currently entrenched in Pima County's bureaucracy. In 2008, he provided false testimony and slandered John Brakey to the Pima County Board of Supervisors when Brakey was falsely arrested while serving as an elections observer (see below). Brakey has so far refrained from suing Pima County over his false arrest, which was requested by Brad Nelson. Despite what we had previously predicted, Benny White indeed testified in the hearing earlier this week. You could see the difficulty in getting a direct answer out of him as he's asked his position over presorting early ballots by precinct.



Discovery of this "runaround" by the county sheds new light on the dynamics of last week's emergency meeting proposed by Mickey Duniho. Here they are spending hours discussing the importance of presorting the early ballots. Benny White left early because he claims to have a conflict of interest with the upcoming court case. Absence makes withholding information a lot easier. Brad Nelson has the easy excuse of being busy during the election season (It's also the excuse Pima County uses for not complying with state election laws). Pima County employee John Moffatt is left to sit through the whole meeting discussing a subject that he knows has been "managed" behind their backs. It's his job.



Here is Benny White lying to the Pima County Board of Supervisors:



With all the scurrying behind the scenes, one has to wonder what part of the election do they plan to alter?

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.

The State of U.S. Elections: 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?"

Local Daily Extolls the Virtues of Pima County in Apologetic Report of Lawsuit Aimed at Keeping Pima County from Breaking Laws

J.T. Waldron

When propaganda gets this obvious, we ultimately choose not to run away from it and prefer not to rely on the hopes that people will ignore it.

It is far more productive to give it its due and shed light on it.

The Arizona Daily Star's sunday edition contains the article with a peculiar title that is self evident as propaganda:

What is the main, bulkier part of the title? You guessed it:

Pima Sees Gains in Election Security

What was the actual current news to be reported in the story?

The lawsuit by citizens to compel Pima County to follow existing election laws.

What's the damage?

The Arizona Daily Star has over 364,000 readers for its Sunday edition, which is about a third of the population of Pima County being falsely assured about "Elections Security". Another story that is being convoluted with this story about the lawsuit involves local election integrity commission member Mickey Duniho's analysis of a nationwide study showing consistent Republican favored margins in larger precincts for both primary and general elections since 2008.   This story had adequate, neutral treatment when it was reported by the same author on the previous Friday, the least favorable day for the 238,000 readers that would elect to check it out. Although the story has little to do with the lawsuit filed last Wednesday to compel Pima County to comply with existing election laws, it serves to confuse the simple lawsuit requiring official returns to be placed in the official returns envelop and legally proper numbers for the hand-count audits.

The only conceivable connection that Dunaho's emergency Election Integrity Commission meeting has with the lawsuit filed last Wednesday is that the anomalies he confirms could be resolved with the proper hand count audits requested in that lawsuit. So could a lot of other ways of cheating be discovered with proper hand count audits.

We put additional police in the streets to prevent all kinds of crimes. Not just one.

Incidentally, this is the only time that the plaintiffs in last Wednesday's lawsuit are mentioned.  Duniho is referred to as "a plaintiff in the lawsuit" but the author fails to mention the twelve others including Green Party Candidate Dave Croteau, Republican Candidate Bill Beard, Libertarian Elections Specialist Jim March and Paul Hilts, the chair of the Pima County Democratic Party Elections Committee.

The title, "Pima sees gains in election security" suggests to its readers, "nothing to see here. All is well." Quick browsers will think that is the point of the article.

The competing "gains in election security" were sprung from the records lawsuit involving the Regional Transportation Authority (RTA) election and they were procedures that would not have been implemented without the public and legal scrutiny surrounding RTA election shenanigans.

While the additional measures are helpful, they are at best mere obstacles for Pima County to maneuver around should they wish to cheat in elections in the future. They are nice measures, but should be seen as window dressing until the core essential steps to counter black box voting machine fraud are implemented. In fact, Pima County's legal team is referring to these measures to block further scrutiny of the RTA ballots now in storage at the Iron Mountain facilities.

While spending 2.5 million dollars on procedures that are outside of the specific measures needed to resolve the lawsuits surrounding a two billion dollar bond election, Pima County could save a great deal of money by complying with the appellate court decision for prospective relief. By removing themselves as an obstacle to prospective relief through the courts, Pima County could assure the public that those "security measure" expenditures were also helping prevent future legal costs involving election transparency. They are refusing to do so at this time because compliance also means allowing a proper audit and forensic exam of the RTA ballots. They know the plaintiff will finally resolve in the courts that the RTA election was rigged. That is why they are choosing not to save time and money by letting this simple procedure forge ahead.

Additional elements designed to vindicate Pima County by the Arizona Daily Star seem to surround an exchange towards the end of the meeting between Pima County employee John Moffatt and Mickey Duniho. First, the idea that Moffatt continues to work for the county and is inextricably entwined within the Election Integrity Commission is an insult to the public. In court he admitted to being responsible for the convoluted logic that ultimately cost Pima County over one million dollars in legal fees to resist public records requests. Moffatt was also named in the IBeta report providing many ineffectual tests that were certain to be meaningless in the first Attorney General investigation of the RTA election. He was also found with his hand in the "evidence cookie jar" in violation of a court order when it was time to divvy up the data after the Democratic Party won the records case.

The video of the EIC meeting shows at the end John Moffatt's essential skill - groveling. Moffatt delivers a pathetic attempt at chastising those who would suggest that Pima County's elections division is capable of fraud. It was disturbing to see at this point that no-one was laughing. It's difficult to imagine the sense of being browbeaten when listening to this delivery up close and in person, but Mickey Duniho seems far more conciliatory for what he knows about Pima County. In fact, he was there when Moffatt violated the court order at the Pima County vault. Frankly, Moffatt should have been handed his ass for even suggesting that accusations of fraud in the Pima County Elections Division are inappropriate.

True to form, this relatively small exchange at the commission meeting affects a large chunk of what made this Sunday's article. Somehow the article extracts a statement from Mickey Duniho, "My feeling is that today elections in Pima County are processed in a very good manner. I don't see any major things that I want to change." The rest of the meeting, however, had Duniho stating that we have no reliance on the integrity of the elections because there is not a sufficient audit of the ballots after they are run through the black box voting machines. In his presentation at the beginning of the meeting, he states "The way we are doing it now where we do a hand-count by batch does not confirm the integrity of the elections." Fair reporting would mention the contradiction and get clarification from Duniho.

Why would the writer omit the fact that the window dressings mean nothing if you have the same crooks running the elections and they are still reserving the right to cheat by violating state laws?

Why does the establishment press insist on letting Pima County get away with rigging elections?

If reporter Carli Brosseau buys John Moffatt's spiel, does she get a chance to line up at Pima County's trough should things go south in the real world?

There is a real cost for preserving this illusion of election theater and I don't think the Star will be willing to pay for it.

Mickey Duniho: Evidence of Vote Counting Fraud in Pima County?

Editor's Note: With the analysis is a full video of the Election Integrity Commission's emergency meeting held on October 26th to hear retired NSA analyst Michael Duniho's explanation of how his study of local elections support nationwide trends found in a paper published by Francois Choquette and James Johnson. Commission member Dr. Tom Ryan has a PhD in computer programming and agrees with what Duniho has discovered.

The video begins with Benny White refusing to participate because of his ardent support for Pima County. He mistakenly assumes that the board meeting is discussing the simple lawsuit that was filed to get Pima County to comply with Arizona State statutes. Arnold Urken is a commission member tied to the county with his role of County Administrator. The chair, Charles Geoffrion, is assigned by Pima County and the meeting itself is also attended by John Moffatt, the Pima County employee previously involved with election data shenanigans.



Mickey Duniho
Analysis in PDF

Former NSA analyst, Michael "Mickey" Duniho

A paper published by Francois Choquette (Aerospace Engineer, Statistics, California) and James Johnson (Senior Quantitative Financial Analyst, California) outlined anomalies found throughout the United States in the Republican Presidential Primary that always favored Mitt Romney. The favoritism correlated strongly with precinct size, and did not correlate with any other logical choices (such as population density, income levels, race, etc). The paper asked readers to confirm their analysis and report on findings.

I analyzed the 2012 Presidential Preference Primary in Pima County and confirmed their analysis. I also analyzed two 2012 Board of Supervisors Republican primaries and found no apparent anomalies. I analyzed many 2010 races and found anomalies in all statewide races, always apparently favoring Republicans (except for propositions). I found no anomalies in the LD28 State Senate race.

The correlation of Republican (or in the case of the Republican Presidential Primary, with Mitt Romney) strongly suggests vote count fraud, which would occur in larger precincts because it is easier to hide it there.

Pima County has persistently refused my requests to sort early ballots before doing the state-required hand-count audit because they say it is too much trouble. These statistics suggest another reason: they may be hiding vote-counting fraud.

We need to re-examine early ballots for the 2010 election, if they are still available, to confirm the hypothesis of vote-count fraud or to certify that there was none. This would involve removing the ballots from the vault under a court order, sorting them by precinct, and then hand counting some of the larger precincts. It appears from the data that we might discover vote-count fraud in every state-wide race in that election. We need to re-examine the Republican Presidential primary early ballots in the same way, sorting them by precinct and then hand counting some of the larger precincts.

If the contention of vote-counting fraud is correct, we could be victimized by vote-continuing fraud in the November election, affecting not just the Presidential race but also state-wide races and possibly county-wide races. Anomalies in the 2010 general election appeared to show about ten percentage points taken from the Democratic candidate and added to the Republican candidate’s total. This changes the outcome of any race that is closer than 20 percentage points.

Here are some charts showing apparent vote flipping and others confirming no fraud in a race. Each chart shows a different race. Lines that move up from left to right represent votes added through fraud. Lines that move down from left to right represent votes taken away from a victim through fraud.

The first chart shows a race that was clearly not flipped, the LD28 State Senate race. It is not a county-wide race, so there were fewer precincts to analyze. The wiggles on the left of the chart represent small precincts with so few votes as to render statistical analysis less useful.

In the larger precincts, the lines are flat, showing no votes transferred from one candidate to another.

The second chart is another race that apparently had no evidence of fraud. This is the 2012 Pima County Board of Supervisors race between the incumbent Ray Carroll and challenger Sean Collins. This race had even fewer precincts (62) than the LD28 State Senate race (92 precincts), so the lines are not perfectly flat, but they do not show any significant slope, leading me to believe there is no evidence of fraud.

The next chart is another Board of Supervisors primary race (District 1, Republican) that shows no evidence of fraud. The small number of precincts (65) causes what would be flat lines in a larger data set to appear wiggly, but again there is no discernible slope for any candidates.

The next chart is the 2010 Giffords-Kelly race, showing an apparent shift of ten percent of the votes from Giffords to Kelly. Unfortunately for Kelly, Giffords appears to have run more than 20 percent better than Kelly so that even with the shift she still won the election by a small percentage. Making an assumption of fraud, this suggests that it might have been programmed into the computer before the counting begins and could not easily be changed during the election process. [Note: I have been advised by the author of the report I was following that I need to account for relative party registration numbers in this chart, which might lessen the steepness of the slopes if Democrats tend to be found in larger numbers in smaller precincts and Republicans in larger numbers in larger precincts. I am working on getting precinct-level voter registration data for 2010 so that I can recalculate this chart to more accurately reflect the anomaly.]

Arizona Citizens' Election Integrity Lawsuit Explained by Attorney Brad Roach and Republican Candidate Bill Beard

From left to right:  Attorney Brad Roach,  John Brakey,
Bill Beard, Chris DeSimone 

KVOA Wakeup Tucson at 7:00 AM Mountain Time on 1030 AM radio

Stay tuned for the final clip containing Pima County shill Benny White refusing to
participate in the Elections Integrity Board's emergency meeting scheduled to discuss former NSA employee Mickey Duniho's analysis of past elections. White mistakenly assumed that the meeting was going to discuss the pending lawsuit requiring Pima County to follow existing election laws. One can assume he is also mistaken in thinking he can be a co-defendant in that case because he ultimately would be acting against significant members within Pima County's Republican Party who are plaintiffs in the lawsuit.




NSA Analyst Mickey Duniho's presentation to the Pima County's Election Integrity Board will be posted later this evening.

Pima commission to discuss chance of election fraud in larger precincts

Arizona Daily Star
Carli Brosseau

The Pima County Election Integrity Commission is holding a special meeting today to talk about whether one member's statistical analysis of votes in recent elections shows evidence of fraud.

Under the group's bylaws, an emergency meeting can be held if at least five of the nine members call for one.

Michael "Mickey" Duniho
His presentation to the Election Integrity Board
will be posted on The Intercept today.

Mickey Duniho, a retired National Security Agency computer programmer, requested the meeting two days ago after he began plotting cumulative votes by precinct and noticing that outcomes seemed to differ by precinct size.

He was replicating earlier studies done by California researchers Francois Choquette and James Johnson, an aerospace engineer and a financial analyst. The researchers argue that their analysis of the recent Republican primary shows Mitt Romney making strange vote gains in most states' large precincts.

Duniho - formerly a Republican election observer in Maryland, a supporter of Democrat-backed lawsuits against Pima County's Elections Department and now a registered independent - said that his results seem to parallel those of Choquette and Johnson, who tried to account for their findings using demographics.

He is now collecting demographic data by precinct to try to explain his results with other factors, such as whether a precinct is rural or the affluence of the precinct's residents.

Duniho suspects that the patterns he found show a 10 percent flip of votes in favor of the Republican candidate in the 2010 race between Raúl Grijalva and Ruth McClung and the race between Gabrielle Giffords and Jesse Kelly the same year, as well as votes switched to benefit Romney in the Republican primary.

"The problem is figuring out what the statistical evidence does mean," Duniho said. "The computer is a black box. It is very easy for the guy who wrote the program to do just about anything."

At today's meeting, Duniho hopes to persuade the county Elections Department to sort early ballots by precinct before doing the hand-count audit required by law.

He has been advocating for that sorting, as well as for upping the percentage of ballots hand-counted, for about six years, arguing that his method boosts the chances of revealing fraud if it were to occur.

By law, Arizona counties must do a hand-count audit of 1 percent of early ballots and 2 percent of precincts in at least one federal and one state race. Pima County already audits more than required - 4 percent of precinct-cast ballots and 1 percent of early ballots. No local races are audited.

Some of the commission's members have argued strongly against holding the meeting and worry that it could unnecesarily increase fears about the vote count.

Benny White providing false testimony
to the Pima County Board of Supervisors.
about John Brakey's arrest while monitoring
elections in the Fall of 2008.

Benny White, a Republican election observer, responded to news of the meeting request with a sharply worded email.

"After reviewing the academic research involved with the links in the message, I conclude that the allegations being made are absolute nonsense," he wrote. "These academics don't take into account the fact that election results are the response by voters to campaigns and candidates. …

"I think there is a greater probability that fluctuations in the electrical voltage of the lines serving the election department have more to do with variations in election results than these alleged anomalies."

The county's technical consultant on election matters, John Moffatt, agrees that the data do not seem to show a vote flip in Pima County, but he does think the California researchers may be on to something with their findings in some other states.

Pima County employee John Moffatt speaks of
"witch hunts" in the past, but is responsible
for the incoherent rationale that required a suit
to obtain electronic public records. 

"It's worth paying attention to, and we took it seriously," he said. "My personal opinion is that it's another witch hunt, but our responsibility is to check this stuff out, not just blow it off."

He adamantly rejects allegations that county elections staff somehow tampered with any results.

The county's elections director, Brad Nelson, will not be at the meeting to approve a change of audit procedures because of family issues, but county workers involved in those processes caution that while it's theoretically possible to make Duniho's suggested change, it would be logistically difficult.

"That's a monumental task," Pima County Recorder F. Ann Rodriguez said. "It's kind of late to be changing the procedures in the middle of a major election."

The sorting machine needed to do the job efficiently would cost at least $125,000, said Chris Roads, deputy recorder and registrar of voters.

To do the sorting by hand would likely take two days, Moffatt said.

The window to challenge a vote count after an election in Arizona is five days after the canvass.

Arizona Election Fraud: East Side Republicans Club host Democrat Bill Risner on election integrity

Arizona Daily Independent

Republican Lori Oien, head of the East Side Republican Club, invited democrat attorney Bill Risner to discuss election integrity in Pima County. The Election Division, under Brad nelson, has come under scrutiny since the RTA Bond election in 2006.

Oien, a former candidate for Tucson City Council, introduced Risner, Republican Election official Benny White, Democrat Election official Mickey Donohue, and a documentary film crew that has been following her and documenting her life for the past 11 months. She told the multi-partisan group, that she had heard Bill Risner on the radio and because election integrity is “not a Democrat or Republican issue, but a fairness issue,” she invited Risner to address the packed house.

Risner, White, and Donahue presented pending lawsuits, current practices, and continuing concerns. Risner explained that “the problem for people who care about democracy and whether your vote actually counts is that we using computers, and they are computers that are privatized and suing their software, and computers do what they are told.” It is exactly what the Pima County computers were told which is at the heart of the continuing legal battle between Risner and the Pima County government.

Pima County officials exempted County races from hand count audits, and have denied access to the ballots cast in the 2006 election, as well as refusing to use optical scanners in the County’s possession to account for all ballots cast in election subsequent to 2006.

Aside from the concerns about the computers’ accuracy and security is the manner in which early ballots are handled by the County. Currently, early ballots are tabulated over a week before General Election Day, which has triggered speculation in past races that the results were known to political operatives who used that information for unfair political advantage.

White, who is a staunch defender of Pima County’s system, conceded that in the past there was fraud, but he said that there is none now.

“It’s our contention base on facts and past history that by the morning of the 30th of October with approximately 25,000 plus vote counted they will know who’s winning and losing and if they need to HACK or STUFF any county races, they will have 7 days to do it, said John Brakey of Americans United for Democracy Intergrity and Transperency in election Arizona, (AUDIT-AZ).