GOP officials in key Arizona county rebut partisan audit

The Maricopa County Elections Department released a report on Wednesday slamming the audit commissioned by the state’s GOP-led Senate, writing that it contained “faulty analysis” and “inaccurate claims.”

“After an in-depth analysis and review of the reports and presentations issued by the Senate’s contractors, we determined that nearly every finding included faulty analysis, inaccurate claims, misleading conclusions, and a lack of understanding of federal and state election laws,” the report reads.

All eyes were on Maricopa County in the aftermath of the 2020 presidential election, where Arizona’s GOP-controlled Senate ordered an audit of the results amid former President Trump’s crusade against the vote tally.

The report, which was compiled by the Florida-based firm Cyber Ninjas, ultimately confirmed President Biden’s win in Maricopa County, even finding that the Democrat won by a larger margin than the final certified results showed.

The audit also made a number of recommendations for changes to Arizona’s election law.

Now, however, the elections department is saying that the findings in the Senate-commissioned audit were misleading or not true.

Specifically, the report says 22 claims were misleading, 42 were inaccurate and 13 were false.

The 93-page report also criticized Cyber Ninjas, writing that its report “inaccurately challenges the legitimacy of thousands of voters who participated in the November 2020 General Election and/or the validity of ballots counted and included in the official results.”

“Our analysis found that Cyber Ninjas made faulty and inaccurate conclusions about more than 53,000 ballots in 22 different categories,” the report says.

The report includes a chart detailing a number of misleading, false and inaccurate claims identified in the report.

The elections department also affirmed that the 2020 presidential vote was not marred by fraud, writing that “The November 2020 General Election was administered with integrity and the results were accurate and reliable.”

“This has been proven through statutorily required accuracy tests, court cases, hand counts performed by the political parties, and post-election audits. The Elections Department followed all federal and state election laws,” the report added.

The Hill reached out to Cyber Ninjas for comment.