The Maricopa County, Arizona, forensic auditors have completed their third ballot recount and are shipping the ballots back to the county officials.
A report is expected to be produced by mid-August on the results of the review, which has faced resistance from Maricopa County elections officials since it began in late April.
Maricopa County Elections Department tweeted Thursday afternoon:
"Maricopa County is picking up the nearly 2.1 million 2020 General Election ballots and other subpoenaed items today. We expect to take two trips and much of the day to retrieve the subpoenaed items. Watch the items being returned here: http://bit.ly/MCTECLiveVideo"
That account has been able to tweet on the audit, but Twitter has blocked all other accounts for those conducting the audit, including @ArizonaAudit and @AuditWarRoom.
Arizona Senate President Karen Fann, who hired Florida-based Cyber Ninjas to conduct the forensic review, had said the third count was necessary when initial audit counts and the certified vote tally by Maricopa County did not match, the Washington Examiner reported.
Cyber Ninjas CEO Doug Logan released a list of donors for the $5,711,514.43 raised for the audit, including:
- $3.25 million from The America Project.
- Nearly $1 million from America's Future.
- More than $600,000 from Voices and Votes.
- $550,000 from Defending the Republic.
- $280,000 from LDFFTAR/EIFFTAR (Election Integrity Funds for the American Republic).
The Arizona Senate, controlled by Republicans, contributed $150,000.
"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 wrote 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."
President Joe Biden won Arizona's 11 electoral votes by around 10,000 votes among the 3.3 million reportedly cast in the state. Maricopa County accounted for 2.1 ballots itself, giving Biden a 45,000-vote margin over former President Donald Trump there.
Trump's campaign rebuked Fox News' decision desk making an early call of the state for Biden on Election Night, arguing it impacted the election results still to come and was premature with less than 5% of the vote tallied in the state. It was that point, Trump has said, he had concerns over the integrity of the election, particularly with respect to mass mail-in ballot procedures instituted under the guise of COVID-19 safety.
Eric Mack ✉
Eric Mack has been a writer and editor at Newsmax since 2016. He is a 1998 Syracuse University journalism graduate and a New York Press Association award-winning writer.
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