Wednesday’s vote by the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors to contract two election auditing firms to review the performance and security of the county’s Dominion Voting System is being questioned by several state legislators, who worry county officials may have misrepresented the firms’ certifications.
Maricopa County’s Election Department has said the upcoming “forensic audit” will analyze whether the county’s tabulation machines counted ballots correctly. The audit is also intended to determine whether the tabulators’ software was hacked or infected by malicious malware, and whether the tabulators sent or received data over the internet.
County election protocols prohibit the tabulation system from being connected to the internet, either by hardwire or wireless.
To that end, Maricopa County will pay Pro V&V and SLI Compliance to verify the “security, reliability, accuracy” of the tabulation system. The companies, according to county officials, are independent certified auditing firms accredited by the U.S. Election Assistance Commission (EAC).
The problem with that, Arizona Daily Independent has learned, is EAC says it does not accredit companies for conducting post-election cybersecurity examinations.
As a result, several legislators want to know what vetting the Maricopa County BOS undertook to ensure the auditors have the necessary credentials to determining whether the software was not corrupted, either purposely or by accident.
That’s important because the Senate President Karen Fann and Senate Judiciary Chairman Warren Petersen have issued two subpoenas to the Maricopa County BOS for every ballot, voter record, election-related documents, software programs, and voting system equipment to allow the legislature to conduct a full-scale audit of the county’s handling of the 2020 General Election.
Maricopa County officials have thus far refused to comply with the legislative subpoenas despite legal action by Fann and Petersen. Instead, the county intends to expose the software and hardware to its own limited audit of the tabulation system.