Senate Commits Hari-Kari In Effort To Block Maricopa County Election Audit

Arizona State Sen. Paul Boyer told fellow senators during a floor debate on whether or not to hold the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors in contempt that God led him to the decision to render the Legislature irrelevant. [Photo via Capitol TV]

Monday’s vote by the state senate resulted in the rejection of a resolution which would have held Maricopa County’s Board of Supervisors (BOS) in contempt for ignoring legislative subpoenas, but many participants saw the outcome as a weakening of the Arizona Legislature’s long-term ability to ensure state laws are administered properly.

All 30 senators took part in the floor session Monday afternoon to vote on Senate Resolution 1005, which would have allowed Senate President Karen Fann to have Maricopa County’s five supervisors arrested for thumbing their nose at two legislative subpoenas related to the 2020 General Election.

Republicans outnumber Democrats in the Senate by 16 to 14. With the contempt resolution needing only a simple majority to pass, all that was needed was for the Republicans to all vote together.

That didn’t happen. Instead, the resolution died on a 15 to 15 vote when Sen. Paul Boyer (R-LD20) voted no, and not one Democrat crossed the aisle.

But many observers say the aftermath of Monday’s outcome will go far beyond an embarrassing loss for Fann and the Republican caucus. They say the long-term casualty of the vote is to the power of the Senate itself, with some using phrases like hari-kari, legislative neutering, abdication of responsibility, and surrender of power.

RELATED ARTICLE: Legislators Should Have Subpoena Power, And Exercise It
“What is asinine is the county is clearly in contempt,” Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Warren Petersen told Arizona Daily Independent. “To vote ‘no’ on contempt is to deny the truth.”

During the floor session, Petersen reviewed the timeline surrounding two current legislative subpoenas and two expired subpoenas which Fann and the judiciary chairman issued to the Maricopa County board in December and January.

County officials announced last month that two companies would be contracted at county expense to conduct separate audits of the Dominion Voting System tabulation machines used in the general election. Those audits would not involve the county’s protocols for voter registration or early balloting, areas which many voters believe could have been susceptible to fraud, or at the very least a disregard of Arizona’s election laws.

Petersen called the county’s audits “a joke” which would not find any irregularities because “they’re not meant to find fraud.” He added that the planned Senate audit was about looking for “shortcomings and vulnerabilities” in the election process, not trying to change past results.

“We need to be able to collect facts – to know what laws need to be fixed,” Petersen said.

Boyer’s vote obviously caught his 15 Republican colleagues off-guard, as just last week he had joined his others in signing on to sponsor the contempt resolution. He explained prior to his vote that he believed the parties “still have time to work on this” and therefore the contempt resolution was hasty, even though he agrees a legislative subpoena can be an effective tool.

“This is not a final determination, nor is it the end of the process,” Boyer said. He added that “measured restraint is a virtue” and advocating for “prayerful patience and a civil resolution.”

Boyer’s comments elicited several passionate rebukes on the senate floor, with several senators arguing the contempt issue was bigger than whether a full-scale audit is conducted.

“We’re the Arizona Senate,” one senator appealed, in a voice which sounded confused by how the vote was proceeding. Another, Senate Majority Whip Sonny Borrelli, argued that the entire legitimacy of the legislature was at stake.

“A political subdivision is challenging your direct authority,” Borrelli said, calling it a “dereliction of duty” by his colleagues. “You’re surrendering your authority!”

Comments by Senate Majority Leader Rick Gray appeared to be directed to Boyer or just one Democrat for the much needed 16th vote. He called the county’s disregard of the senate’s subpoenas “egregious” but insisted the desired audit was about wanting voters “to have certainty” with how election laws were administered in Maricopa County and not about overturning any results.

In the end, not even a private conversation between Fann and Boyer before the end of voting could not save the resolution in order to preserve the senate’s unrestricted subpoena authority.

Next up is a Tuesday morning hearing at the Maricopa County Superior Court on a request by the BOS for an injunction preventing the Senate from enforcing the subpoenas. And while Judge Timothy Thomason has previously indicated the Senate appears to have “explicit contempt authority” under the Arizona Constitution, he is not sure the judiciary is the proper forum to resolve the dispute.

The reason, Thomason noted, is that the Senate is granted power to enforce its own subpoenas. The problem of course is that the enforcement mechanism is a contempt resolution -and arrest- of any witness who does not comply with the subpoenas.

Which leaves the question of whether Fann and Petersen will simply quash the two outstanding subpoenas now that they have no way to force the Maricopa County board to comply.