The phony Arizona election “audit” goes even further off the rails

| 11:00 pm EDT August 21, 2021
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The Maricopa county audit of the 2020 election is still happening nearly a year after the first ballots of the election were sent out – and still a source of embarrassment for the GOP, as it should be. Facing a lawsuit, many right-wing pundits are trying to distance themselves from the entire debacle, as it’s increasingly looking worse for the state Republican Party in Arizona. Now, party officials are beginning to come out against it and the obviously illegitimate nature of the whole thing, with county recorder Stephen Richer, officially making a public statement.

At this point, I hope my principal motivation for speaking out is abundantly clear: the Ninja audit is an abomination that has so far eroded election confidence and defamed good people,” he wrote in the statement, which was addressed to fellow Republicans. He went on to mostly be correct in saying that the only people supporting or staying silent on the issue now were people who were simply doing it to score extra points with Donald Trump’s base.

At this point in the game, Richer deserves exactly zero points for doing this – but the inevitable pattern seen in the Maricopa audit is the standard Republican MO: Raise suspicion where there isn’t any and then force an investigation by whatever means necessary – even if you have to hire a group called Cyber Ninjas to carry it out. Even if the investigation predictably turns up nothing – the fact that one has happened gives ammunition to right-wing media outlets and the voters. As the GOP is pretending to care about election integrity again, keep in mind that this is just more of the same old pattern and vote them all out in 2022.