The latest desperate measures
If you’re like me, you suffered emotional trauma after the 2016 “election” of Trump and took up the fight to save our country and our sanity. In addition to volunteering, donating, and spreading actual facts, a great way to stay sane was to inform myself, research the truth, reassure myself that Trump, McConnell, and the like did not have a magic wand. Another therapeutic activity for me was reading the writings of truth purveyors like the Palmer Report and Greg Olear every day, which I still do.
Now, witnessing the GOP panic after losing control of the Presidency, the House, and the Senate, it appears they are also losing control of their minds. The problem is, while Democrats worked hard and smart, never cheating or further destroying the foundations of our democracy to rebalance power, the GOP are sinking to new desperate measures to regain power. They continue using unconstitutional and criminal tactics in their efforts to overturn a free and fair election, spreading the Big Lie, and even conspired to attack the Capitol. Now, despite losing over 60 legal challenges to the 2020 election around the country, their latest move is an election “audit” of the 2020 ballots from Arizona’s largest county where Biden won by more than 2 percentage points.
Even after multiple Maricopa County audits were conducted that found no evidence of widespread voter fraud, and Secretary of State Katie Hobbs certified the election results, they are still perpetuating this insane lie. Arizona Republicans hired Cyber Ninjas, a shadowy company whose CEO deleted his Twitter account after spreading the Big Lie, to oversee the audit. By using this company, the Republicans have reduced transparency and, according to Secretary of State Hobbs, a Democrat, “are making it up as they go along,” hand counting ballots, reviewing voter machines, and door-knocking to match ballots to those individuals who believe they have cast a vote. The 2.1 million unprotected ballots and 400 tabulation machines were transported to an unsecured site. These tactics are so clearly unconstitutional and beyond the scope of the 2020 election, there is no chance the polluted results would stand up in court.
More importantly, with the election already having been certified in every state, even if the “audit” were to find any credible evidence of fraud or misconduct, the most Republican lawmakers in Arizona and other states could do is use those results in their ongoing attempts to dramatically change how voting happens in their states. That’s a big if.
Chicago native Lorraine Evanoff earned her degree in French from DePaul University then became a Certified Financial Manager. She worked as a finance exec in film production for seven years in Paris, then in Silicon Valley during the dot-com era, and later for various Hollywood production companies, notably as CFO of National Lampoon. She is currently living in Los Angeles with her husband.