Chris Mays
Arizona Attorney General Chris Mays told the Cochise County Recorder (a friend and ally of the losing state’s candidate’s secretary and election denier Mark Finkem) that he knew almost everything about the county’s election campaign. is suing Cochise County for giving power to
Mays warned officials last month that the operation carried out by two Cochise County Republicans, a three-member Cochise County Board of Supervisors, was likely illegal.
Now the newly-elected Democratic Attorney General is asking a judge to void an agreement that would consolidate most electoral powers under Republican Cochise County Rector David Stevens.
In a statement, Mays described the agreement as an “unconditional surrender.”
“The broad provisions of the agreement, without regard to specific statutory powers, devolve almost entirely from the Board to the Registrar of election powers,” Mays said in the complaint. and does not have a clear restrictive principle on its exercise.”
In the past, Cochise County’s electoral administration was split in two.
Stevens acted as county record keeper by registering voters, mailing ballots, and verifying signatures on returned ballots. A separate elections officer, hired by the county board, was responsible for running election day and counting votes.
Cochise County’s last election administrator, Lisa Mara, recently resigned over Republicans’ illegal attempts to raise their hands on the county’s board of directors in the 2022 midterm elections.
On February 28, in exchange for hiring new directors, the board surrendered its own voting rights to Stevens.
“I think we are acting in an inappropriate and unwise way,” they said, against the objections of Anne English, the sole Democratic overseer of the Attorney General’s Office and Board.
Republican Overseers Tom Crosby and Peggy Judd, who voted to hand over power to Stevens, were not immediately reachable for comment on Tuesday.
Stevens works with the Election Integrity nonprofit, founded by former state legislator Finkem, a Republican election naysayer who lost to Democrat Adrian Fontes in the 2022 election for Secretary of State. Stevens has also advocated for his count of illegal full his hands on the 2022 ballot.
The Attorney General’s Complaint filed in Cochise County Superior Court alleges that “By agreement, the Registrar illegally expanded his powers and the Board illegally and almost entirely waived its statutory duties relating to elections.” ing.
Mays further expressed concern about the public’s right to know “when and how the government makes important decisions that affect voting rights.” If so, he claimed that he did not mention how he would handle deliberations on election procedures that would take place in public meetings.
“We are deeply concerned that this move will obscure or potentially obscure the actions and deliberations that the board normally conducts publicly under the Open Meetings Act,” Mays said in a statement. rice field.
But not everyone agrees with Mayes. Historically, other counties have delegated special authority over the administration of elections to county registrars. Arizona’s new secretary of state, Fontes, told Votebeat that counties “shouldn’t be prevented from doing what they think is right.”
