Abe Hamade is looking for an opportunity to claim that he is entitled to a new trial to overturn the results of the attorney general election.

Mojave County Superior Court Judge Lee Jansen held a hearing on May 16 to force Hamade’s lawyers to present new evidence that some votes were not counted. They also want Jansen to allow a full inspection of all ballots, when the judge first ruled that Democrat Chris Mays won the race in December. I denied this.

A new order does not mean that judges will ultimately agree to grant a new trial.

Hamade’s attorneys argue that the problems discovered during the recounting of votes in Pinal County point to the kind of things they believe went wrong in the election.

These issues became apparent after officials scrutinized some of the votes after the first election results were reported and authenticated, after a forced recount generated 507 votes.

Hamade picked up 392 of them. But statewide, he was voted over 2.5 million votes, and he was declared the winner with just 280 votes, which was still not enough to close the gap with Mr. Mayes.

Since then, Pinal County election officials have blamed the disparity on human error.

Now, lawyers representing Hamade, the Republican National Committee, and two voters want Jansen, who restricted ballot inspections before the first trial, to reopen the case.

Attorney Tim La Sota specifically said there was reason to believe Maricopa County was not counting Hamade’s votes properly.

It all comes down to what was found in Pinal County during that hand recount.

However, those marks were not recognized by the automatic tallying equipment. However, Hand in his review was able to determine the intentions of each voter.

La Sota claims there’s likely an Election Day ballot in Maricopa County with a similar problem. And only if Janssen allowed a new trial to go through all the votes to see if there were more votes for Hamade than were officially recorded, he said. Stated.

He also refers to “undervoting”, meaning a vote in which people voted for other candidates but seemingly skipped the race for Attorney General. 90,000 more votes were cast.

He said only a study of these ballots would determine whether people really skipped that race.The same thing happened with the governor and secretary of state elections. , argued that La Sota was more likely to endorse Hamade because Republicans are more likely to vote on Election Day than Democrats.

This is backed up by official responses showing those who took the poll favored Hamade by more than two to one. It was Mays’ stronger display in the early voting that provided the margin of victory.

In the first trial, Jansen allowed Hamade’s legal team to examine about 2,300 votes under the law that dictates what is allowed in election challenges.

In it, the judge concluded that only 14 ballots had been submitted, which may have raised questions about whether the votes should be counted, whether it was Hamade or Mayes. These were votes that were not clearly marked by voters.

But Jansen said that wasn’t enough to determine that county election officials who hand-checked these ballots had done something wrong.

“Most likely, these 14 ballots were voter errors and weren’t filled out as instructed,” the judge said.

“The bottom line is that you haven’t proven your claim,” he told La Sota, who made the case in a half-day trial in December. I think the election was held illegally or incorrectly.”

La Sota said it inspected all ballots and could provide that evidence if it were allowed to present its findings and legal arguments at the new trial.

As for the possibility of dismissing Mr. Mays, there is precedent for dismissing incumbents.

This occurred in the 1916 gubernatorial election between incumbent Democrat George WP Hunt and Republican challenger Thomas E. Campbell.

Campbell was sworn in after the return gave him a 30-vote advantage.

However, Hunt refused to resign while contesting the results, while Campbell served as de facto governor on an interim basis. After considering questions about Taka, he brought Hunt into office in late 1917.

“So there is no artificial time limit to complete the contest process,” said La Sota. “As Pinal County recognizes, in situations like this, taking the time to physically inspect ballots can help identify miscounts and ensure all votes are counted properly. play an important role in.”