The Arizona Secretary of State’s office is threatening to sue Cochise County if it goes ahead with all ballot hand counts in the midterm elections.

State Elections Commissioner Cori Rorick sent a letter The Cochise County Attorney’s Office and the State Legislative Council have agreed that under state law, counties are not allowed to count ballots by hand, Rorrick said. , writes that hand counting jeopardizes the accuracy of elections and that the time it takes to manually tally all votes makes it impossible to meet state deadlines for finalizing election results. .

“If the board votes to proceed with a full hand count, the accuracy and integrity of the election will be jeopardized. We will take all available legal steps to assure you,” Rorik wrote.

Still, despite early voting already taking place for the Nov. 8 election, regulators are likely to vote on the plan. They will meet on Monday at 2pm to discuss it and possibly vote. On the agenda posted on the county website on friday.

Supervisors Peggy Judd and Tom Crosby, two Republicans on three boards, I want to manually count all the votes cast in the midterm elections by the county’s 87,000 registered voters. After receiving Lorick’s letter, Judd told Votebeat that he wasn’t sure if he would vote to make the handcount happen, but he still wanted to have a discussion and vote next week.

“I’m not giving up just yet,” said Judd.

She doesn’t believe hand counting will be illegal, saying, “There are a lot of legal opinions out there.” Judd was a state legislator before being elected to the county board in 2016.

She brushed off other concerns in her letter, stating that the votes were counted manually in front of the ballot counting machine and that it worked. I said it would take, but I wanted to make it happen.

“It’s not as big a deal as some people worry,” she said.

The original proposed plan was to continue to count ballots using county counting machines, but also to count hands. The supervisor has not provided details on how the handcount will be done, how much it will cost taxpayers, or which method’s outcome will be official if the two do not match. County election officials estimate that handcounting requires a total of 2,500 hours.

Ann English, a Democrat supervisor who opposes the plan, told Votebeat on Wednesday: [by hand] Not legal or possible. ”

The county attorney’s office repeatedly warned supervisors earlier this month that their plans were not legal and that they would block any votes because allowing votes on illegal proposals would increase the county’s liability and risk. It is unclear how it was approved for the official meeting agenda. The county attorney’s office did not respond to a request for comment Thursday.

English said she had not been informed that the county attorney’s opinion had changed on the matter. I believe.

She said she hopes the other two supervisors will change their minds about defying the counsel’s advice.

The State Legislative Council recently joined the topic October 5 letter sent to Congressman Gail Griffina Republican living in the county, agrees with the county attorney’s office that full ballot counting is only permitted under state law.

Lorick urged supervisors on Wednesday to “abandon this misguided effort”, saying the ballot-counting machines were safe and accurate and that a full hand count would raise many concerns.

“In particular, counting by hand is inevitably time-consuming and prone to human error,” Lorick writes. “Arizona election officials responsible for overseeing the counting of ballots have completed accurate handcounts for elections with dozens of races on ballots in time for applicable statutory deadlines, including county canvases. I can prove that it is impossible to do the deadline.”

This deadline requires the county to finalize the election or hold a ballot between 6 days and 20 days after the election.

“A drastic change in procedures just a few weeks before Election Day poses a significant risk of administrative error and could lead to voter confusion and mistrust in the election,” Lorick continued. I was.

Judd said she viewed the letter from the secretary of state as a “threat” but said it didn’t deter her from moving forward.

Election researchers and consultants generally advise against hand counting ballots because machine counting has proven to be more accurate and efficient. Pre-election tests and post-election audits may include partial hand counts, helping machines count votes accurately.

Republican-leaning counties are the latest to propose handcounts. The proposal spread all over the countryfueled by conspiracy theorists spreading mistrust of vote-counting machines since the 2020 election and unsubstantiated claims that the machines are programmed to switch votes in favor of Joe Biden.

No evidence of voting machines hacked in 2020 All lawsuits alleging so have been dismissed and Federal agencies and experts said 2020 was the safest election ever.