Tonight, the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors approved an agreement with the Arizona State Senate that keeps county routers and other sensitive materials out of the hands of the Senate’s contractor, Cyber Ninjas. The agreement also protects taxpayers and ends a legal dispute over the Senate’s ongoing election review by bringing the County into full compliance with outstanding subpoenas.
READ THE AGREEMENT
VIEW BOARD’S PUBLIC DISCUSSION OF THIS ACTION
Under the agreement, an independent third party (the Special Master) will hire a team of technology experts to review the County’s routers and splunk logs and then answer questions posed by the Arizona Senate. At all times, the routers will remain in production and in the custody of Maricopa County. The agreement is structured in a way that ensures no personal identifying information or sensitive law enforcement or court-related information is revealed.
“This agreement is a step in the right direction to putting this nonsense behind us," said Chairman Jack Sellers, District 1. "The Cyber Ninjas will never be able to touch the routers or access our data. An independent third party can confirm what we've always said: the election equipment was not connected to the internet and no vote switching occurred. And our residents, law enforcement, and courts can all rest assured that their data and equipment are protected.”
Arizona’s Attorney General gave the Board until September 27 to comply fully with Senate subpoenas or risk losing $676 million in shared state sales tax revenue.
While the County disagrees with that finding, litigation always comes with risk. County leaders determined they would not be able to do the people’s work in either worst-case scenario—whether the County is forced to turn over routers directly to the Senate, or if nearly $700 million in revenue was withheld.
The agreement with the Senate comes with a provision that the Senate President write a letter to the Attorney General stating the County has now fully complied with the Senate’s outstanding subpoenas and that further action is not warranted.