A Pennsylvania-based IT firm is no longer managing the hand recount of the 2.1 million ballots in Arizona’s Senate-led Maricopa County election audit after its contract ended earlier this month.
Wake TSI was the subcontractor that developed and oversaw the procedures for recounting the county’s ballots cast in the 2020 election, working alongside Cyber Ninjas, the state Senate’s lead contractor in charge of the audit of Maricopa County’s general election results.
The firm has passed the hand counting task over to Scottsdale-based company StratTech Solutions, which plans to use Wake’s procedures for the remainder of the hand recount, according to Randy Pullen, an audit spokesman and former state GOP chairman.
Pullen told the AZ Republic that the Senate’s contract with Wake TSI ended May 14, the original completion date for the hand count. He added that many of the same workers and volunteers will now be working under StratTech.
MARICOPA COUNTY 2020 ELECTION AUDIT RESUMES AFTER WEEKLONG PAUSE
“They were done,” Pullen said of Wake TSI. “They didn’t want to come back.”
Senate President Karen Fann said Wake TSI completed the obligations under its contract and was told last week that the firm would not return for the remainder of the audit.
“They finished up with their contract, so they don’t need to be there anymore,” she said.
It is unclear whether StratTech, which focuses on cybersecurity and internet technology, has prior election or auditing experience.
The Senate has extended its lease at the Veterans Memorial Coliseum, where the audit is taking place, to June 30 after high school graduations at the facility led to a brief pause in the recount process last week. Fann has said the audit is expected to conclude before the new deadline.
Senate Republicans have lauded Wake TSI’s election audit experience, noting its workers performed a 2020 election hand count in Fulton County, Pennsylvania. The audit in Fulton County was performed at the request of Republican state Sen. Doug Mastriano, who has been documented as an advocate of the “Stop the Steal” movement which purported the 2020 election was stolen from former President Donald Trump, according to the Arizona Mirror.
Cyber Ninjas’s original statement of work said Wake TSI would be “leading all ballot hand-counting processes.”
When Cyber Ninjas’s CEO Doug Logan was questioned about his company’s lack of experience in election audits, he emphasized the company was the “coordinating firm” for other companies with more specified election experience.
Logan has also faced criticism for touting unsubstantiated claims of election fraud in the 2020 election, though he has since deleted public statements on the matter from social media. He previously said the hiring of Wake was important because he trusted the firm to create a ballot counting process that was “beyond reproach.”
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The Washington Examiner contacted Arizona Senate Republicans, Wake TSI, and StratTech Solutions for comment but did not immediately receive a response.
