Judge will not block Arizona Senate’s 2020 election recount

(KYMA, KECY/ AP News) - Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Daniel Martin decided Wednesday that the Republican-led audit of ballots from the 2020 Presidential election will continue.

After suing to block the audit, Democrats pushed for the audit to be blocked completely. Yet, the decision still turned out to be a win and a loss for Democrats because allowing the audit to continue comes with some conditions.

The private company, Cyber Ninjas, hired by the Republican-led State Senate must make its procedures public in order to guarantee the privacy of voters and the secrecy of their choices.

The Democrats argued the public has a right to know how the recount of 2.1 million ballots in the state's most populous county was being conducted. Lawyers argued that voter privacy would be irreparably harmed if the process proceeded.

Wednesday’s court hearing is the latest in a series that began when the state Senate subpoenaed Maricopa County’s ballots and vote tabulation machines so it could audit the results that showed Biden winning in Arizona. Biden’s victory in Arizona being the first for a Democrat since Bill Clinton’s 1996 win.

Senate Democrats call the audit an effort to perpetuate “The Big Lie,” which is what they call Trump’s insistence that he only lost because of election fraud.

In response, former Republican Secretary of State, Ken Bennett, acting as the Senate's liaison, says that voter secrecy is being protected and that ”we are going to be able to tell every Arizonan in a few weeks that they can have complete integrity and trust in their elections, or we have some parts of the election that need to be improved." 

The recount is scheduled to be done by May 14th. As of Wednesday, there have been fewer than 100,000 ballots counted so far.