Maricopa County officials continue to try to cover up their crimes by blaming the manufacturers of the tabulators. But, if you spend a little time and talk to the manufacturer, you get a different picture altogether. The OKI Printer company says that their operating manual specifically says that 80# paper is the maximum the printers can handle ballots printed on both sides. The county used 100# paper.
That might have worked with one-sided paper, but not with two and if the county had checked their manual or with OKI, that would have been made quite clear. A 2022 General Election Internal Review, dated July 26, identifies the OKI ballot-on-demand printers as malfunctioning in up to 223 voting centers in Maricopa County. The majority of the printers used in Maricopa County were manufactured by OKI. The report claims that between 32 and 34% of the votes could not be read by the tabulators.
Hours-long lines developed at many of the polling sites as tabulators could not read the ballots being printed.
Republican National Committee lawyer Mark Sonnenklar testified at 2022 Arizona GOP nominee Kari Lake’s election challenge trial in December that his team of roving attorneys on Election Day found these problems occurred in 132 locations, or about 59 percent in all.
The county put the figure at 70 locations last fall, according to The Washington Post.
VISIT OUR YOUTUBE CHANNELGiven that Republicans typically vote 3-to-1 over Democrats on Election Day and the 17,000 votes separating Lake and Democrat Katie Hobbs, Sonnenklar testified, “There’s no question in my mind that had there not been tabulator issues at 132 vote centers, this election would have ended up with Kari Lake winning.”
🚨 Bombshell Testimony from Election Day Attorney 🚨
"There's no question in my mind that had there not been tabulator issues at 132 vote centers, This election would have ended up with @KariLake winning."
Help FUEL our Legal Team:https://t.co/n3390q4MVM pic.twitter.com/Sxa059aM52
— Kari Lake (@KariLake) December 21, 2022
The county’s 2022 General Election Internal Review findings regarding the OKI printer problems mirror what former Arizona Supreme Court Justice Ruth McGregor concluded in a report she submitted to the county in April.
VoteBeat’s Jen Fifield reported McGregor had been hired by the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office to conduct an independent review of what happened on Election Day.
Maricopa County has maintained that there was nothing that should have signaled some of its ballot printers would fail on Election Day in Nov, causing widespread problems.
But the company that made the printers say the risk was clear.
A 🧵, and story: https://t.co/I48VxgVYWr
— Jen Fifield (@JenAFifield) July 27, 2023
The McGregor report said:
“Based on our tests, and for the reasons described in this report, we concluded that the combined effect of using 100-pound ballot paper and a 20-inch ballot during the 2022 general election was to require that the Oki B432 printers perform at the extreme edge of their capability, a level that could not be reliably sustained by a substantial number of printers.”
OKI responded to the report in a May letter to Maricopa County Attorney Rachel Mitchell, writing:
“OKI was disappointed that we were not contacted during the investigation, or prior to the public release of the report, to provide our input and feedback regarding the printers’ performance during the election.”
“We strongly believe that common sense and reason dictated that, during the investigation, the investigation team should have requested an interview from the manufacturer to address the alleged printer performance failures by that manufacturer’s printers.”
“As a result, it seems that the true underlying cause of the election issues was human error in the use of 100 lb. paper without reviewing the manual and/or confirming with OKI that such use was within the specifications of the OKI B432 printers.”
