Lawsuit Brought by Two Cochise County Supervisors Against Election Certification Declared Moot
Since the almost disastrous stonewalling, delaying and violating the law by refusing to certify their county's ballots by the state's legal deadline, there's been a lot of talk in Cochise County, Arizona about the possibility of recalling county supervisors Peggy Judd and Tom Crosby. Their refusal to follow the law, resulting from their belief in baseless and unproven conspiracy theories about vote counting machines, and as an attempt to stop statewide certification of the election by withholding their own certification of votes, is grossly negligent and irresponsible. It is a demonstration of incompetence which sends a clear message to voters that they are not qualified to serve, and are willing to put their own interests and politics ahead of their responsibility to the county's residents.
There have been multiple calls for these two supervisors to resign. They put the 55,000 or so votes from Democrats, Republicans and Independents in the county at risk of not being counted. Had the Secretary of State allowed that to happen, subtracting those votes from all of the elections that would have been affected would have resulted in Democratic candidates winning the District 6 congressional seat and the State Superintendent of Public Instruction elections. That risk was incredibly irresponsible, and a demonstration of a lack of respect for the will of the voters that is unpatriotic and anti-American.
All of those votes came from people who were residents of the county that these supervisors are charged with the responsibility of serving. But their actions were obviously quite self-serving, imposing their own interests and opinion over the interests of those whom they are elected to serve. They broke the law, and had to be forced by a court to follow it. One of them, Crosby, did not show up for the meeting that was court-ordered, which is a further violation of the law.
There is further evidence that in their plotting to carry out their election denier agenda, the two Republican supervisors may have violated the state's open meetings laws as well. If they had integrity, resignation would be the best way to resolve the problem. County election supervisor Lisa Marra said that recall is a complicated and involved process. People who make these kinds of mistakes and show this kind of incompetence in the private sector get fired. So regardless of how complicated that process might be, the voters owe this to themselves to hold these supervisors accountable for their incompetence, and fire them.
Turnabout is Fair Play
Republicans have pushed to get candidates into lower level positions on school boards, city councils and county boards of supervisors precisely as a means of initiating an election-denier agenda. Here is a perfect opportunity to take back a couple of seats and restore some common sense to county government, while saving the taxpayers from having to pay for wasteful, pointless court costs.
We've seen that election deniers seldom have the support of enough of the voters, including Republicans, to win very many elections. Cochise County has had its share of backward politicians for decades and decades (I grew up there, so I have some idea of what that's been like), and being a county supervisor should be a position that gets past partisan politics into oversight of resources which make the county a better place to live.
An Opportunity for Redemption
It was embarrassing, yes, embarrassing, to the residents of Cochise County when its supervisors started making national headlines for essentially cutting of their nose to spite their face. While alluding to non-existent ballot issues in Maricopa County, basically parroting Kari Lake, who lost the gubernatorial election, they put their own county at risk, not something that you'd expect from responsible county supervisors. The news, as well as the names of the two supervisors who acted so incompetently, was spread all over the country, making the whole county look provincial and backward.
A strong showing of voters in a recall election that ousts the two election deniers would be a great opportunity for the county to get some of its reputation back as the historic center of the old Southwest instead of forever being associated as the election denying county. Getting two Democrats to join the third one on the county board of supervisors, who, unlike Crosby and Judd, respect the law and for American democracy, would make great headlines.
So we encourage those who are thinking seriously about launching the recall to do so. It may be difficult but it will be worth it.
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