Special Stack... Day 2 Trial Short Analysis

"Clicking like a woodpecker" rapid fire approval.

Phoenix, AZ May 19, 2023, It was an odd day in Court yesterday, in session from 9:00am to 10:00am then recess until 1:00 for lunch? Not too many jobs have those kinds of perks. Ugh.

On to the trial analysis… Perhaps the Lake v. Hobbs et al hearing should be labeled the Woodpecker Hearing. Counsel for Kari Lake, Kurt Olson, aptly coined the phrase “clicking like a woodpecker” during Day 1, and a gain today, when describing the rate at which signatures were allegedly verified.

An inside the shop witness, some calling her a whistleblower, Jacqueline Onigkeit, who was a 2022 county signature verification worker, provided further testimony today and was cross examined. While she explained her dedication to doing a good job, she described a slow and methodical process. That description is counter to the video played in court showing the “clicking like a woodpecker” rapid fire approval. While witness Onigkeit explained that the Level 1 signature verification workers were audited every day, “for too many approvals or too many rejections,” the point seems to be missed.

So wait a minute, exactly who establishes “too many”? Is there a predetermined number by management —to drive a predetermined outcome— that the Level 1 folks cannot go over on rejections, nor under for approvals? There was no testimony given regarding this question. During Day 1, both Andrew Meyer and Jacqueline Onigkeit said only three Level 2 signature verification workers provided oversight of their work, and they explained that the number of signature verification personnel was not sufficient to address the number of ballots. And again, when the queue was overloaded, the Level 2 work was sent back to Level 1 reviewers. Once again a flawed process that was understaffed.

Add to this question, while the Maricopa County elections officials claim that their system met the requirements of law, the claim is not supported by the rather damning video showing that some of the signature verification workers just went through the motions and clicked rapidly through the images they were given to verify or reject. The numbers are not adding up.

Work done by We The People AZ Alliance, which included the entire 2022 election data set —all of the envelopes— puts the number of defective signatures at 298,000. That is the output of a process that is seriously flawed. However, Maricopa County elections officials want us all to focus on the shinny object; they have a process, they follow their process, but wait a minute. What they will not answer is, are you really following the process even when workers are just going through the motions?

Counselor Olson uses ARS § 16-550, to explain the obvious failure of Maricopa County. So what exactly is signature verification as defined by the statute? “Shall compare” [the two signatures]. Is the signature on the return envelope consistent with the voter registration card. Testimony earlier earlier in the day by Erich Speckin spoke to the absurd notion that 2.9 seconds is sufficient to compare the signatures. This appears to affect 284,000 ballots were verified in less than 3-seconds per envelope.

Unfortunately the RSBN feed die as Counselor Olson was making the point that what occurred was not signature verification, but instead rapid fire, 100% approval.

Monday’s post will be for Paid Subscribers, it will focus on the lawless Adrian Fontes’ who currently occupies the Secretary of State office, and his failures to “just follow the law” and his failure to provide reporting on voter rolls cleanup that is required under ARS § 16-165(M), which requires that the Arizona Secretary of State, “shall report the following information to the legislature at the end of each quarter…”