Revealed: FBI subpoena in Maricopa County probe focuses on discredited ‘audit’

By Brentin Mock

"Vote here" signage is stored at a warehouse at the Maricopa County Tabulation and Election Center (MCTEC) ahead of the 2024 Arizona Primary and General elections in Phoenix, Arizona on June 3, 2024. Maricopa County election workers have repeatedly been the target of harassment and threats since the 2020 US election due to the spread of online misinformation about voter fraud. Officials are preparing for another onslaught of conspiracy theories in the 2024 presidential race by bulking up security and giving public tours at their ballot tabulation facility in downtown Phoenix, Arizona. (Photo by Patrick T. Fallon / AFP) (Photo by PATRICK T. FALLON/AFP via Getty Images)

The  Arizona Senate released the grand jury subpoena for the recently opened FBI probe into Maricopa County’s 2020 election results Friday night. It sheds further light on what the Trump administration is seeking in its investigation, which is part of a broader campaign for a federal takeover of elections. 

The March 5 subpoena, issued to Arizona Senate President Warren Petersen, asked mostly for equipment and data related to a widely debunked audit of Maricopa County’s 2020 presidential election voting records conducted by partisan cybersecurity firm Cyber Ninjas. 

Election experts are concerned that Trump may be using this probe as a ploy to obtain the state’s unredacted voter rolls, which Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes (D) is currently fighting in court to block. Arizona is one of dozens of states that the Trump administration has sued to have them submit their voter rolls to the U.S. Department of Justice – a maneuver that would undermine constitutionally protected state sovereignty over elections and endanger voters’ privacy rights.

The Maricopa County probe, along with the FBI’s January seizure of Fulton County, Georgia’s 2020 election records, also seem part of Trump’s agenda to relitigate – or at least cast doubt on – that year’s results, in which he lost to Joe Biden. 

They also happen to fall right when Trump is building a case for passing the SAVE America Act, a bill that would impose restrictive voter registration and voter ID policies nationwide that is currently being debated in the U.S. Senate. 

However, the Maricopa County subpoena focuses on the CyberNinjas 2021 audit, which was notoriously mishandled through a process that even Cyber Ninjas admitted was  “screwy.” 

Specifically, the subpoena asks for:

  • Reports produced by Cyber Ninjas, or its subcontractors, summarizing the forensic findings of the audit.
  • Any original electronic media devices in the possession of the Arizona State Senate provided by Maricopa County to assist in the audit, to include, but not limited to, external hard drives, thumbdrives, USB drives, memory cards, SD cards, PCMIA cards, Compact Flash, CD/DVD, with accompanying chain of custody documentation.
  • Electronic media devices (to include, but not limited to external hard drives, thumb drives, USB drives, memory cards, SD cards, PCMIA cards, Compact Flash, CD/DVD), produced and or provided [by] Cyber Ninjas, or its subcontractors, during the audit, which store electronic images, data, or clones of the Maricopa County Election Department’s elections equipment software and data, with accompanying chain of custody documentation.
  • Any documentation produced by Cyber Ninjas, or its subcontractors, related to the audit, to include, but not limited to, forensic tools used, forensic software versions used, forensic procedures used, and all documentation related to the imaging, cloning, extraction, and analysis of the Maricopa County Elections Department electronic systems. 
  • Any available official records depicting communications between the Arizona Senate and public officials from Maricopa County, to include members of the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors, the Maricopa County Recorder’s Office, and the Maricopa County Elections Department.

Arizona Senate President Warren Petersen, who helped facilitate the Cyber Ninja audit – and who has over the years denied, without evidence, that Biden defeated Trump in the state fairly – said on social media that he handed over records to the FBI in compliance with the subpoena. On March 7, an FBI agent reportedly collected dozens of hard drives, videos, photos and other documents related to that audit, according to records obtained by ProPublica. 

Meanwhile,  Secretary of State Fontes has instructed county election officials not to comply with any federal subpoenas requesting voters’ fully unredacted files. 

“The grand jury should not serve to circumvent Arizona’s ongoing lawsuit, and our offices will pursue all legal actions available to prevent the Department of Justice from misusing the grand jury process,” wrote Fontes in a joint letter with Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes (D) to county election officials. “I implore you to fulfill your oath by declining any such illegal demands.”