Chair/Vice Chair Response to Recorder Court Filing
While the Board typically wouldn’t comment on an ongoing investigation, especially one involving Maricopa County employees, Recorder Heap’s legal motion and public statement today require that we respond with a factual accounting.
At approximately 1:36 p.m. on March 12, 2026 - as results were being tabulated for the Tempe Jurisdictional Election - two Maricopa County Recorder’s Office (MCRO) employees were seen via closed-circuit security cameras removing a piece of equipment from the Maricopa County Election & Tabulation Center (MCTEC). The Recorder’s Office CIO and another employee wheeled the pre-tabulation scanner controlled by the Board of Supervisors out of the building, loaded it into the back of a pickup truck, and drove off. This was believed to be a personal vehicle, as it bore no Maricopa County insignia. The individuals returned to MCTEC with the scanner approximately 50 minutes later, after the county Elections Director had alerted MCRO leadership to the incident. It is unknown what transpired with the scanner during this period, other than that it was taken to MCRO executive offices.
As part of normal protocol, Maricopa County Human Resources (HR) opened an internal inquiry to determine what, if any, county policies had been violated. MCRO refused to participate. However, the HR report independently substantiated the incident and confirmed the CIO had been notified on at least one occasion, in an inter-office message on March 5, that the scanner was controlled by the Board’s Elections Department.
The HR investigation also determined that, on the same day the CIO removed the Board-controlled scanner, he also removed what appeared to be a handful of provisional ballot affidavit envelopes from a secure area of MCTEC. These envelopes potentially contained live ballots, creating grave chain-of-custody concerns. The investigation could not determine what, if anything, the CIO did with these materials, but a count the following day determined all ballots and envelopes had been accounted for.
Following completion of the HR inquiry, county leadership shared the findings with the Recorder’s Office and engaged the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office (MCAO) to receive legal advice. MCAO reviewed the report and appointed a special prosecutor to determine whether criminal activity occurred. That investigation is ongoing.
The Board replaced the compromised scanner at a cost of approximately $70,000.
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