Maricopa County supervisors, recorder go to court over election systems audit

The Maricopa County Board of Supervisors and Recorder Justin Heap agree that the county needs to audit its election systems, but they remain at odds over who should oversee the process.

That was the main takeaway from a hearing in Maricopa County Superior Court on Tuesday as Heap seeks an order to stop the board from giving a third-party contractor access to interconnected technology systems used by the board and recorder, which includes the voter registration database.

Heap filed the legal action after the board hired The Intersect Group to come up with a recommendation for the best way to split the complicated election management systems and databases shared by the two offices to resolve an ongoing power struggle over who controls the county’s elections.

Who’s the boss?

Kory Langhofer, an attorney for the supervisors, told Judge Scott Blaney that the board is just following through on a request Heap made months ago, pointing to a request Heap submitted in asking for $150,000 to hire a consultant and conduct an audit to split the system.

But James Rogers, Heap’s attorney, said that’s not quite true.

Under the contract with The Intersect Group, the Recorder’s Office is essentially a spectator, Rogers argued.

Heap’s staff can still access the systems they need to run the office, but the recorder has no supervisory powers over the contractor or the audit itself, Recorder’s Office staff testified.

And that, Rogers argued, violates state law.

He cited state laws giving the recorder power to administer the voter registration database and argued that means only the has the power to authorize an audit of the larger system that houses that database.

“So if the county wanted to do this, they could have, but as our briefing showed, as all the papers show, the Recorder asked for this, and he was shut out,” Rogers said.

The legal fight stems from an agreement signed by former Recorder Stephen Richer and the Board of Supervisors in 2024 that made several changes to the way elections are managed in the county, including shifting the recorder’s IT staff under the supervision of the Board of Supervisors.

In Arizona, counties are charged with administering most election-related duties, and the law divides up specific responsibilities between county boards of supervisors and recorders’ offices. Election services agreements, like the one signed in 2024, are common to clear up ambiguities and to assign duties that can be overseen by the board or recorder under state law.

But when Heap took office in January, he dissolved the agreement, arguing it took away powers assigned to his office by law – allegations the Board denies.

After months of contentious negotiations, Heap sued the board over a number of claims – including that it illegally took control of his IT staff and technology systems.

Expertise

In an order setting the hearing, Blaney said he was particularly concerned about the recorder’s allegations that the board hired an unvetted contractor who could put sensitive voter information and the county’s election systems at risk.

And much of the hearing focused on the testimony of Bryan Colby, the Recorder’s chief information officer, who made those claims in a legal filing.

Langhofer attempted to poke holes in Colby’s testimony.

For instance, he pointed out that Colby, who has 30 years experience in the IT industry, began at the Recorder’s Office in July and has no prior experience working in elections or government.

Colby testified that he believed The Intersect Group allowing a third party to access election systems would give them access to sensitive voter information, including Social Security numbers, and could open the system up to cyber attacks.

But, when Langhofer asked, Colby said he had no reason to believe the contractor hired by the county would attempt to hack the county systems or act inappropriately with voter data.

Still, Colby said he was concerned that bad actors could access the county system by attacking The Intersect Group.

“This is a theoretical,” Colby said. “Whether its TIG or through the TIG systems that they have access to Maricopa County, nefarious acts could be done.”

However, county officials said steps have been taken to address those concerns.

That includes requiring the contractor to sign non-disclosure agreements and pass background checks.

And Nate Young, the county’s deputy chief information officer, said the contractor will only have access to an area of the system where new code is tested.

Any changes to the live system made must then pass through additional screening before they are implemented, Young said.

“Code bombs, document destruction, felonies like this is, it's nonsense,” Langhofer said. “It's complete rake speculation with really no basis in fact.”

A difficult split

Colby told the court he believes the county already has the staff available internally to split the election systems without hiring a third party firm.

“There are solid technical reasons for taking this approach, and frankly, the board's insistence on hiring a third-party contractor to conduct a 14-week-long audit is puzzling, unnecessary, and wasteful of taxpayer dollars,” he said in a legal declaration.

Colby estimated it would take staff two to four weeks to come up with a plan to separate the systems – much quicker than the 14-week timeline estimated by The Intersect Group.

But Langhofer, the board’s attorney, argued that simply isn’t true.

Maricopa County Elections Director Scott Jarrett testified that the election system in question touches dozens of different tasks that are under the supervisors control every day, like developing ballots, determining voting locations and recruiting poll workers.

“It was built, really, as one system, and there's these subapplications that are used within it, but they're all intertwined,” he said.

Langhofer argued Colby didn’t understand the sheer number of systems utilized by the board that integrated into the larger system, which also deals with the recorder’s responsibilities, such as voter registration.

“Your estimate for how complicated it would be to assess this problem, kind of dissect the report on the board’s sort of spheres here, it would be wrong because you misunderstood the problem, right? Langhofer asked.

“Possibly, yes … possibly. It depends on the complexity of it,” Colby responded.

And, under questioning, Colby admitted he hadn’t actually spoken about the project with the two staffers, Dustin Bryant and Michael Johnson, who he said could split the system in house.

Judgement day

Blaney said he plans to rule on Heap’s request to stop the audit as soon as possible.

But he implored both sides to try and come up with a solution outside of the courtroom.

“The court does not like to get involved in political issues,” he said. “I mean, it's something where our political branches and the political experts can duke it out a little bit better than the court can, but I'll do what's required of this court.”