Arizona lawmaker claims interference in grand jury probe

In a letter Tuesday, the Gilbert Republican told Timothy Courchaine, the U.S. Attorney for Arizona, that the pair want him to produce "detailed information'' about the materials he produced about the 2020 presidential election pursuant to a subpoena. Those records concern an "audit'' the Senate conducted in 2021 amid allegations that, despite official election returns, Donald Trump actually outpolled Joe Biden.

Petersen said the Senate obtained an opinion letter from a private law firm concluded that the Senate was obligated to comply with the subpoena.

"The Arizona attorney general and secretary of state's actions may constitute obstruction of justice and witness tampering,'' he told Courchaine of the pair's efforts.

But Petersen, who is hoping to unseat Mayes in November, said it's not just this request for the info about the audit that he believes runs afoul of the law.

He pointed out that just last month, Fontes and Mayes told county election officials to refuse to comply with any grand jury subpoenas at all for their voter records.

The pair reminded the counties that there already is a lawsuit in federal court over whether the Department of Justice is entitled to a full — and unredacted — list of voter information. There is currently no date set for a hearing.

Petersen, in his letter, called that advice by the pair "misleading'' and "illegal.''

"This pattern of conduct suggests an inappropriate attempt to interfere with the grand jury's ongoing investigation,'' he wrote.

What the grand jury actually is investigating, however, remains unclear.

Trump has openly pressured the Department of Justice to review his 2020 loss despite multiple court rulings in Arizona and elsewhere saying that the election was run fairly.

Even a hand count of Maricopa County ballots conducted as part of the Senate "audit'' by Cyber Ninjas, the firm the Senate hired with no previous experience in such a review, found that not only did Biden win Maricopa County, but he won it by an even larger margin than the official tally.

Despite that, as recently as last June, Trump called for a special prosecutor to investigate.

And when word of the Arizona subpoena to Petersen became public, the president posted on his social media, "Great!!!''

Petersen said what makes the information records that he surrendered pursuant to that subpoena particularly significant is that they are "only available records left from that race.

Arizona law requires that election records, including ballots, be destroyed after 22 months. But the audit conducted by the Senate did retain images of the 2.1 million ballots cast in Maricopa County.

But Mayes said the issue of concern to her isn't about the ballot images of a 6-year-old election. Any statute of limitations to challenge that election has long since run.

Instead, Mayes said, it appears to be a back-door effort to get access to confidential information about voters — the very same information that the Department of Justice is trying to get openly through its federal court lawsuits against not just Arizona but also other states.

"Unable to win in court in their efforts to seize the private data of Arizona voters, the Trump administration is attempting an end run around the rulings against them in these cases by weaponizing the federal grand jury process,'' Mayes said in a prepared statement. "It won't work.''

And she said it's clear that what the Trump administration wants is not about the long-past 2020 election.

"This is about laying the groundwork to deny the results of the 2026 election if they don't go their way,'' Mayes said. "No matter what Warren Petersen or the Trump administration have to say, I took an oath to uphold our Constitution and defend our elections, and I will not be deterred from doing so.''

It's not just Mayes questioning the real reason for the subpoena.

Assistant Attorney General Karen Hartman-Tellez had previously sent a letter to Courchaine about that grand jury subpoena that resulted in Petersen surrendering everything he had from the Senate audit of the 2020 election. The FBI did release a receipt for the property it took.

"That receipt, however, provides little information about the content of the listed electronic storage media,'' she told Courchaine. "For example, it lists 'eight USB drives' and 'misc. documents,' but it is unclear whether those items or others on the receipt include voter registration records.''

Hartman-Tellez said while the database for the 2020 election differs from those currently registered, some of the information is the same — including what the state contends is confidential and not subject to disclosure. That includes social security numbers, driver's license numbers, mother's maiden name, day and month of birth, and signatures. And she warned if that's in the material that the feds got from Petersen, Fontes is "prepared to take steps'' from keeping the federal government from using it in illegal ways.

That, in turn, goes to the lawsuit yet to be resolved in federal court, where the Trump administration claims — and Fontes disputes — that it is entitled to the records so it can investigate whether the state properly maintains voter registration rolls.

Mayes also took a shot at Petersen on Tuesday for trying to get Courchaine to investigate whether she and Fontes, by asking about the information he turned over, are obstructing justice and illegally tampering with a grand jury witness.

"After wasting taxpayer dollars on the laughable Cyber Ninjas audit, Petersen again wasted Arizona's taxpayer dollars on a legal opinion that painstakingly tries to justify his failure to uphold Arizona's constitutional right to protect its voters' privacy,'' the attorney general said, referring to the legal opinion he sought from a private law firm saying he has to respond to the subpoena.

"This is yet another example of Petersen desperately seeking favor from a president who cannot accept that he lost his reelection in 2020 fair and square,'' Mayes wrote. "Arizonans will not be fooled.''

Fontes also criticized Petersen, not just for turning over the records but for now seeking a federal probe of himself and Mayes for asking questions about it.

"While Arizona state Senator Petersen continues to prioritize Donald Trump's wishes over the safety and security of Arizona's voters, I can confidently affirm that these methods of intimidation will not stop our work,'' he said in a statement.