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MAGA Candidate Joins WA Election Audit Lawsuits Claiming Votes Were ‘Flipped’ in Three Counties in 2020

BY September 22, 2021

Lawsuits filed Thursday in Clark, Snohomish, and Whatcom (Washington) counties claim the auditors in each of those counties “flipped votes,” kept illegal records of voters by political party, defied public records laws, and, in some cases, used unverified election equipment during the November 2020 election.

The suits contend that approximately 6,000 votes were flipped, and more than 400,000 were added or removed in one or more statewide races “before, during and/or after the election.” They argue a part of that happened in the county where each suit is filed.

[Jaime Herrera Beutler]

[Joe Kent]

The suits were filed by the Washington Election Integrity Coalition United with an additional 28 individuals — including Trump-endorsed congressional candidate Joe Kent, Patriot Prayer founder Joey Gibson, and Yacolt Town Council member Michelle Dawson — signing on as plaintiffs. Kent is challenging Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler, who was re-elected for the fifth time in 2020, for her 3rd Congressional District seat. The lawsuits also ask to have the county auditors “permanently restrained from allowing and/or facilitating electronic manipulation of the voting results,” claiming the auditors “engaged in wrongful acts, errors and/or neglect of duty.”

According to court records, Clark County Auditor Greg Kimsey in August denied a Washington Election Integrity Coalition United public records request for actual ballots from the November election that the group says is legally allowed.

Washington Election Integrity Coalition United leader Tamborine Borrelli, of Gig Harbor, has traveled the state in search of residents willing to join the effort.

 

Along with legal fees, the suits seek a “full forensic audit” to be conducted in the same manner as the audit carried out this year in Maricopa County, Arizona, which was initiated in April by Senate Republicans and has yet to reveal any evidence of widespread voter fraud. The suits also seek to have Jovan Hutton Pulitzer, who conducted the Arizona audit and claims to have invented technology that can detect fraudulent ballots, perform similar audits in Washington State. The suits are largely similar, except Snohomish County Auditor Garth Fell is accused of using uncertified voting equipment, while the Clark County auditor is not.

The litigation didn’t surprise Washington’s Republican Secretary of State Kim Wyman. “This is the new reality on the ground for election administrators,” she said. “It doesn’t matter how wide a margin in the results. You call everything into question and it undermines the validity of everything in the process.” No one in Washington, nor elsewhere is, anyone discussing the extensive audit trail compiled by local auditors, Wyman said. “All these allegations and I’ve yet to see anything brought to a prosecuting attorney or the FBI that we could actually respond to,” Wyman said.

Joe Kent has also indicated he will undertake the same actions in the 2022 Midterm elections and is already calling for a “full forensic audit” before a single vote has even been cast. The Democratic challenger in WA 03, Brent Hennrich, had this to say about the process: “Greg Kimsey is a Republican and has the utmost respect in conducting elections from every elected person and former candidate I have spoken with in my run to date. I find this attack on our electoral system to be hyper-partisan, and only to be the base fuel for attacks that are being pre-planned for the 2022 election where my name will be on the ballot. I have stated on the record multiple times I will accept the results of the ballot count in ’22. For a group of people who consistently state they hate wasteful government spending, it seems odd to make the government spend money to defend this attack.”

UPDATED: We received a response from Jaime Herrera Beutler’s office via spokesperson Parker Truax: “Relitigating the 2020 election long after all reasonable legal challenges have been examined and rejected by the courts is a dead-end for Republicans, and it distracts our party from promoting policies that help ordinary Americans and winning new people over to our cause.”

[Attempts to reach Joe Kent for comments were not returned by our publishing deadline on Wednesday. HillReporter will update should we receive any responses.]



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