A Republican county official and proud member of the stolen election set has come up with a creative new way to try to make money off his recent defeat.
Forget holding out a tin cup to the gullible base , as you spin tales of the many conspiratorial ways in which you were robbed.
Forget going to court, even, where you would have to present actual evidence to back up your claim.
Nope, just hit up the taxpayers.
Cavanaugh claims officials modified the results
Pinal County Supervisor Kevin Cavanagh is threatening to sue his own county over his loss in the July 31 primary for county sheriff.
The Washington Post reports Cavanaugh has filed a notice of claim, alleging the Republican county recorder and five other election county officials conspired to “modify the results” of his race .
He wants $65,000. Come Jan. 1, his price will go up to $1 million, the Post reports.
In his notice of claim, Cavanaugh says election officials conspired to “transfer approximately 35% of votes” using USB sticks to shift his votes to his Republican opponent, Pinal County Sheriff’s Lt. Ross Teeple.
Teeple won by a 2-1 margin.
The county says there’s no evidence of wrongdoing.
Both county and state Republican Party officials say there’s nothing to suggest votes were improperly tabulated.
He created his own analysis to say so
But Cavanaugh points to a 21-page statistical analysis he put together with his wife, his administrative assistant and some guy he hired off the internet, claiming the votes were “manipulated” in his and several other county races.
His report claims, among other things, a statistical pattern that points to cheating and a lack of correlation between his campaign advertising and election results.
The county says it’s all bunk, but it has launched an audit anyway, hoping to put the issue to rest in this heavily conservative county before the November election.
As if election deniers would trust an audit. (See: the Arizona Senate’s Cyber Ninjas audit , which concluded three years ago that Joe Biden won Maricopa County in 2020, yet still is cited by conspiracy kooks as evidence of a stolen election.)
The county has 60 days to respond to Supervisor Cavanaugh’s threatened lawsuit.
Me? I’d send him a 21-page response, calculating the statistical odds of a score at taxpayer expense as zero.
He'll lose, but so will Pinal County voters
County taxpayers owe this guy nothing for declining to elect him.
Sadly, though, they’ll still pay in other ways — both in an outlay of cash to auditors and a potential loss of voter confidence in the coming presidential election.
This is a county that has spent two years working to ensure the coming election works as it should after the debacle of 2022 , when an embarrassment of foul ups and failures to follow through left voters stunned.
From 2022: Pinal County elections mess is inexcusable
Since then, the county has hired a new recorder to oversee elections and invested in training for her staff. It’s created new processes and upgraded security protocols.
The county even built a new $32 million election headquarters , featuring walls of windows so that people can more easily watch as the votes are counted.
All to try to rebuild trust.
Now, along comes an unsuccessful candidate — a county official, no less — unwilling to accept defeat and demanding that taxpayers pay up.
This is a whole new level of sore loser.
Reach Roberts at laurie.roberts@arizonarepublic.com . Follow her on X (formerly Twitter) at @LaurieRobertsaz and on Threads at @LaurieRobertsaz .
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This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Opinion: Pinal County supervisor takes 'sore loser' to a whole new level
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