LOS ANGELES, California – The third day of the State Bar of California (SBC) disbarment trial of Trump attorney John Eastman took place on Thursday, with the SBC calling Maricopa County Recorder Stephen Richer and Jonathan Marks, Deputy Secretary for Elections and Commissions in Pennsylvania, as witnesses. Richer is a Republican who started a PAC for election fraud-denying Republicans, and Marks was appointed to the position under then-Secretary of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Kathryn Boockvar, a Democrat. The SBC is asserting that Eastman violated attorney ethics rules by advising Donald Trump and state legislatures on how they could reject certifying electoral votes from states suspected of electoral fraud in the 2020 election.
Attorneys for the SBC and Richer conducted direct and cross-examination of the two witnesses. Shortly into the direct examination of Richer, as he began testifying about his confidence regarding Dominion voting machine tabulators, Eastman’s attorney Randy Miller expressed his concern to the SBC disciplinary Judge Yvette Roland that she was allowing the SBC’s witnesses like Richer to present one side but not allowing Eastman’s witnesses to testify on the same topic. He said it was “quite prejudicial,” only “getting half the story.” Roland did not change her mind.
SBC attorney Duncan Carling asked Richer several questions about the firm that performed an independent audit of Maricopa County’s 2020 election, the Cyber Ninjas. Richer said they were “a bunch of imbeciles” who “probably fudged those numbers,” referring to recently released text messages where he said owner Doug Logan instructed those involved to use numbers “as long as it was close.”
Richer said the Maricopa County Supervisors are composed of four Republicans and one Democrat, adding, “one Republican has been lockstep with me — the truth — the entire time.” Richer was apparently referring to Bill Gates, who frequently makes similar public statements to Richer, declaring that there was no election fraud.
Richer testified extensively about Maricopa County Elections’ procedures. SBC attorney Duncan Carling asked him if the voting machine tabulators were thoroughly looked into. He responded in the affirmative, saying they were “subject to an immense amount of testing,” there was a hand count conducted afterwards which “matched 100%,” and the tabulators were certified by the Electoral Assistance Commission and the Arizona Secretary of State. Several Arizonans filed lawsuits alleging that the voting machine tabulators are not properly accredited, and Arizona Corporation Commissioner Jim O’Connor warned officials not to use them.
Lawsuits filed by Kari Lake and others pointed out that the hand counts Richer referred to only examined small numbers of ballots and failed to inspect other aspects of the election process such as signature verification. Lake also accused the county of stating it had conducted statutorily required Logic & Accuracy testing of the tabulators properly prior to the election when it had not.
When asked if voting safeguards were in place in the county, Richer responded, “Safety is a high priority in Maricopa County. … Security in Maricopa County continues to go up.” Carling asked him to clarify what he meant by voting security. Richer responded, “First, making sure chain of custody is in place…” Former Attorney General Mark Brnovich conducted an investigation into the 2020 election and found that “Maricopa County failed to follow critical procedures when transporting early ballots from drop locations to the election headquarters,” totaling 100,000 to 200,000 ballots.
Richer criticized Sidney Powell, Donald Trump’s former attorney who sued over election fraud in the 2020 election with a lawsuit she famously announced as, “I am going to release the Kraken.” He contrasted her to Arizona lawyer Kory Langhofer, “people like that versus people like Kraken.” Richer praised Langhofer for not alleging fraud and voluntarily withdrawing his “green button lawsuit.”
That lawsuit, filed by the Arizona Republican Party, accused poll workers of improperly telling voters during the 2020 election to press a green button to override errors when trying to cast their ballots. An attorney who does not want to be identified due to fear of retaliation told The Arizona Sun Times that Langhofer was under investigation by the State Bar of Arizona at the time, which likely influenced his actions.
Richer said the voting tabulators were extensively tested, and it’s a “fanciful notion” that they could have connected to the internet. He said the election proceedings were livestreamed 24 hours a day, and political parties were involved in the proceedings. Richer’s final statement during the direct examination was, “All credible evidence points to a fair and accurate election in 2020.”
Much of Marks’ testimony consisted of reviewing memos and letters he’d written regarding election procedures, as well as explaining election procedures in Pennsylvania. He denied there was “widespread fraud,” stating there were “no errors,” instead there were “anomalies that weren’t really anomalies.” He repeatedly asserted that the election was “safe.”
When asked about several allegations of election fraud made by former State Rep. Frank Ryan (R-Lebanon), an accountant who looked into the anomalies, Marks declared that none of them were valid.
Marks asserted that one of the post-election audits conducted was the “gold standard of audits,” which used a “scientific method” to determine “to a degree of certainty” whether the election was accurate.
The trial is livestreamed and is expected to last two weeks, until next Friday. The first day of proceedings is covered here and the second day here.
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Rachel Alexander is a reporter at The Arizona Sun Times and The Star News Network. Follow Rachel on Twitter. Email tips to [email protected].
