The same logic, if we can call it that, props up the remaining election audit efforts around the country. Republican officials are no longer defending audits by claiming the election was stolen. “This is not about Trump. This is not about overturning the election,” Arizona state Senate President Karen Fann insisted the other day. She is a driving force behind the expensive monster hunt masquerading as an audit of more than 2 million Maricopa County votes. Nearly three months into this gigantic goat rodeo, with no end in sight, Fann explained: “This has never been about anything other than election integrity.”
In other words, the author of the Arizona audit — which will cost Maricopa County taxpayers almost $3 million — is not claiming there are any actual monsters under the bed. However, some people are afraid there might be monsters. And only a monster hunt can reassure them.
But it’s not that simple.
The fact is, many monster hunts have already taken place. There have been counts and recounts, audits and re-audits, lawsuits, hearings, legislative investigations in places from Philadelphia to Phoenix, Atlanta to Ann Arbor. The floorboards of America’s polling places are worn with the knee marks of monster hunters searching for that which is not actually there. The man former president Donald Trump selected to keep our rooms monster-free, former Homeland Security cybersecurity czar Christopher Krebs, said the election was “the most secure” ever. Trump’s senior law enforcement official, then-Attorney General William P. Barr, said “we have not seen fraud on a scale that could have effected a different outcome.”
The existence of monsters is not the point. Someone fears that monsters may be feared, so they must be sought.
To complicate matters, only those who believe in the monsters under the bed are now considered credible monster hunters. Doug Logan, head of the Florida company called Cyber Ninjas that is running the Arizona audit, has no known experience with an election audit remotely on this scale. Nevertheless, Logan has repeatedly expressed his view that the election was fraudulent. His faith is his credential.
Perhaps you can remember all the way back to election night — when Trump could not sleep because of a monster under his bed. America had not counted each and every one of more than 150 million votes within the first few hours after the polls closed. That alone was proof of fraud. “Stop the steal!” people cried.
Now in Arizona, the Cyber Ninjas are almost three months into their project. If failing to determine the entire country’s election results in three hours is suspicious, what is failing to determine the results from a single county in three months?
Monster hunters in Georgia were granted their request to see scanned images of more than 140,000 absentee ballots, which had already been thoroughly examined for monsters multiple times. That’s a good thing: The images are public records and should be available to the public. But, of course, that was not enough. They wanted the actual ballots — a request the judge denied — but not because they had evidence of flaws in the scanning.
No. There was just a monster under their bed.
But again, it’s not that simple.
Monster hunting has become a multimillion-dollar business. There is a media division, in which networks and websites vie for the attention of Americans with monsters under their beds. Some of these outlets insist all day that yes, there is a monster, and they will soon prove it. “After seven months?” you say. “Soon!” they repeat.
Other outlets are more subtle, asking day after day: If there’s no monster, what’s the harm in looking for it?
There is a political arm. Politicians from Trump on down started raising money from the monster-obsessed last November and haven’t let up for a day. They often partner with the merchandising division, selling flags, hats, yard signs, shirts and other paraphernalia proudly proclaiming there’s a monster under the bed.
Imagine if mom or dad got paid based on how many frightened children they had to deal with each night. Might that affect the nature and content of the bedtime stories they tell?
Rest assured, America: The hunt will continue as long as the money’s good. They’re not necessarily saying they’ll find a monster. But then again, invisible monsters are the very worst kind.
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