On Monday, John Brakey served members of the Pima County Board of Supervisors with a lawsuit demanding a recount in the recent RTA Next election, claiming there were “material discrepancies” in the election that “raise questions as to whether the reported results accurately reflect the legal votes cast.”
And if you’re thinking, “Why does that name sound familiar?” you’re probably an old-school Tucson political geek, or you were way too invested in news about the Cyber Ninjas audit of the 2020 election in Maricopa County.
You see, Brakey has been claiming election fraud since the George W. Bush days — back when stolen elections was a Democratic talking point rather than a Republican one.
John Brakey
He’s a founding member of Audit Elections USA — a group of self-described patriots who bill themselves as “experienced advocates for election transparency” who have been involved with pretty much every regional election conspiracy over the last two decades.
He also notably served as the token Democrat working with the Cyber Ninjas during its deeply flawed “audit” of Donald Trump’s 2020 loss in Maricopa County.
Brakey ultimately condemned that audit, saying his job was to bust myths and that he felt bad for the people who had been mislead into believing Trump won the election. (For fun, here’s a link to the famous “Daily Show” interview with Brakey and Cyber Ninjas audit liaison and former Republican Secretary of State Ken Bennett.)
Our favorite moment from the “Daily Show.”
But it’s clear Brakey has bought into quite a few myths during his long career as an election integrity activist.
And with his lawsuit this week, Brakey has come full circle, going back to the same well that made him famous with election fraud wonks: the long, protracted battle over the initial RTA election 20 years ago.
Brakey filed his 16-page lawsuit against last month’s RTA Next election pro se — which means he filed in court representing himself rather than getting a lawyer — after supervisors ignored the comments he made at the last call to the public.
In his filing, Brakey told the court that his investigation found material discrepancies in election records, including the unexplained removal of over 5,000 registered voters from the total number of registered voters on the final day of the election reporting period. He also argues that roughly 500 ballots lack proper transfer records.
Several weeks ago, Brakey went before the Pima County Board of Supervisors during their regular meeting and asked them not to canvass the results, arguing there were unanswered questions about how the election was conducted.
“I am not asking you to overturn this election. I am not alleging fraud. I am asking for something much simpler, and much more reasonable: Before you certify this election, take a short pause and verify it using the records your system already produces,” Brakey wrote in a statement hand-delivered to boardmembers.
His solution called for a pause in the canvass in order for election officials to do a “limited election review” using ballot images in six randomly selected precincts.
He pledged that “if a proper audit is conducted, Ken Bennett will participate.”
Included in his letter to the supervisors was a two-page pamphlet used by the Audit Elections USA which includes information on ABE, an elections verification software package that his Audit Elections USA has built.
And that seems to fit with Brakey’s modus operandi: “Just asking questions” about election results while stirring up suspicions that elections — any election, all elections — can be or are rigged. And then offering his own solution.
His group has plenty of experience filing legal challenges against election results, most recently in Santa Cruz County. Brakey and his group have filed the following legal challenges in Pima, Maricopa and Santa Cruz county over the last two decades. This is not a comprehensive list.
2007: RTA/Pima county — public records case
2010: Maricopa county election — election procedures lawsuit
2014: Santa Cruz county — public records case
2016: statewide — Arizona presidential preference election challenge
2016: Pima County — ballot-image preservation lawsuit
2021: Maricopa county — cyber ninja audit
2022: Santa Cruz county — public records
2026: Pima county — election challenge
Their track record is hit and miss — they’ve hit on a handful of public records cases, but missed every single allegation of fraud or malfeasance that they’ve ever made.
Including the fight that launched his career: the 2006 RTA election investigation.
Here’s a teaser for the “Fatally Flawed” documentary about the 2006 RTA fight that was uploaded last month on YouTube, although the documentary is about 17 years old. We haven’t watched the whole documentary because the cheapest option is on Amazon in the form of a used DVD.
Technically, the Pima County Democratic Party filed that lawsuit in 2007, but Brakey was deeply involved in the fight as a member of the party’s Election Integrity Committee.
The battle between the party and the county painted the 2006 election as rigged, and the lawsuit ended with election officials being forced to release internal election data for outside review.
A criminal investigation by then-Attorney General Terry Goddard and a full hand recount of the election showed the 2006 RTA election was not rigged and that the results were correct.
And for what it’s worth, that whole conspiracy that the election was rigged all stemmed back to an alleged confession at the Boondocks Lounge bar from a computer programmer who allegedly told a county employee that he “fixed” the results on orders from Pima County officials. (The programmer later said under oath that that wasn’t true, and the employee who allegedly received that confession was later fired for drinking on the job.)
It’s unclear whether Brakey’s latest election contest of RTA Next will go forward.
In a hearing on Wednesday, a Pima County Superior Court judge ruled that Brakey failed to prove to the court that he had served the papers properly. Brakey reportedly hand-served some of the elected offices, but at least one supervisor told us earlier in the week they hadn’t been served.
This colorful illustration was included in the election challenge Brakey filed with the court earlier this week.
The Pima County Attorney’s Office has asked Brakey to voluntarily dismiss his case as there is no valid legal basis to maintain this version, although Brakey could easily refile.
The judge told Brakey that moving forward with his case without a legal basis could result in sanctions, a source at the Pima County Attorney’s Office told us.
But legal repercussions for his crusades have never stopped Brakey.
In fact, he seems to revel in them.
In 2008, for example, Brakey was arrested for being disruptive and then refusing to leave while working as an observer for the Democratic Party during a post-primary ballot hand-count and audit. (The charges were later dropped.)
As the Tucson Weekly noted at the time, a deputy cuffed him, led him outside, cited him and release him.
Then Brakey asked the officer to cuff him again and snap a picture on his cell phone.
The deputy turned down Brakey’s request.
We’ve found at least a sliver of bipartisan agreement in Southern Arizona’s congressional delegation.
U.S Reps. Adelita Grijalva and Juan Ciscomani are both on the record opposing plans to put U.S. troops on the ground in Iran.
Last week, Ciscomani told KTAR that he doesn’t think ground troops are necessary and the Trump administration has made what he described as significant progress in Iran.
“No troops are needed on the ground at this point," Ciscomani said. “What I am for is to end this conflict immediately and make sure that there is peace in the region.”
The comment puts him at odds with more hawkish voices in his party calling for a more aggressive military posture toward Iran.
At a #NoKings rally on Saturday, Grijalva made it clear she doesn’t support the war in Iran.
“There is always money for endless war, but never enough money for the urgent needs of everyday people. Taxpayers have already spent $22.8 billion on the reckless conflicts abroad — money that could have provided Medicaid for over 6 million children, funded Head Start for more than 1.3 million families, canceled $20,000 in student debt for 1 million borrowers, funded ACA premium assistance that Republicans refuse to extend,” Grijalva said.
Finally, something they can agree on.
Maybe because gas now costs $4.50 a gallon here in the Old Pueblo, or that recent polls show a majority of Americans do not support military action in Iran.
No way around it: Marana officials can’t just avoid the thorny political issues that come with a federal plan to turn a former state prison into an immigration detention center, Arizona Daily Star columnist Tim Steller writes. The “horrific stories of mistreatment” in detention centers as President Donald Trump pursues his mass deportation agenda are well documented. If Town of Marana officials decide to do nothing about the detention center, then “it’s a decision to go along with a shocking pattern of abuse.”
Local control, from the Capitol: Republican state Rep. Quang Nguyen wants Democratic Attorney General Kris Mayes to investigate the City of Tucson’s ordinance that blocks ICE agents from operating on city property, along with a similar ordinance in Phoenix, Capitol scribe Howie Fischer reports. Nguyen says state law blocks cities from limiting the enforcement of federal immigration laws, which isn’t just a complaint that’ll go away on its own. State law also says legislators can force the AG to investigate local governments, and if Mayes finds Tucson broke the law, it could lose 10% of it’s state-shared revenue.
Taking their shot: Trans Tucsonans and others who need hormone medication publicly took their injections on the steps of City Hall, Cody Hays reports for LOOKOUT. They were trying to raise awareness of anti-trans discrimination on Trans Day of Visibility Public Hormone Jab, especially as state and federal lawmakers keep targeting the trans community.
Scottish pride: Tucson Congressman Juan Ciscomani, along with several members of the Main Street Caucus, went to Scotland during the Easter Congressional recess, Nicholas Wu reports for Semafor. The article includes a picture of several lawmakers — although not Ciscomani — at Edinburgh Castle as part of a trip focusing on “economic development, foreign partnerships, and business engagement.”
If you upgrade to a paid subscription, we promise not to blow it on a trip to Scotland.
Not a good sign: The snowpack in the Rocky Mountains that feeds the Colorado River broke records this winter, but not in the way you’d want it to, the Associated Press reports. Colorado recorded its worst snowpack since 1941, including mountain snow that contained half the average moisture. That’s applying even more pressure to the multi-state negotiations over the river that could lead to huge cuts for Arizona.
If only every day were April Fools’ Day.
For most people, it’s the one day where you can get away with saying something completely wrong.
For Tucson-area Republican Rep. Rachel Keshel, it’s apparently the one day a year she tells the truth.
She took a break from her relentless drum beat about election fraud to post a tongue-in-cheek tweet saying Joe Biden won the 2020 election.
But some of her fellow election conspiracists didn’t get the joke.
So she had to clarify.
