New Mexico secretary of state asks state attorney general to investigate county commission refusing to certify election results

CNN
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New Mexico Secretary of State Maggie Toulouse Oliver on Thursday questioned the state’s attorney normal to examine a GOP-led county commission that refused to certify the benefits of a modern primary election.

In the referral to Lawyer Standard Hector Balderas, a fellow Democrat, Oliver mentioned customers of the Otero County Fee have taken “multiple unlawful actions” this thirty day period – which includes declining to certify the success of the June 7 principal, ordering the elimination of ballot-fall bins and voting to discontinue to the use of vote-tallying equipment.

“All county officers just take an oath to uphold the structure and legal guidelines of New Mexico,” Oliver mentioned in a news launch. “The Commissioners in Otero County have violated the public’s rely on and our point out guidelines by means of their new actions and need to be held accountable.”

Otero County is one particular of the initially recognised communities to balk at certifying election effects. The flare-up in this rural New Mexico county has sparked fears between voting rights specialists that conspiracy theories about voting equipment and other factors of election administration have taken deep root in some pockets of the nation and could guide to even further disruptions this tumble.

The Point out Supreme Courtroom on Wednesday, performing on an crisis ask for from Oliver, purchased the Otero County commissioners to certify the principal benefits by Friday – the statutory deadline for county certification.

The fee has added a Friday emergency assembly to just take up the certification.

Fee Chairwoman Vickie Marquardt has not responded to CNN’s inquiries.

But fellow commissioner Couy Griffin advised CNN on Thursday that he did not intend to comply with the point out Supreme Court purchase and would not vote to certify the effects.

“I’m not setting up to move off my placement,” he claimed in a temporary phone job interview. “Why have a commission if we just get overridden by the court technique?”

Griffin, a founder for Cowboys for Trump, was identified responsible in a March bench demo of trespassing on US Capitol grounds on January 6, 2021, while then-Vice President Mike Pence was there. He is scheduled to be sentenced Friday in Washington.

Griffin, Marquardt and Commissioner Gerald Matherly cited their distrust of Dominion voting equipment in refusing to certify the success at a Monday conference of the Otero County Commission.

“I have huge issues with these voting devices,” Marquardt reported during that meeting. “I truly do. I just really do not consider in my coronary heart that they can not be manipulated.”

On Thursday, Griffin instructed CNN that he’s “not hoping to overturn an election. We want transparency.”

“The far more they check out to battle us and shut us down,” he explained, “the far more of a skeptic I will become.”