Screams, threats as county certifies vote
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. >> A standoff over the security of voting machines between a Republican-leaning county in New Mexico and Democratic state officials that threatened to erupt into a wider political crisis was defused Friday after local commissioners voted to certify their election results.
The move by the Otero County commission reversed an earlier decision against certifying results of the June 7 primary because of unspecified concerns with Dominion voting systems, a target of widespread conspiracy theories since the 2020 presidential election.
The two commissioners who voted in favor said they had been threatened with prosecution by the state attorney general and had no choice under the law — but criticized their position as being little more than rubber stamps.
Commissioner Couy Griffin was the lone dissenting vote, but acknowledged that he had no basis for questioning the results of the election. He dialed in to the meeting because he was in Washington, D.C., where hours before he had been sentenced for entering restricted U.S. Capitol grounds during the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection.
“My vote to remain a `no' isn't based on any evidence. It's not based on any facts,” Griffin said, nevertheless requesting a hand recount of ballots. “It's only based on my gut feeling and my own intuition.”
The Otero elections clerk earlier said that the primary had gone off without a hitch and that the results had been confirmed afterward.
Democratic Secretary of State Maggie Toulouse Oliver, who had appealed to the state Supreme Court to intervene, expressed relief at the Otero County decision and called it a “shame that the commission pushed our state to the brink of a crisis by their actions.”
The showdown provided a stark example of the chaos that election experts across the U.S. have warned about as those who promote the lie that former President Donald Trump was cheated out of reelection seek to populate election offices and the usually low-profile boards that certify the results.