Cyber Ninjas CEO suggests that audit should revive door-knocking plan

PHOENIX – Cyber Ninjas CEO Doug Logan said Thursday he thinks the audit he’s leading of last year’s Phoenix-area election should include door-to-door canvassing, a plan that was shelved after the U.S. Department of Justice raised concerns.

During a livestreamed hearing led by Arizona Senate President Karen Fann, Logan said canvassing could help explain possible anomalies found in the voter registration rolls.

Logan said one of the issues was that around 18,000 voters who participated in the election were removed from the rolls soon after.

“They were on the voter rolls, they showed as voted, and then they were removed,” he said. “There could be a good logical explanation for that, but it seems like a large number to me.”

He said getting more information about the requests made for removal from the rolls as well as “knocking on doors and canvassing can help validate that information.”

Fann asked if there were options other than door-knocking. Senate audit liaison Ken Bennett, who was on the panel with Logan, said it might be done by comparing county voter records with data maintained by the Arizona secretary of state.

Fann and Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Warren Petersen, the only lawmakers involved in the hearing, expressed a desire to get Logan and his cohorts whatever they say they need to produce a complete audit report.

But they didn’t specifically address door-knocking beyond Fann’s question after Logan mentioned it.

In May, after the Department of Justice warned that directly contacting voters could amount to illegal voter intimidation, the Senate put the door-canvassing plan on hold but proposed a method for doing it if necessary.

The audit began April 23 after the Senate won a legal battle with Maricopa County over access to voting equipment and approximately 2.1 million ballots from the November 2020 election. Logan said operations at the Arizona State Fairgrounds, first at Veterans Memorial Coliseum and now at the Wesley Bolin Building, are almost finished.

“At this stage in time we have tallied all of the ballots, we’ve done paper examination on all of the ballots — that data is still be worked through,” Logan said.

“The only thing we have left is we’re working through some of the last bits of aggregation to make sure all these numbers are perfect, because we totally understand how much focus is on us right now.”

The U.S. House Oversight and Reform Committee sent Logan a letter Wednesday requesting documentation about Cyber Ninjas’ role in the audit, how it’s being funded, and any possible connections between his Florida-based company and former President Donald Trump or his surrogates.

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