Pennsylvania state senator gets replaced as leader of 2020 election investigation

The top Republican state senator in Pennsylvania announced Friday he is replacing GOP state Sen. Doug Mastriano with a different senator to lead an election review of several counties regarding the 2020 contest.

Pennsylvania Senate President Pro Tempore Jake Corman said he had "many frustrations" with Mastriano, who last month sent letters to Tioga, Philadelphia, and York county officials with requests for access to equipment, documents, and other information for a "forensic investigation" similar to the 2020 election audit commissioned by the GOP-controlled Senate in Arizona. However, the three counties signaled they would not comply with the demands, to which Mastriano said he would set up a committee vote for subpoenas, after acting Pennsylvania Secretary of the Commonwealth Veronica Degraffenreid made an example of a fourth county, Fulton, by decertifying its equipment because a private firm was granted access to its machines.

Republican state Sen. Cris Dush, who visited the Maricopa County audit with Mastriano, will "take up this cause and initiate a thorough review of the election," Corman said in a statement, which also said Mastriano's replacement will take a stand against Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf, who has decried audit plans as a "disgrace to democracy."

“It is deeply disappointing that Senator Mastriano has retreated from conducting a forensic investigation of the election in Pennsylvania, and it is discouraging to realize that he was only ever interested in politics and showmanship and not actually getting things done," Corman wrote in the Friday statement.

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"We need someone to lead this effort who is more interested in real results than grandstanding at rallies," Corman said, alluding to Mastriano's past statements endorsing former President Donald Trump's election fraud claims following the November election, which have been rejected by election authorities ranging from the federal to the local level.

Mastriano also released a statement on Friday, saying he was "threatened with the loss of my committee chair" and "threatened that my staff would be fired as retribution" for his desire to move forward with his election investigation. He noted Degraffenreid's warning to all Pennsylvania counties that giving "third-party entities" access to voting machines would result in the decertification of voting equipment and said Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro, also a Democrat, "has promised to obstruct the investigation in 'every step of the way.'"

As a next step, Mastriano was planning to assemble his panel, the Intergovernmental Operations Committee, for a meeting at the Capitol in Harrisburg to vote on issuing subpoenas. "The tentative date for that committee vote was to be August 6. But that meeting never happened," Mastriano wrote.

"Unfortunately, Senate President Pro Tempore Jake Corman prevented this committee meeting from taking place. Without consulting me, Senator Corman called the members of my committee and told them that there would be no vote on the subpoenas," Mastriano added.

Prior to his statement on Friday, Mastriano was seen in a now-deleted video on Thursday claiming his audit efforts were "thwarted" by members in his own party. On Friday, he repeated that "it is not just Democrats who stand in the way of this investigation."

Both Dush and Mastriano traveled to Phoenix in June to observe the forensic audit being led by Cyber Ninjas, a private Florida-based firm, which has been widely criticized by Maricopa County officials as well as Democratic Arizona Secretary of State Katie Hobbs, who dubbed it a "political stunt."

Corman is still committed to auditing various county elections in Pennsylvania, saying Friday: "We remain committed to an open, honest review that will lead to positive changes to restore the public’s faith in our elections."

The Washington Examiner contacted the offices of Corman, Dush, and Mastriano but did not immediately receive a response.

President Joe Biden won Pennsylvania by more than 80,000 votes in 2020. Both state and national officials, including some with Trump's Justice Department, said they uncovered no evidence of widespread fraud, as the former president and his allies have claimed after his loss.

In Arizona, Senate President Karen Fann said on Monday the Senate's audit companies are preparing a report on their findings. An audit spokesperson said they expect to deliver the main report to the Senate by Monday, according to local KNXV reporter Garrett Archer, which will then be reviewed by the legislative body.

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Efforts to audit election results or reexamine election methods have been underway in several other counties across the nation, including a report submitted to officials over the Windham, New Hampshire, election review that verified the accuracy of the recount, as well as an investigation of procedures in Fulton County, Georgia.

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Tags: News, Pennsylvania, Senate, 2020 Elections, Republican, Donald Trump

Original Author: Kaelan Deese

Original Location: Pennsylvania state senator gets replaced as leader of 2020 election investigation