Cyber Ninjas, the Florida firm hired by Arizona Senate Republicans to conduct a partisan review of Maricopa County's 2020 ballots, said Thursday evening that it is not longer in business. "Cyber Ninjas is shutting down," company representative Rod Thompson told NBC News. "All employees have been let go," including CEO Doug Logan.
But an Arizona judge who had just fined it $50,000 a day for noncompliance with an August order to turn over audit-related records to The Arizona Republic, wasn't having it.
"The court is not going to accept the assertion that Cyber Ninjas is an empty shell and that no one is responsible for seeing that it complies," Maricopa Superior Court Judge Hannah told Cyber Ninjas lawyer Jack Wilenchik. He questioned the company's insolvency, citing millions in donations, and suggested it needn't cost much to comply with the records request. Hannah said the fines would start to accrue Friday, and may be applied to individuals in the company.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
"Wilenchik has asked to quit as the Cyber Ninjas lawyer because he hasn't been paid, but Hannah refused to approve until new local attorneys are in place to represent the firm," The Associated Press reports.
The Republic had requested $1,000 a day in sanctions, but Hannah called that "grossly insufficient" to compel Cyber Ninja's compliance. "It is lucidly clear on this record that Cyber Ninjas has disregarded that order," he said in his ruling.
State Senate President Karen Fann (R) hired Cyber Ninjas to conduct what she called a "forensic audit" of Maricopa's ballots, part of a broader effort by allies of former President Donald Trump to find evidence for his claim the election was stolen. Cyber Ninja, which had no election review experience, eventually found that Trump lost the county, and Arizona, to President Biden by more votes than originally counted.
Cyber Ninja's final report also found several problems with how the election was conducted. On Wednesday, Maricopa County released its own report rebutting almost all the claims in Cyber Ninja's report. The county's three-month investigation did find that 87 of the 53,304 ballots flagged as questionable in the Senate review were either mistakenly double-counted or potentially cast illegally. In a four-hour hearing on Wednesday, county election officials ran through Cyber Ninja's errors and misleading and accurate claims, attributing them to poor analysis or fundamental misunderstandings of how elections are run.
-
Israel: Losing the American publicFeature A recent poll finds American support for Israel's military action in Gaza has fallen from 50% to 32%
-
Unmaking AmericansFeature Trump is threatening to revoke the citizenship of foreign-born Americans. Could he do that?
-
EPA: A bonfire of climate change regulationsFeature The Environmental Protection Agency wants to roll back its 'endangerment finding,' a ruling that lets the agency regulate carbon emissions
-
Trump sends FBI to patrol DC, despite falling crimeSpeed Read Washington, D.C., 'has become one of the most dangerous cities anywhere in the world,' Trump said
-
Trump officials reinstating 2 Confederate monumentsSpeed Read The administration has plans to 'restore Confederate names and symbols' discarded in the wake of George Floyd's 2020 murder
-
Trump nominates Powell critic for vacant Fed seatspeed read Stephen Miran, the chair of Trump's Council of Economic Advisers and a fellow critic of Fed chair Jerome Powell, has been nominated to fill a seat on the Federal Reserve Board of Governors
-
ICE scraps age limits amid hiring pushSpeed Read Anyone 18 or older can now apply to be an ICE agent
-
Trump's global tariffs take effect, with new additionsSpeed Read Tariffs on more than 90 US trading partners went into effect, escalating the global trade war
-
House committee subpoenas Epstein filesSpeed Read The House Oversight Committee has issued a subpoena to the Justice Department for its Jeffrey Epstein files with an Aug. 19 deadline
-
India rejects Trump threat over Russian oilSpeed Read The president said he would raise tariffs on India for buying and selling Russian oil
-
NY's Hochul vows response to Texas gerrymanderSpeed Read Gov. Kathy Hochul has promised to play ball with redistricting that favors the Democrats
