EXPLAINER: As Arizona election ‘audit’ ends, new ones begin

By MARC LEVY
Associated Press

HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — The most closely watched attempt by Republicans to examine the 2020 presidential election came to an embarrassing end this week in Arizona, but efforts to conduct more are cranking up elsewhere. The most recent is in Republican-controlled Texas, where the secretary of state’s office announced it would begin a “full and comprehensive forensic audit” of the 2020 election in four heavily populated counties. These reviews go by various names: “audits” or “investigations,” sometimes with the word “forensic” attached. But their scope is not always well-defined or understood, even by those pushing them. Critics say they have one goal: to validate Trump’s baseless claim that widespread fraud cost him the election, regardless of what they find.