Iraq's Supreme Court on Thursday upheld a disputed law ordering a hand recount of the ballots from last month's national elections after widespread allegations of fraud embarrassed political leaders and marred the initial result.
Chief Justice Medhat al-Mahmoud, centre, speaks to media in the Supreme Court building in Baghdad, Iraq, Thursday, June 21, 2018. (AP Photo/Hadi Mizban)
What was supposed to mark the start of a new era for Iraq has turned into a political crisis as the charges of vote tampering grew too loud for Prime Minister Haidar al-Abadi's government to ignore.
The May 12 election was the first since Iraq declared victory over the Islamic State group, which was in control of one-third of Iraqi territory just three years ago. But the euphoria over that milestone was quickly overshadowed by the charges of voter irregularities that surfaced on the day of the election and grew louder in the weeks that followed.
Adding to the outcry was a suspicious fire days after Parliament ordered the recount that burned down a warehouse believed to contain some of the ballots cast by Baghdad voters.
The Interior Ministry said the June 10 blaze was confined to a storage unit holding the electronic machinery introduced in the election to speed up the vote count and protect against ballot stuffing, and insisted the ballots were secure. But eyewitness reports said some ballots were charred and others soaked as firefighters battled the blaze.
A hand recount of all 11 million ballots could take weeks, if not longer, and promises to delay the already sluggish process of forming a new government.
Chief Justice Medhat al-Mahmoud, speaks to media in the Supreme Court building in Baghdad, Iraq, Thursday, June 21, 2018. (AP Photo/Hadi Mizban)
Still, the populist preacher Muqtada al-Sadr, who came in a surprise first place in the vote, called on his supporters to respect the recount ruling.
"I call on everyone to show restraint and deference to the law, even if they are not convinced by it," al-Sadr said in a statement.
Thursday's Supreme Court decision upheld a law ordering a recount passed by Parliament after the initial results showed that two-thirds of current lawmakers would lose their seats. The timing of the law's passage led President Fuad Masum and the national elections commission to charge lawmakers with political interference.
But the Supreme Court ruled that the legislation was broadly constitutional and endorsed an order to replace the Independent Elections Commission with a panel of nine judges to supervise a recount. The commission, disputing the fraud allegations, had refused to conduct one of its own.
However, the court rejected a measure invalidating all ballots cast abroad and by Iraqis displaced by recent conflict. Chief Justice Medhat al-Mahmoud said that sweeping measure was unjust to voters who cast legitimate ballots.
Chief Justice Medhat al-Mahmoud, center, consults with his aides in the Supreme Court building in Baghdad, Iraq, Thursday, June 21, 2018. (AP Photo/Hadi Mizban)
An estimated 3 million Iraqis live in displaced persons camps, and international groups urged authorities to take measures to ensure they could vote. Many were driven from their homes during battles against the Islamic State group, and are presumed to be overwhelmingly Sunni, reinforcing the perception that they are being marginalized by the Shiite-dominated government in Baghdad.
Still, a hand recount is unlikely to dispel the fraud allegations.
Ahmad al-Abadi, a lawyer representing Parliament's case to the Supreme Court, said the recount would get the country "70, 80, 90 percent" of the way to having an untainted result, but that because of the Baghdad warehouse fire there would never be 100 percent certainty.
Outgoing Parliament Speaker Salim al-Jabouri called the fire arson, but authorities have not named any suspects in their investigation.
A recount is not likely to change the balance of power between the country's Shiite, Sunni, and Kurdish blocks, according to Bilal Wahab, a fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.
"The majority of accusations of fraud were from within the communities, and not between them," Wahab said.
Iraqi electoral officials work to salvage ballot boxes as smoke rises from a fire that broke out at Baghdad's largest ballot box storage site, where ballots from Iraq's May parliamentary elections are stored, in Baghdad, Iraq, Sunday, June 10, 2018. (AP Photo/Karim Kadim)
Shiite groups have dominated government since the U.S. invaded Iraq in 2003, deposing Saddam Hussein and ushering in an era of sectarian civil war.
While the charges of voting irregularities in the May election have centered on alleged tampering with the electronic voter machines and falsified results, scores of voters were turned away from voting stations because the election authority failed to issue proper identity documents in time. Those irregularities, as well as reports of voter intimidation and vote buying, will be impossible to detect in a recount said Vian al-Sheikh Ali, director of the election monitoring group Tammuz.
Voter turnout in the election was 44 percent, the lowest in the post-Saddam era.
The most serious allegations of foul play came from Iraq's Kurdish provinces, as well as the predominantly Sunni province of Anbar and Kirkuk, a province that Iraq's regional Kurdish administration claims for its own, al-Sheikh Ali said.
After the results were released, Arab and Turkmen voters in Kirkuk demonstrated in front of the election commission headquarters, saying the margin of victory for a mainstream Kurdish party was not believable.
As the allegations reached a crescendo, Prime Minister Abadi's government said it had found "unprecedented" violations in the vote, faulting the politically appointed elections commission.
Wahab said the broad nature of the allegations and network of institutions linked to the charges meant it was unlikely voters would ever get to the bottom of the fraud.
"It's an art that's been almost perfected in Iraq," he said.
PHOENIX (AP) — An Arizona grand jury has indicted former President Donald Trump 's chief of staff Mark Meadows, lawyer Rudy Giuliani and 16 others for their roles in an attempt to overturn Trump’s loss to Joe Biden in the 2020 election.
The indictment released Wednesday names 11 Republicans who submitted a document to Congress falsely declaring that Trump won Arizona in 2020. They include the former state party chair, a 2022 U.S. Senate candidate and two sitting state lawmakers, who are charged with nine counts each of conspiracy, fraud and forgery.
The identities of seven other defendants, including Giuliani and Meadows, were not immediately released because they had not yet been served with the documents. They were readily identifiable based on descriptions of the defendants, however.
Trump himself was not charged but was referred to as an unindicted co-conspirator.
With the indictments, Arizona becomes the fourth state where allies of the former president have been charged with using false or unproven claims about voter fraud related to the election. Heading into a likely November rematch with Biden, Trump continues to spread lies about the last election that are echoed by many of his supporters.
“I will not allow American democracy to be undermined,” Democratic state Attorney General Kris Mayes said in a video released by her office. “It’s too important.”
The indictment alludes to Giuliani as an attorney “who was often identified as the Mayor” and spread false allegations of election fraud. Another defendant is referred to as Trump’s “ chief of staff in 2020,” which describes Meadows.
Descriptions of other unnamed defendants point to Mike Roman, who was Trump’s director of Election Day operations; John Eastman, a lawyer who devised a strategy to try to persuade Congress not to certify the election; and Christina Bobb, a lawyer who worked with Giuliani.
A lawyer for Eastman, Charles Burnham, said his client is innocent. Bobb did not respond to a text message seeking comment, nor did a lawyer who is representing Roman in a case in Georgia.
George Terwilliger, a lawyer representing Meadows, said he had not yet seen the indictment but if Meadows is named, “it is a blatantly political and politicized accusation and will be contested and defeated.” Giuliani's political adviser, Ted Goodman, decried what he called “the continued weaponization of our justice system.”
The 11 people who had been nominated to be Arizona’s Republican electors met in Phoenix on Dec. 14, 2020, to sign a certificate saying they were “duly elected and qualified” electors and claiming that Trump carried the state. A one-minute video of the signing ceremony was posted on social media by the Arizona Republican Party at the time. The document was later sent to Congress and the National Archives, where it was ignored.
Biden won Arizona by more than 10,000 votes. Of the eight lawsuits that unsuccessfully challenged Biden’s victory in the state, one was filed by the 11 Republicans.
Their lawsuit asked a judge to de-certify the results that gave Biden his victory in Arizona and block the state from sending them to the Electoral College. In dismissing the case, U.S. District Judge Diane Humetewa said the Republicans lacked legal standing, waited too long to bring their case and “failed to provide the court with factual support for their extraordinary claims.”
Days after that lawsuit was dismissed, the 11 participated in the certificate signing.
The Arizona charges come after a string of indictments against fake electors in other states.
In December, a Nevada grand jury indicted six Republicans on felony charges of offering a false instrument for filing and uttering a forged instrument in connection with false election certificates. They have pleaded not guilty.
Michigan’s Attorney General in July filed felony charges that included forgery and conspiracy to commit election forgery against 16 Republican fake electors. One had charges dropped after reaching a cooperation deal, and the 15 remaining defendants have pleaded not guilty.
Three fake electors also have been charged in Georgia alongside Trump and others in a sweeping indictment accusing them of participating in a wide-ranging scheme to illegally overturn the results. They have pleaded not guilty.
In Wisconsin, 10 Republicans who posed as electors settled a civil lawsuit, admitting their actions were part of an effort to overturn Biden’s victory. There is no known criminal investigation in Wisconsin.
Trump was indicted in August in federal court over efforts to cling to power after his defeat, including the fake electors scheme. The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday will hear arguments on his claim in that case that he can't be prosecuted for acts he committed while serving as president.
In early January, New Mexico Attorney General Raúl Torrez said that state’s five Republican electors cannot be prosecuted under the current law. In New Mexico and Pennsylvania, fake electors added a caveat saying the election certificate was submitted in case they were later recognized as duly elected, qualified electors. No charges have been filed in Pennsylvania.
In Arizona, Mayes’ predecessor, Republican Mark Brnovich, conducted an investigation of the 2020 election, but the fake elector allegations were not part of that examination, according to Mayes’ office.
The so-called fake electors facing charges are Kelli Ward, the state GOP’s chair from 2019 until early 2023; state Sen. Jake Hoffman; Tyler Bowyer, an executive of the conservative youth organization Turning Point USA who serves on the Republican National Committee; state Sen. Anthony Kern, who was photographed in restricted areas outside the U.S. Capitol during the Jan. 6 attack and is now a candidate in Arizona’s 8th Congressional District; Greg Safsten, a former executive director of the Arizona Republican Party; energy industry executive James Lamon, who lost a 2022 Republican primary for a U.S. Senate seat; Robert Montgomery, chairman of the Cochise County Republican Committee in 2020; Samuel Moorhead, a Republican precinct committee member in Gila County; Nancy Cottle, who in 2020 was the first vice president of the Arizona Federation of Republican Women; Loraine Pellegrino, past president of the Ahwatukee Republican Women; and Michael Ward, an osteopathic physician who is married to Kelli Ward.
In a statement, Hoffman accused Mayes of weaponizing the attorney general’s office in bringing the case but didn’t directly comment on the indictment’s allegations.
“Let me be unequivocal, I am innocent of any crime, I will vigorously defend myself, and I look forward to the day when I am vindicated of this naked political persecution by the judicial process,” Hoffman said.
None of the others responded to either phone, email or social media messages from The Associated Press seeking comment.
Associated Press writers Gabe Stern and Scott Sonner in Las Vegas, Kate Brumback in Atlanta and Marc Levy in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, contributed to this report.
FILE - Mark Meadows speaks with reporters at the White House, Oct. 21, 2020, in Washington. Meadows, chief of staff for former President Donald Trump, was among those indicted Wednesday, April 24, 2024, in an Arizona election interference case. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, File)
FILE - Former Mayor of New York Rudy Giuliani speaks during a news conference outside the federal courthouse in Washington, Dec. 15, 2023. Guiliani, a lawyer for former President Donald Trump, was among those indicted Wednesday, April 24, 2024, in an Arizona election interference case.(AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana, File)
FILE - Kelli Ward, with her husband Michael Ward at her side, concedes to Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., in the race for the Republican nomination to U.S. Senate, Aug. 30, 2016, at her primary night party at a hotel in Scottsdale, Ariz. Ward and her husband are two of 11 Republicans in Arizona who submitted a document to Congress falsely declaring Donald Trump had beaten Joe Biden in the state during the 2020 presidential election were charged Wednesday, April 24, 2024, with conspiracy, fraud and forgery, marking the fourth state to bring charges against "fake electors." (David Kadlubowski/The Arizona Republic via AP, File)
FILE - Arizona Rep. Jake Hoffman, R-Queen Creek, is sworn in during the opening of the Legislature at the state Capitol, Jan. 11, 2021, in Phoenix. Hoffman is one of 11 Republicans in Arizona who submitted a document to Congress falsely declaring Donald Trump had beaten Joe Biden in the state during the 2020 presidential election were charged Wednesday, April 24, 2024, with conspiracy, fraud and forgery, marking the fourth state to bring charges against "fake electors." (AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin, Pool, File)
FILE - Arizona Republican U.S. Senate candidate Jim Lamon poses for a photograph prior to the Arizona Republican Senate primary debate hosted by Newsmax at the Madison Center for The Arts, July 13, 2022, in Phoenix. Lemon, one of 11 Republicans in Arizona who submitted a document to Congress falsely declaring Donald Trump had beaten Joe Biden in the state during the 2020 presidential election, was charged Wednesday, April 24, 2024, with conspiracy, fraud and forgery, marking the fourth state to bring charges against "fake electors." (AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin, File)
FILE - Republican Rep. Anthony Kern argues in support of a provision in the Arizona budget package that strips cash from Maricopa County Sheriff's Office, May 4, 2017, in Phoenix. Kern is one of 11 Republicans in Arizona who submitted a document to Congress falsely declaring Donald Trump had beaten Joe Biden in the state during the 2020 presidential election were charged Wednesday, April 24, 2024, with conspiracy, fraud and forgery, marking the fourth state to bring charges against "fake electors." (AP Photo/Bob Christie, File)
FILE - Dr. Kelli Ward, left, chair of the Arizona Republican Party, talks with a supporter of President Donald Trump as they join the crowd at a rally outside the Arizona Capitol, Nov. 7, 2020, in Phoenix. Ward is one of 11 Republicans in Arizona who submitted a document to Congress falsely declaring Donald Trump had beaten Joe Biden in the state during the 2020 presidential election were charged Wednesday, April 24, 2024 with conspiracy, fraud and forgery, marking the fourth state to bring charges against "fake electors." (AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin, File)
