Arizona AG Responds to Reports of FBI Subpoena For 2020 Records: All Based On ‘Crackpots and Lies’

This is your TPM evening briefing.

Mar 09, 2026

*Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes speaks at an event on November 2, 2024 in Phoenix, Arizona. TPM illustration/Getty Images.*

Investigation Into Trump’s 2020 Delusions Expands

The FBI has expanded its investigation into President Trump’s delusion that the 2020 election was stolen from him, with reports that it issued a grand jury subpoena for documents about the election results in Maricopa County, Arizona, a blue county in a swing state that has become a hotbed for conspiracy theorists’ fever dreams about the 2020 election.

Multiple news outlets are reporting that the Arizona State Senate received a subpoena in recent days. You may recall that the Arizona Senate was the venue for the supposed “audit” of the 2020 election conducted by the company Cyber Ninjas, which Republicans in the state and Trump’s closest allies used as an opportunity to spread debunked conspiracy theories about rampant fraud and electronic voting machines, among other things.

The supposed audit was ultimately not helpful for Trump’s Big Lie purposes. In 2021, the people running the review said they’d found no evidence of fraud and actually found nearly 100 additional votes for President Biden and 261 fewer votes for Trump in that county after the hand tally was conducted.

But that hasn’t done much to quell Trump or his election deniers’ fixation with the county.

Both Trump and Republican President of the Arizona Senate Warren Petersen confirmed the subpoena in social media posts on Monday. Trump did by sharing an article written by none other than John Solomon, a right-wing columnist and writer who has a strong record of promoting conspiracy theories, including spreading disinfo about the events surrounding Trump’s initial impeachment during his first term.

“Great!!!” Trump wrote, linking to a post written by Solomon, who also has close ties to Trump’s FBI Director Kash Patel as well. “FBI secretly seizes election records from Arizona’s largest county as voting probe expands.”

“Late last week I received and complied with a federal grand jury subpoena for records relating to the Arizona State Senate’s 2020 audit of Maricopa County,” Petersen wrote on X, confirming reports. “The FBI has the records.”

Additional details on the subpoena, per the New York Times:

The subpoena issued to the State Senate appeared to be a way to get around the fact that many of the records from the 2020 election in Maricopa County, including ballots, have already been destroyed under normal election practices, according to two state officials familiar with the matter.

Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes issued a statement on Monday calling the whole ordeal out for what it is: “the weaponization of federal law enforcement in service of crackpots and lies.” Here’s Mayes’ statement in full:

The 2020 General Election in Arizona has been exhaustively reviewed. Multiple audits, court proceedings, and independent investigations — including those pursued by members of the same political party of the President — found no evidence of fraud sufficient to alter the outcome. These findings are not in dispute by any credible authority. The election results were certified, litigated, and affirmed.
In fact, under the direction of my predecessor, Attorney General Mark Brnovich, agents and support staff of the Arizona Attorney General’s Office spent over 10,000 hours investigating voting irregularities and alleged instances of illegal voting by high-profile election deniers. Complaints and allegations submitted to the Arizona Attorney General’s Office by members of the public were also unsupported by factual evidence.
Warren Petersen knows all of this. He has known it for years. He spread false stories of election fraud in 2020, and he remains an unrepentant election denier, using his platform as Senate President to legitimize conspiracy theories that Arizona’s own courts and law enforcement have thoroughly debunked.
What the Trump administration appears to be pursuing now is not a legitimate law enforcement inquiry. It is the weaponization of federal law enforcement in service of crackpots and lies.

‘Cyber Ninjas Part 2’

Former Maricopa County Recorder Stephen Richer, a Republican who served as recorder from 2021-2025 and had to deal with all the unhinged aftermath of Trump’s 2020 lies, posted a series of tweets a Monday amid reports of the subpoena, reminding people that “the Attorney General’s Office under Mark Brnovich spent 10,000 man hours investigating the 2020 election results. They found no material fraud or error.”

Andy Ogles Says Something Insane

Rep. Andy Ogles (R-TN) posted on Twitter Monday morning saying something Islamophobic and shockingly racist in the wake of protests that broke out outside New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s home at Gracie Mansion over the weekend, when white supremacist and pardoned Jan. 6 rioter Jake Lang decided to hold an anti-Islam rally there.

“Muslims don’t belong in American society. Pluralism is a lie,” Ogles posted.

The congressman is openly Islamophobic and has even called for Mamdani — who has been a U.S. citizen since 2018 — to be deported.