An Arizona state lawmaker revealed Monday that federal authorities subpoenaed him for records related to the 2020 election, marking the second publicly confirmed jurisdiction the Department of Justice is investigating over the matter.

Arizona Senate President Warren Petersen, a Republican, said in a social media post he received the subpoena for material related to the state Senate’s 2020 audit last week and complied with it.

“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. “The FBI has the records. Any other report is fake news.”

The request represents an expansion of a federal probe tied to 2020 after the DOJ initially targeted Fulton County, Georgia. The development also comes as President Donald Trump has grown increasingly outspoken about election security in the lead-up to the 2026 midterms, renewing his attention on disputes stemming from the last presidential race.

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Petersen made the revelation after President Donald Trump shared a Just the News report about the subpoena on Truth Social, writing, “Great!!! FBI secretly seizes election records from Arizona’s largest county as voting probe expands.”

Multiple U.S. officials confirmed the election probe to Fox News, saying the DOJ is looking at a large tranche of Arizona data from 2020 and 2024.

The White House directed Fox News Digital to the FBI on Monday when asked for comment. The FBI declined to comment.

Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes, an elected Democrat, said the new investigation was based on claims that courts and state investigators have proven wrong.

“What the Trump administration appears to be pursuing now is not a legitimate law enforcement inquiry,” Mayes said in a statement. “It is the weaponization of federal law enforcement in service of crackpots and lies.”

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The subpoena comes as the president increasingly focuses on election security ahead of the 2026 midterms, telling Congress in a social media post on Sunday that he will not sign any legislation into law until it passes the SAVE America Act.

The bill’s primary purpose is to require voters nationwide to show physical identification to prove citizenship to vote in federal elections. The version of the bill Trump is pushing would also ban mail-in ballots except for the military and in other extenuating circumstances.

Maricopa, Arizona’s most populous county, was a hotbed for accusations of voter fraud in 2020. Fulton County, Georgia, faced similar accusations, with the DOJ launching a separate investigation into the 2020 election earlier this year. 

Trump lost Arizona in 2020 by about 0.3 percentage points. The president refused to concede, and his legal team brought a series of lawsuits alleging vote-counting irregularities, but none were successful.

Fox News’ David Spunt and Jake Gibson contributed to this report.

FIRST ON FOX: A Wisconsin man driving a stolen vehicle was killed Wednesday after he fled through a U.S. Border Patrol checkpoint and led authorities on a vehicle chase and shootout in Texas.

The incident happened at around 10:30 a.m. at the Sierra Blanca checkpoint in the Big Bend Sector between El Paso and Van Horn, a remote area. 

James Douglas McMillan, 33, of Greenfield, Wis., took off from the checkpoint after a Border Patrol drug K-9 alerted to the vehicle and agents directed McMillan to pull over for a secondary search, the Texas Department of Public Safety said. 

During the car chase, McMillan opened fire out of his vehicle window at DPS troopers and other authorities from several law enforcement agencies and civilian vehicles, DPS said.  

“As law enforcement returned fire, DPS Troopers performed a precision immobilization technique (PIT) maneuver and successfully stopped the suspect vehicle,” a DPS statement said. 

McMillan barricaded himself in his vehicle and eventually pointed his weapon towards officers, prompting officers to open fire, authorities said. 

He was shot and killed. No law enforcement officers or civilians were hurt.  

Investigators determined McMillan was driving a vehicle reported stolen in Arizona. The shooting is being investigated by the Texas Rangers, with assistance from the FBI and USBP.

In January, a man suspected of smuggling illegal immigrants was shot by federal officers during a gunfire exchange in Arizona. 

Patrick Gary Schlegel, 34, fled from authorities on foot and allegedly shot at a CBP helicopter and at agents, Heith Janke, the special agent in charge of the FBI’s Phoenix Division, said at the time. 

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Schlegal, a U.S. citizen from Arizona, underwent surgery and survived. No one else was harmed, authorities said. 

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A Democrat running for Congress in one of the most competitive seats in the country once said she would combat systematic racism by redirecting law enforcement funding when asked if she would “defund the police” in 2020.

“I support the reallocation of funding to programs that would allow people to live their best lives,” JoAnna Mendoza, a Marine veteran, told the Arizona Clean Elections Commission and Arizona Capitol Times at a town hall event.

“Such as social service programs. Such as housing, public education, healthcare, ensuring that we are addressing economic stability and environmental safety.”

Mendoza, who is running to represent Arizona’s 6th Congressional District, denied ever supporting defunding the police, according to her campaign.

“Jo Mendoza has been on the record for years that police need MORE resources to do their jobs – not less – including body cameras and training. And she has repeatedly stated that she does not support defunding the police,” Mendoza’s campaign said in a statement to Fox News Digital.

“Any other assertion is categorically false, a lie and a political smear from D.C. hacks hoping to save Juan Ciscomani from an early retirement,” the campaign said, referring to the GOP incumbent Mendoza is running against. 

Mendoza did not clarify what she had meant by the 2020 statement. However, her campaign pointed to other comments she made in 2020.

“I do not support defunding the police. Police officers are being asked to do too much. They’re being asked to address issues because of the lack of resources in our communities,” Mendoza said in another virtual event that year.

The Republican National Committee slammed Mendoza in a statement to Fox News Digital.

“There’s no way for JoAnna Mendoza to spin her extreme anti-police views, and Arizonans will know that she sides with dangerous criminals over them,” Nick Poche, a spokesperson for the RNC, told Fox News Digital.

The “defund the police” platform, which at the time was championed by several progressive Democrats, has aged poorly, leading Republicans and Democrats to view mere mentions of the phrase as a political liability in 2026.

The movement first burst onto the scene through the outrage after the death of George Floyd, a Black Minnesota resident who died after a police arrest in which an officer pinned him to the ground by placing a knee on his neck for an extended period. 

His death sparked an uproar in cities across the country over racism in law enforcement and whether police in America could do more to avoid violence during arrests.

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Although the outrage over Floyd eventually subsided, many of the calls to divert resources away from police persisted as a Democratic platform, leading some cities like Minneapolis and Austin, Texas, to reduce their police budgets.

However, the movement began to draw ire from Democrats who feared the party had taken a stance that could be considered at odds with community safety and worsen their odds at the ballot box.

Rep. Jim Clyburn, D-S.C., the House Majority Whip under U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., in 2021, said the phrase was “cutting the throats of the party.” 

“We keep making that mistake. This foolishness about you got to be this progressive or that progressive,” Clyburn said.

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Other Democratic strategists, such as James Carville, have also condemned the platform.

Carville called the slogan “the three stupidest words in the English language” in interviews in 2024 and went as far as suggesting the slogan could have led to the loss of Vice President Kamala Harris in her bid against Donald Trump.

“We could never wash off the stench of it,” Carville added.

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Mendoza faces a tough race in Arizona’s 6th Congressional District. Ciscomani, the seat’s current incumbent, narrowly won election in 2024 in a 50%-47.5% victory over Democrat challenger Kirsten Engel.

The district is listed among the Cook Political Report’s most competitive races in 2026, earning one of the 18 seats with a “toss-up” designation.

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Poche believes Mendoza’s previous comments have just made her bid against Ciscomani harder.

“If the Democrats think a defund-the-police radical can beat him, they’re just plain stupid,” Poche said.

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