Kelli Ward is the head of the Arizona GOP, perhaps the most extreme MAGA GOP state organization. She and her husband were both “alternate electors,” and both are targeted as key people in the scheme. Whenever prosecutors are looking at charging conspiracy cases like this, it really helps to have a pattern of behavior seen in as many states as possible. So, getting the records from the state leader is that much more valuable. The Wards filed suit to prevent the January 6th Committee from subpoenaing their phones. It didn’t work.

The court wasn’t impressed that both husband and wife are doctors and thus “privileged…” From NBC News:

A federal judge in Arizona ruled Thursday that the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol can see the phone records of Arizona Republican Party Chairwoman Kelli Ward and her husband.

U.S. District Court Judge Diane J. Humetewa rejected the Wards’ arguments in a February lawsuit that the congressional panel should be prevented from getting the phone records of the couple, who are doctors, because it would violate medical privacy laws.

The FBI has teams that review the records first for any sort of privileged material and then hand off the records that are subject to investigation to the team investigating the case. The criminal investigators never see the privileged material.

In January, the state GOP chair and her husband, Michael Ward, were among 14 of 84 so-called alternate electors subpoenaed by the committee because they had claimed in bogus documents that then-President Donald Trump had won the 2020 election in their states..

Yes, now they have to deeply fear that their phone calls and texts align with other party leaders in other states with the exact same plan, establishing a pattern among conspirators and the increased likelihood that they’ll be charged. Oh, and one other thing that the doctors who believed they could keep their phones over the medical privilege; they should know that if they’re charged with conspiracy, there is no rule against hearsay evidence among conspirators. After all, the talks themselves constitute the crime.

****

[email protected], @JasonMiciak, with Nicole Hickman