Thanks for your help again.
For the match_phrase query, it was being used in conjunction with other match and match_phrase queries, so my understanding was the And Operator was needed to build the query properly.
For example, a search might involve a combination of the term "swamp" and "pacific chorus frog", which would result in a match query combined with a match_phrase query. I will make sure the search combination works during my testing.
Thanks.