A Battle For Election Oversight Is Brewing In Maricopa County

For years, Maricopa County, Arizona, voters have been forced to endure incompetent election administration from the locality’s top elections officials. So in 2024, they decided to do something about it.

During the Grand Canyon State’s July primaries, Maricopa voters ousted then-Recorder Stephen Richer, a self-professed Republican who often used his position to attack Arizonans concerned about the county’s inept election management and engaged in efforts to censor his political opponents. To take his place, voters nominated Republican Justin Heap, a then-Arizona Freedom Caucus member who ran on a platform of restoring “confidence” and transparency to Maricopa County elections.

With Arizona trending in Republicans’ favor and a Heap victory in the November contest likely, Maricopa County voters seemed all but poised to have someone oversee elections who cared about providing them with an honest and open process. But as the old saying goes, one shouldn’t count his chickens before they hatch.

Despite being a lame duck after his primary defeat, Richer seemingly wasn’t finished inviting chaos into Maricopa County’s election administration. Less than a month before the Nov. 5 election and Heap’s eventual victory, the then-recorder struck a deal with the then-Maricopa County Board of Supervisors (MCBOS) to effectively strip key election administration responsibilities and resources from the recorder’s office and give them to the Board.

This new Shared Services Agreement (SSA), which took effect weeks before Heap was sworn into office in January, has pitted Maricopa’s new recorder against the current MCBOS, which thus far has appeared reluctant to renegotiate a new deal. If left unresolved, the ongoing dispute could potentially impact the administration of the county’s upcoming elections and harm voters’ trust in the process.

“The voters who [elected] me have the right to expect that the recorder they’re electing is going to come in with all of his constitutional powers and statutory duties in place,” Maricopa County Recorder Justin Heap told The Federalist.

The Shared Services Agreement

As explained by a local Fox affiliate, for roughly 30 years, the SSA granted the Maricopa recorder oversight of “all election responsibilities.” That changed in 2019 when then-Maricopa Recorder and now-Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes and the MCBOS struck a new agreement that “split up roles” between the two departments.

Since then, the recorder’s office has primarily handled matters related to early voting, while the MCBOS has overseen in-person voting and tabulation.

According to KJZZ Phoenix, however, the arrangement agreed to by Richer and the prior Board changes this dynamic by granting the MCBOS “the authority to appoint the board that processes early ballots, which includes an inspector and two judges from different political parties.” Those boards, the outlet noted, “examine, count and verify early ballots before they are tabulated” and oversee responsibilities like “opening envelopes, ensuring the ballot envelopes show the correct election code and identifying damaged ballots.”

This is an apparent departure from the county’s prior SSA, which reportedly gave the recorder’s office the power to handle such matters.

The 2024 agreement went a step further by shifting the “recorder’s information technology [IT] staff and its associated $5 million budget under [the Board’s] supervision,” KJZZ Phoenix reported. According to the new SSA, this includes “any IT-related service necessary for the Recorder to effectively perform its elections or business-related responsibilities as designated.”

The SSA brokered by Richer and the then-MCBOS took effect on Dec. 10, 2024.

Ongoing Dispute and Negotiations

Speaking with The Federalist, Heap argued that the SSA in its current form hampers his office’s ability to carry out the necessary functions delegated to his position. Specifically, he claimed that the decision to revoke his IT staff effectively puts him at the mercy of the MCBOS when it comes to fulfilling his election-related obligations.

“All three of my duties — recording of public documents, election services, and maintaining the voter rolls — all those divisions need IT staff, and I don’t have IT staff” under this SSA, Heap said. “So, if I want to do things that are exclusively under me, which includes reporting of public documents and voter roll maintenance … I no longer have the staff to be able to do it. The Board says … they will respond to my reasonable requests … and their IT staff will work on my projects. But again, that’s really dependent on the Board and their timetable.”

After consultation with the Maricopa County attorney’s office, Heap sent a letter to the MCBOS on Jan. 27, in which he gave notice that the October 2024 SSA is “terminated, and all provisions therein are invalid.” He argued the decision is supported by Arizona law, which, as he described, “states that one elected body cannot bind the powers of its successor.”

The communique was issued following weeks of reported conversations with several Board members about the existing SSA.

It was at this point that the recorder’s office and the MCBOS retained outside counsel to advise them on the matter, according to Heap.

After unsuccessfully attempting to renegotiate the agreement with the Board, Heap published a press release on Feb. 24 explaining the situation and his concerns about the SSA. The recorder characterized the agreement as a “backroom, eleventh hour power grab” and laid out a series of proposals for a new SSA.

According to the presser, Heap is seeking to “[r]einstate the 2021 SSA structure, with agreed upon modifications” and the recorder’s “full authority over early voting, as per statute and past agreements,” as well as “[r]eturn the 4 Early Vote Processing [full-time employees] FTEs, 5 GIS technician FTEs, and a minimum of 15 IT FTEs to the Recorder’s office.”

“I’m simply asking that the Board maintain the status quo and give me the … same powers and authority that my predecessor [had],” Heap told The Federalist.

MCBOS Chair Thomas Galvin, a Republican, released a Feb. 24 statement responding to Heap, claiming there were “factual errors in Recorder Heap’s statement” about the agreement and that he doesn’t view the ongoing dispute “as a ‘battle.’” In addition to Democrat Steve Gallardo, Galvin is the only other MCBOS member to serve on the Board that greenlit the current SSA.

“My colleagues and I happily look forward to further and continued dialogue to ensure a new SSA aligns with Arizona law and best practices in election administration,” Galvin said.

Heap told The Federalist that he and his outside counsel met with Galvin and MCBOS Vice Chair Kate Brophy McGee on Tuesday in what he characterized as a “friendly” meeting. According to the recorder, the members “asked a few questions but mostly just listened to [his] proposals.”

“The meeting concluded without the Board agreeing to any terms and without the Board proposing any plans or conditions of their own. They stated they would review my draft SSA with their counsel and the other Board members and get back to me,” Heap said.

Galvin did not respond to The Federalist’s request for comment.

The Road Ahead

While negotiations remain ongoing, the Board and Heap’s impasse over the current SSA could potentially jeopardize the administration of Maricopa County’s upcoming 2025 elections. The county is slated to hold municipal contests for the cities of Goodyear and Glendale in May, with military and overseas ballots expected to be mailed out as soon as April 5.

“All of this should have been resolved in January, and could have been resolved in a single meeting,” Heap said. “This issue can’t be delayed until the end of March because there’s deadlines and [election preparations] that have already begun [and] are taking place, and we need to get this agreement settled.”

Heap said he is prepared “to petition the courts to restore [his] statutory authority and resolve this impasse” if the MCBOS “refuses to engage in discussions about the SSA.”

“In [2024], the voters of Maricopa County sent a clear message: they want leaders who will implement efficient and trustworthy election reforms,” Heap said. “The Board has a legal obligation to provide elected offices with the staff and resources necessary to fulfill their statutory duties. … If this dispute goes to court, I am confident my office will prevail.”

For more election news and updates, visit electionbriefing.com.

Shawn Fleetwood is a staff writer for The Federalist and a graduate of the University of Mary Washington. He previously served as a state content writer for Convention of States Action and his work has been featured in numerous outlets, including RealClearPolitics, RealClearHealth, and Conservative Review. Follow him on Twitter @ShawnFleetwood