Arizona’s ‘Broken’ Election Administration Is A Choice

While Donald Trump has officially secured a second term as president, all eyes remain on the Sunbelt state of Arizona, where election officials continue to tabulate ballots days after the Nov. 5 contest.

As of Friday morning, the Arizona secretary of state’s office estimates there are more than 780,000 votes yet to be counted. Preliminary results released thus far show Trump leading Kamala Harris by 5.9 points and Democrat Senate candidate Ruben Gallego leading Republican Kari Lake by 1.7 points.

Control of the state legislature and numerous local races are also yet to be officially determined as of Friday morning, according to The New York Times.

While winning Arizona is no longer necessary for Republicans to take control of the White House and Senate this year, the state’s reputation for taking days to produce final election results shouldn’t be dismissed out of hand.

“The longer you drag it out, the more it raises suspicions that shenanigans are occurring, that fraudulent activity is occurring,” Arizona Free Enterprise Club President Scot Mussi told The Federalist. “The only way to eliminate that is to ensure that we have election results on election night.”

Failure to provide voters a definitive answer on the outcome of any given race within the day of the election undermines voters’ faith in the process. Imagine, for instance, if the outcome of the 2024 presidential race came down to which candidate won Arizona. The ineptitude of officials in Maricopa County — Arizona’s most populous locality — and other jurisdictions to enact the procedures necessary to release results in a timely fashion would undoubtedly cause a crisis of confidence among Americans.

The status quo in Arizona “has to stop, because the length of the process is undermining confidence in the system,” Arizona GOP Chair Gina Swoboda told The Federalist.

Why the Delays?

While Arizona, and specifically Maricopa County, have certainly had their fair share of election misadministration, the biggest hindrance to voters obtaining results quickly originates from an issue within state law, according to Mussi and Swoboda.

In Arizona, voters are permitted to return their early mail ballots via mail or deliver them in person at any vote center in their respective county by 7 p.m. local time on Election Day. All absentee voters are required to provide their signature on the ballot envelope affidavit, which is then compared to the one on their registration form. Once election workers confirm the signatures match, the ballot is processed and tabulated.

The Arizona secretary of state’s office notes that “most” early mail ballots returned prior to Election Day are “tabulated in the weeks leading up to the election.” It’s how counties manage the early ballots returned on Election Day, however, that presents a problem to voters receiving timely election results.

Swoboda told The Federalist the primary reason for the state’s failure to produce election results in a timely manner is the result of existing law permitting voters to drop off their early ballots on Election Day.

In Maricopa County, for example, officials estimated on Wednesday that more than 212,000 early ballots were returned to county voting sites on Election Day. That total is even larger (more than 225,000) when including early ballots the county received from drop boxes and the Post Office.

These mail ballots and those in other counties returned on Election Day, Swoboda noted, must undergo the aforementioned verification process before they can be tabulated by officials, a process the secretary of state’s office claims “takes time.”

“This delay we’re going to have from today to Saturday is 100 percent caused by voters being allowed to drop off [hundreds of thousands of] ballots in envelopes on Election Day,” she said.

Meanwhile, Constantin Querard, president and founder of the Arizona-based Grassroots Partners, pointed to Maricopa County and other localities’ two-page, double-sided ballot as a potential factor hindering the prompt release of election results. Speaking with The Federalist, he said that while everything “seem[ed] fine” at the beginning of election night, it became evident as the evening dragged on that Maricopa officials were caught off guard by how the unusually long ballot impacted their operations.

“They clearly got something wrong leading up to [election night] because they were way behind and that first ballot drop was light,” Querard said. I find it “hard to believe they were surprised by the scale of the operation, but it seems the two-sheet ballot really messed with their estimates.”

Mussi told The Federalist that while he doesn’t believe officials such as Maricopa County Recorder Stephen Richer are intentionally delaying the “broken” process, Richer and those who agree with him “actively defend it and believe that it is working.”

Officials’ Resistance to Change

While continuing to hamper Arizona’s ability to deliver timely election results, legislative attempts to streamline the efficiency of the state’s tabulation process have proven difficult.

In 2022, the Arizona Legislature revised state law to allow counties to conduct “on-site tabulation of early ballots.” According to Mussi, however, none of Arizona’s 15 counties have implemented it.

“That law has been in place since 2022. They could [have done] it for this election,” Mussi said. “We’re going to urge counties after this election to implement that, to provide that option [where] if [a voter has] an early ballot, they could go to a location, show ID, [and] tabulate their ballot on site. That will address the vast majority of the issues we’re having now with [not] getting election results on election night.”

Swoboda told The Federalist state Democrats and the counties’ lobbying organization have fought “every bill” Arizona Republicans have brought forward that would require localities to implement on-site tabulation for early ballots dropped off at polling sites on Election Day. She opined that such opposition — which continues to undermine confidence in Arizona’s elections — stems from their desire to institute an all-mail voting system in the state.

“They don’t want to do anything to make the in-person voting experience better because they believe that they can get us to go to all-mail,” Swoboda said. “I understand why they want it, but they’re not going to get it … because we have a right to vote in person.”

While required on-site tabulation remains a major hurdle, legislation passed earlier this year could potentially alleviate some existing backlogs.

The bill stipulates that, beginning in 2026, voters “may choose to provide identification” that meets current statutory requirements “when presenting [their] mailed early ballot” at a polling site on Election Day. After election officials “confirm that the name and address on the identification reasonably appear to be the same name and address shown on the voter’s registration record” and “stamp the signed affidavit with a stamp that reads ‘ID verified,’” the ballot is to be placed in a designated ballot box and “deemed ready” for tabulation since the voter’s identification has already been verified.

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