Democrats admit thousands of registered Arizona voters haven’t provided proof of citizenship after shock computer ‘glitch’

Arizona’s Democratic leaders raised concerns on a secret call about a shocking discovery that, if made public, would accuse them of rigging the upcoming elections and casting doubt on the results of the last two.

“If this becomes public, all the conspiracy theorists in the world — in the world — will come back to relitigate the last three elections, at least in Arizona,” Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs said on the call. , a recording of which was obtained by The Washington Post.

As they played out the planned scenarios on how to respond, it became clear that about 100,000 Republican voters would be affected, to the Democrats’ benefit.

“If we do what you’re talking about, we’re talking about disenfranchising probably tens of thousands of Republican voters,” said Democratic Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes.

State leadership made the crisis call after learning that tens of thousands of residents had been registered to vote for decades even though there was no evidence they had provided proof of citizenship, which is required under Arizona law.

The revelation could have led to thousands of voters being excluded from the ballot, multiple lawsuits over the issue and many questions about the legitimacy of the results in Arizona, a key state that could determine the winner of November’s presidential election.

It appears to be a problem that has not been addressed for twenty years.

In 2004, Arizona passed a law requiring voters to provide proof of citizenship in order to vote. But about a decade later, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of a federal law that prevented states from requiring proof of citizenship to vote for president and other federal offices.

To comply with the new federal ruling, Arizona has adopted a dual registration system.

Those who provide proof of citizenship will receive complete ballots showing local, state and federal races. Those who did not receive ballots showing only races for federal offices.

But a discovery this month showed that tens of thousands of voters had been marked as eligible for complete ballots, even though there was no evidence they had provided citizenship documents.

And that led to Democrats’ dilemma: Changing these people’s voting status risked depriving them of legitimate voters six weeks before the election. Allowing them to vote as they had in the past would be against the law.

Originally, state leaders were concerned about the issue affecting about 148,000 voters.

But the final number came to about 98,000 – most of whom were Republicans and almost all of whom appeared to be citizens.

Hobbs argued that one way to deal with the politically explosive situation was to give these voters ballots only with the federal races.

But Mayes, the attorney general, and Democratic Secretary of State Adrian Fontes argued that they could not disenfranchise so many voters so close to the election.

Fontes also pointed out that federal law prohibits states from making major changes to their voter registration lists less than 90 days before the election.

Mayes noted that getting the proper proof of citizenship into the system would be a logistical nightmare.

“Think of all the 82-year-olds in wheelchairs who won’t make it to the polls and won’t be able to find their damn driver’s license. or birth certificates on time,” she said.

“If we do what you’re talking about, we’re talking about disenfranchising probably tens of thousands of Republican voters,” she said.

In addition to the presidential race, Arizona voters will also decide on a constitutional amendment to guarantee women’s right to abortion and decide which party controls the state legislature.

Mayes, the attorney general, worried that their Democratic trio would be accused of disenfranchising Republicans to gain an advantage in those contests.

“We can’t do that,” she said.

Fontes, the foreign minister, summed it up: “They are going to beat us up, whatever we do, whatever we say.”

And the bigger problem was confidence in the system.

“It will validate all their theories about illegal voting in our elections, even though we all know that’s not true,” Gov. Hobbs said he was concerned about the call. The Washington Post.

Mayes worried about the outcome if they removed voters from the ballot: “The reality is, if we let this happen, all of these elections are moot. They are going to call for new elections.’

Hobbs responded, “They’re also going to call for new elections for 2020 and ’22.”

The leaders came up with a solution: an out-of-court lawsuit to give them legal cover.

The state announced that computer problems at the Department of Motor Vehicles caused the outage, which was resolved.

Maricopa County Recorder Stephen Richer, a Republican, indicted Fontes. The state Supreme Court ruled that voters’ right to vote in full should remain in effect.

But the details of the call show how concerned state leaders are about the Nov. 5 election and the response to whatever the outcome may be.

Republicans are already laying the groundwork for filing lawsuits in several battleground states if Donald Trump loses, including in Arizona.

Arizona was the center of conspiracy theories and recounts during the 2020 election, with Trump falsely claiming the election was stolen from him.

Several counties conducted audits using manual counts and found no evidence of voter fraud. An investigation into Maricopa County ballots — which cost millions of dollars — found no evidence of any Chinese ballots containing paper containing bamboo.

Hobbs was secretary of state at the time and faced death threats as she oversaw the trial. Fontes was the recorder for Maricopa County.

And several top Trump allies are facing charges in the state for their alleged actions in Arizona after the election. Mayes is leading that prosecution.