Arizona election error could affect eligibility of nearly 100,000 voters | 2024 US Elections

Arizona’s top elections official said Tuesday that a newly identified error in the state’s voter registration process must be quickly resolved as the first ballots are expected to be sent to some voters as early as this week.

Election officials at the Maricopa County Clerk’s Office identified a problem last week involving voters with old driver’s licenses who may never have provided documentary proof of citizenship but were coded as having provided it and were therefore able to cast full ballots. The state has a bifurcated system in which voters who do not provide documentary proof of citizenship cannot vote in local or state elections, only federal elections.

Given the close election and Arizona’s status as a swing state, the issue that affects nearly 100,000 voters will likely be the subject of intense scrutiny and litigation in the coming weeks. Arizona has more than 4.1 million registered voters.

Gov. Katie Hobbs directed the Division of Motor Vehicles to correct the coding error, which Secretary of State Adrian Fontes said was already being addressed going forward.

It is unclear whether any of these voters voted illegally or whether they had already provided proof of citizenship. People who register to vote check a box on the registration form, under penalty of perjury, stating that they are citizens.

“We have no reason to believe that there are a significant number of people left on that list who are not eligible to vote in Arizona,” Fontes said at a news conference Tuesday. “We can’t confirm that at this point, but we have no reason to believe that.”

The error, reported by Votebeat on Tuesday, is linked to several peculiarities of Arizona’s governance.

Since 1996, Arizona residents have had to prove their citizenship to obtain a regular driver’s license. And since 2004, they have had to prove their citizenship to vote in local and state elections.

State-issued driver’s licenses don’t expire until the driver turns 65, meaning some residents will have a valid license for decades before needing to renew it. These factors explain the error.

The issue has divided the Republican secretary of state for Maricopa, the state’s largest county, and the Democratic secretary of state. Stephen Richer, the secretary of state, argues that such voters should only be able to vote in federal elections, while Fontes says the state should maintain the status quo of allowing them to vote by complete ballot, given the proximity of the election. Fontes has asked counties to allow such residents to vote by complete ballot this year.

Arizona is home to a strong election denial movement, and this issue is likely to fuel these narratives. Republicans have for months stoked fears about noncitizens voting in the November elections in Arizona and across the country, despite the lack of evidence that noncitizens are voting in significant numbers.

Richer wrote on X that his office would sue Fontes’ office over the matter, saying that since they disagree, the courts will provide “a clear answer.” Richer’s office identified the problem, which affects every county in the state. The complaint was filed Tuesday afternoon, and the clerk’s office said it discovered the problem when it identified a noncitizen who was mistakenly registered to vote, even though the person had not voted in the past.

“All of these individuals have attested under penalty of sanctions that they are U.S. citizens. And, in all likelihood, they (are) almost all U.S. citizens,” Richer wrote on X, adding that they had not provided proof.

The group in question includes about 98,000 voters. Fontes said the “majority” of those residents are Republicans and between the ages of 45 and 60, having obtained their driver’s license before 1996.

“If you are on this list, rest assured that you will be contacted soon by Arizona election officials,” Fontes said. But, he added, election offices want the courts to rule first before contacting voters “willy-nilly.”

As Votebeat describes it, the issue affects people who “obtained their Arizona driver’s license before October 1996 and then received a replacement duplicate before registering to vote sometime after 2004.”

Election officials reviewed voter registration forms to see when licenses had been updated and whether the dates meant people had submitted the required proof of citizenship. For dates after October 1996, officials assumed the documents were in order. But unbeknownst to election officials, the Division of Motor Vehicles system updated the license issuance date when people replaced or updated their licenses, making it appear that the license was more recent and included proof of citizenship.

The mistake occurred, apparently unnoticed, since 2005, the lawsuit says.