Republican candidates and conservative media organizations grabbed reports of voting problems in Arizona on Tuesday, even as state and county officials said the complaints were exaggerated. It failed and reiterated their claim that reform was necessary.
Mark Finkem, who won the Republican nomination for secretary of state in Arizona, said before his victory was announced, “there is fraud going on all over the state.”
Gateway Pandit, a conservative website that covered Tuesday’s election rumors with bated breath, said Arizona’s largest county was apparently “ridden with serious irregularities occurring all day long, and the election was in full swing.” It raises even more integrity concerns.”
There is no evidence that fraud was pervasive in Tuesday’s election. But the concerns raised were reinforced by a number of problems in Pinal County, her third-most populous county in the state, located between Phoenix and Tucson.is more than 63,000 votes A new ballot had to be issued because it was mailed in the wrong local race.On Election Night, in at least 20 of the 95 constituencies Pinal County Was Out of Ballots or Completely Missing.
Sophia Solis, Arizona’s secretary of state’s deputy communications officer, said voters will be able to cast their ballots in these precincts using the voting machines normally used by voters with disabilities. .
“We haven’t heard about widespread problems,” Solis said, adding, “One of the main problems we saw yesterday was the spread of misinformation and disinformation.”
Kent Volkmer, an attorney for Pinal County, said the county has more direct voters than ever before and far more independent voters. He added that many voters abandoned their mail-in ballots so they could vote in person, possibly motivated by ballot printing problems.
“I think few people have been impacted more negatively than something related to community,” Volkmer said.
One of Tuesday’s popular talking points revived a fallacious theory from 2020. This is known as Sharpie gate, claiming that markers provided by polling place workers bleed out, invalidating votes.election administrator said Machines can read ballots marked with pens, markers or other instruments and manually check for any problems.
“This is Sharpygate 2.0,” conservative commentator Ben Berquam said in a livestream. Finkem shared the conspiracy theory on his own Twitter account. Arizona’s Second District congressional candidate Ron Watkins, who finished last in Tuesday’s race, also suggested Watkins’ votes were being artificially slashed.
Many election fraud theories focused on the gubernatorial primary between former newscaster Kari Lake, whom Trump endorsed, and Karin Taylor-Robson, who was endorsed by former Vice President Mike Pence. Mr. Lake lagged heavily behind his competitors for most of the night, creating a theory of election fraud among his supporters. She finally took the lead.
Lake’s supporters suggested during the livestream that the results were questionable as many other pro-Trump candidates have won their race. , and polls suggested a slight advantage for Taylor Robson. In-person votes were tallied on election night, and Mr. Lake’s supporters preferred to vote in person.
As the count continued late into the night, Ms. Lake declared victory while still trailing Ms. Taylor Robson.
“We’re going to win when the legal votes are tallied,” Lake said at an election night party. The Associated Press has not yet called for a race.
