In a recent revelation, a supposed glitch in Arizona's Presidential Preference Election has been found to potentially alter voter registrations from Republican or Democrat to Independent or "other" in the statewide voter registration system.
This discovery has raised concerns, given that Arizona's Presidential Elections operate under closed primaries, allowing only registered Republicans or Democrats to vote in their respective party's primary.
The Arizona Secretary of State's office has reportedly acknowledged this issue, stating in an email to Arizona county recorders that it is "currently impacting all recognized party preference values." The current Secretary of State, Adrian Fontes, who served as Maricopa County Recorder during the contentious 2020 election, is at the helm of this issue.
However, the only example provided pertains to Republican voter registrations. The email instructs county recorders to ensure their teams verify the correct voter party preference until the Arizona Voter Information Database (AVID) is updated to account for this unexpected change.
This situation seems to be a push towards open primary elections and rank-choice voting, a move already being pursued with a ballot initiative titled "Make Elections Fair Arizona Act." Arizona Republicans have opposed this measure, citing "voter disenfranchisement and confusion," while Democrats have remained silent on their stance, as reported by Fox 10.
Fontes, who has previously advocated against political parties restricting their primary elections, noted that the current open primary rule for Arizona's regular primary elections does not apply to Presidential Preference Elections.
Adrian Fontes and Maricopa County Recorder Stephen Richer, the two most prominent election officials in Arizona, have also advocated for ranked-choice voting. They discussed election reform at an event in Phoenix last year, as reported by The Gateway Pundit.
The upcoming Republican primary is expected to be more contested than the Democratic primary, with liberal megadonors like Reed Hoffman pouring substantial funds into Nikki Haley's campaign. This financial support could potentially benefit Haley in Arizona, given Democrats' alleged plans to manipulate the primaries by registering as Republicans to vote against Trump.
Following the alleged scheme to rig the voting machines on election day, causing a 60% failure rate for in-person voters, as reportedly happened to Republican voters in the last election, it appears that Arizona's election officials may be devising a new strategy to undermine Trump.
This glitch could also impact the 2024 General Election, mirroring the errors seen in 2022, where Republicans were compelled to vote provisionally on election day due to random changes in their voter registrations.
The Arizona Daily Independent reports that Governor Katie Hobbs' Elections Task Force's final report, issued in November 2023, addressed the systemic failures of the EZ Voter system. These failures were highlighted due to the narrow vote split between Kris Mayes and Abe Hamadeh in the 2022 Arizona Attorney General's race.
During a statewide recount announced on December 29, Hamadeh was found to have fallen short of Mayes by 280 votes out of more than 2.5 million ballots. While Hamadeh's attorneys prepared for his election challenge, they discovered several issues that disenfranchised certain voters. Among those were Arizona residents who were forced to cast provisional ballots, not due to their own errors, but due to failures in Arizona's dysfunctional voter registration system.
This revelation does not bode well for the integrity of Arizona's 2024 election. It underscores the need for a thorough review and rectification of the state's voter registration system to ensure a fair and transparent electoral process.
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