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Maricopa County braces for potential danger during election tabulation

An official ballot drop box at Maricopa County Elections Department
Sky Schaudt/KJZZ
An official ballot drop box at Maricopa County Elections Department's office in Phoenix.

Maricopa County officials have shored up security for this election and any potential fallout. The county is braced for danger during tabulation, which is when trouble has occurred in recent elections.

Maricopa County is one of the largest counties in the country and one of the largest voting districts. It’s also a hotbed of election fraud conspiracy theories.

This year, precautions include snipers, active-shooter drills and hourly monitoring of social media for threats and misinformation that could harm voters.

“We have both foreign actors and people within this country that are intentionally spreading misinformation about our elections. So, when people are starting to raise questions already about the 2024 election in Maricopa County, it doesn’t surprise me unfortunately,” Republican County Supervisor Bill Gates said.

Sheriff Russ Skinner said county officials didn’t have these concerns before 2020, but now they want to be overprepared.

In Oregon and Washington, ballot drop boxes were recently set on fire and damaged. Skinner addressed that and a recent incident in Arizona where a man set fire to a mailbox and damaged ballots that were inside.

Skinner reiterated that the man who was arrested for the crime in Arizona told police he just wanted to be arrested and didn’t start the fire for election-related reasons. Also, Skinner noted that mailboxes are not the same as ballot drop boxes.

Elections Director Scott Jarrett said the county has more than 71 drop boxes and will have more than 260 on Election Day, all monitored by cameras and individuals. He said the outdoor drop boxes have fire suppression canisters in them as well.

More than a million county voters have already sent in early ballots, and the county anticipates a surge of voters on Election Day.

Gates noted that “some candidates believe that their voters have the right to not have to wait in a line,” but that may not be realistic. In-person Election Day voters typically do face lines, and this year, long, two-page ballots could take longer to fill out than usual.

Camryn Sanchez is a field correspondent at KJZZ covering everything to do with state politics.