Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes has weighed in on the latest election dispute between the Maricopa County recorder and Board of Supervisors.
Earlier this week, the supervisors voted to approve vote center and drop box locations for upcoming elections. That prompted a legal threat from Recorder Justin Heap, who argued his office has sole authority over drop box locations.
At issue is Arizona’s complicated web of election laws, which divide administrative duties between recorders and boards of supervisors.
In a letter, Heap’s attorney cited laws giving the recorder control of early voting locations.
“A ballot drop box is, under any reasonable interpretation of the plain meaning of the statutory text, an ‘early voting location,’ as it is a physical site where voters may deliver their voted early ballots during the early voting period,” attorney James Rogers wrote.
Rogers also argued any election worker who picks up ballots from a drop box approved by the board without the recorder’s permission would be guilty of a Class 5 felony for violating a state law that prohibits people from collecting ballots by “misrepresenting itself as an election official or as an official ballot repository.”
But the board disagreed, arguing it has authority to designate drop boxes in accordance with Arizona’s Elections Procedures Manual. That’s a guidebook for election administrators across the state, also established by state law, that is updated every two years by the Secretary of State’s Office, with approval from both the governor and attorney general.
The manual states that “all ballot drop-off locations and drop-boxes shall be approved by the Board of Supervisors (or designee).”
Mayes agreed with the board’s interpretation of state law.
In a letter to Rogers and attorneys for the board, she said the supervisors were “following established practice.”
She pointed out that the 2019, 2023 and 2025 versions of the elections manual all gave boards of supervisors approval authority over ballot drop box locations.
Rogers, Heap’s attorney, pointed out that the elections manual cannot be used to transfer powers from one elected official to another in violation of the law.
But Mayes argued that is not the case here.
She acknowledged that the law gives the recorder control of “early voting locations.”
“But, as a matter of common sense, a drop box is not an early voting location,” Mayes wrote. “It is simply a place to deposit a voted and sealed early ballot packet.”
For instance, she pointed out, voters cannot obtain a ballot at a drop box location like they can at an early voting location.
“Indeed, if Recorder Heap’s counsel were correct, every mailbox in the state would be an early voting location, and every mail carrier could be accused of illegally harvesting ballots,” Mayes wrote.
The drop box dispute is the latest development in an ongoing fight between Heap and the board over control of the county’s elections that has yet to be resolved with just one month to go before early voting begins in Arizona’s July 21 primary election.
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