Recount in Arizona's CD3 can begin after Maricopa County certifies election results

The Maricopa County Board of Supervisors certified the 2024 primary election Monday morning.

The Board celebrated what they consider to be a successful election: the longest wait time for voters was three minutes, and the final results came out faster than they have in the past 20 elections.

Still, the board faced suspicion of election fraud from the public, something that has become commonplace since 2020. Supervisor Thomas Galvin lost his patience with one woman who said she has more faith in elections in the Middle East and Russia than in Arizona:

“If anyone has more confidence in elections in Russia and in Middle Eastern countries not named Israel? That is a joke. That is a joke,” Galvin said. “Let’s see — go ahead with Russia, have fun voting in Russia, see how that goes.”

Galvin was responding to Barbara Hiatt, whose husband lost the primary election for Maricopa County Recorder. Secretary of State Adrian Fontes is scheduled to certify the statewide election results on Thursday.

The certification is required before Fontes’ office can conduct a recount in the 3rd Congressional District, where 42 votes separate the top contenders.

Former Phoenix City Council member Yassamin Ansari is leading over former state lawmaker Raquel Terán by less than .5 percentage points — the margin that triggers a recount under Arizona law.

Fontes confirmed the need for a recount and petitioned the Maricopa County Superior Court to authorize it, court records show. The secretary estimated the recount process will be completed by Aug. 19 if everything begins as planned Tuesday.

Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Jennifer Ryan-Touhill officially ordered the recount, records show. The judge scheduled a hearing to announce the results on Aug. 20.

In the race, 301 people “over-voted,” meaning they incorrectly voted for more than one candidate. If those voters had filled in their ballots correctly, the race might never have gone to a recount, giving Ansari the win — or it could have been enough to flip the results for Terán.

Maricopa County Elections Director Scott Jarrett told the county board of supervisors that the over-voters are a small minority of voters, not constituting an alarming percentage.

Whoever wins the Democratic bid will face Republican Jeff Zink in the November general election. The district leans Democrat and encompasses parts of Phoenix. The seat was left vacant when U.S. Rep Ruben Gallego decided to seek a U.S. Senate seat. He'll face Republican Kari Lake in November.

The canvass of election results had long been a dull, unceremonious act of government business in the Grand Canyon State. But since Joe Biden’s defeat of Donald Trump in the 2020 presidential election in Arizona, election conspiracies have flourished and — at times — hindered the process.

This year, the certification of primary election results largely has gone smoothly across Arizona, with the majority of the state's 15 counties approving the results without issue. The state's canvass is scheduled later this week.

In neighboring Pinal County, the all-Republican board of supervisors certified the primary election results after Supervisor Kevin Cavanaugh alleged inconsistent voting patterns in his failed run for sheriff and in a handful of other countywide races.

Pinal County recorder Dana Lewis said every time that Cavanaugh professed an anomaly, his own statistics didn’t back it up.

Some of Cavanaugh's colleagues dismissed his claims of cheating as a “clown show." Chairman Mike Goodman banged his gavel nearly 30 times in a heated exchange with Cavanaugh, who ultimately voted to approve the results “under duress."

Cavanaugh earlier submitted a complaint to the attorney general's office, which confirmed receipt Monday but declined to say if it would investigate.

Elsewhere in Arizona, rural eastern Cochise County certified the primary results without drama Friday. The GOP stronghold on the U.S.-Mexico border was roiled after the midterm contests two years ago amid rampant election denialism and unsuccessful calls for a hand count of all ballots.

The board is made up of the two Republicans who demanded the hand count in 2020 and a Democrat who was not at Friday's meeting.

Officials and government websites in the rest of Arizona's counties confirmed canvasses there were successful, with a scattering of automatic recounts triggered. Those included county supervisor races separated by just three votes in La Paz and Yuma counties.