Republican candidates for Maricopa County recorder have a fundamental disagreement over the results of the county’s last two general elections, and that disagreement was on full display at a debate on Monday.
Incumbent Recorder Stephen Richer, who took office in 2021, is one of a handful of election officials in Arizona who has defended the integrity of the county’s election results in the face of criticism of Republicans aligned with former President Donald Trump and former gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake, who have both falsely claimed their respective elections were “stolen” in 2020 and 2022.
“Another hallmark of my office is that we follow the law,” Richer said. “Much and many cases have been filed over the last three-and-a-half years. My office has lost zero cases.”
Richer’s stance stands in stark contrast to his opponents in the primary election, state Rep. Justin Heap and Don Hiatt.
Hiatt repeated false claims that the 2020 presidential election was stolen from former President Trump.
Heap refused to say whether he thinks widespread fraud affected the results of the 2020 or 2022 elections but did call the results of those elections into question.
Heap argued administrators like Richer have failed to follow state laws designed to ensure voter confidence in election results and said there are real problems with Maricopa County’s election administration, pointing to well-publicized ballot printer failures in 2022 that led to long lines and frustration at some voting centers.
“The 2022 election was a catastrophe up and down the line,” Heap said. “I think even if you could prove that there was absolutely no voter fraud, which is not what I'm arguing, but even if there was no voter fraud, the job that the (Maricopa County) Board of Supervisors did of of having half our polling stations go down, we know for a fact that that disenfranchised hundreds of thousands of Arizona voters, and, mathematically, most day-of voters are Republicans.”
But, as Heap acknowledged, Richer was not responsible for those Election Day problems.
In Maricopa County, the Board of Supervisors oversees Election Day while the recorder is responsible for early voting.
Heap also declined to answer why, if Republicans were disproportionately impacted by the 2022 Election Day problems, other top-of-the-ticket Republicans still managed to win races, including state Superintendent Tom Horne and Treasurer Kimberly Yee, who won her race by 11 percentage points.
Beyond those Election Day issues, Heap said Richer’s office failed to perform signature verification of early ballots in compliance with state law — mirroring arguments made by Lake in her failed lawsuits challenging the 2022 election — and also said the incumbent recorder has not properly maintained voter rolls to ensure that they are accurate and that only eligible voters are receiving ballots.
Heap cited anecdotal evidence of Maricopa County residents receiving multiple early ballots by mail or ballots for individuals who do not live at their homes. He said he would prefer to get rid of early voting by mail altogether.
“Clearly, day-of voting is the best,” Heap said.
Richer said his office has cleaned the voter rolls, saying the number of active registered voters has gone from 2.6 million in 2021 to 2.4 million today.
“We've gone down by 200,000, despite being the fastest-growing county in the United States, so anyone who talks about voter rolls has to establish that it has been done to the tune of 200,000,” he said.
Beyond those specific criticisms, much of the debate focused on a perceived decline in voter confidence in election results and who is to blame for that phenomena.
Heap said election officials, including Richer, have failed to take concerns with Maricopa County’s election systems seriously or make efforts to increase transparency in election administration, leading to a decline in voter confidence.
“They say ‘I don’t trust it,’ because they see glaring problems and failures systemic [sic] up and down the line, and these problems seem not to get fixed for multiple cycles,” Heap said.
But Richer said that is not true.
He pointed to an array of efforts to make the election process transparent and educate voters about the steps the county takes to ensure the accuracy of election results. That includes regular tours of the county’s main election facility, Maricopa County Tabulation and Election Center; live-streams of vote counting during elections; and his office’s record of responding to resident questions in a timely manner.
It’s Heap, Hiatt and those like them, Richer said, who are hurting voter confidence by repeating disproven claims that fraud or other malfeasance changed the results of past elections.
“What frustrates me is when people like this, or elected leaders who have access to every single piece of information and who, quite frankly, in private, will tell you they know the 2020 election wasn’t stolen, and then they go out there and they hem and haw or they go along with it, that’s what damages voter confidence,” Richer said.
Richer also blamed that rhetoric for an increase in threats of violence against election workers. Earlier that day, Richer shared a video online of Maricopa County Republican Committee Vice Chair Shelby Busch telling a crowd she would lynch him.
“That’s not appropriate, because we know some people have taken action,” Richer said. “We know that some people have made voice calls. And so that’s really disappointing. She knows better. I’m sorry she did it.”
Heap also condemned any violence or threats directed at elected officials.
“That's simply not part of who we are as Americans,” Heap said.
Richer didn’t blame Heap or Hiatt for sparking those threats, saying “I think that they are very, very low down on the list.”
Instead, Richer said there are other, higher-profile Republicans who are responsible, including former President Donald Trump.
Richer said he voted for Trump in 2020 but will not do so again, confirming he plans to vote for Biden in November.
