Arizona House Republicans Advance 2 Measures Relating To Voter Signatures And Recounts
House Republicans in Arizona advanced two election integrity bills on Monday.
One of the bills, which passed the House but must still be approved by the Senate, boosts the recount threshold to 0.5 percentage points.
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According to the AZMirror:
The House also passed Senate Bill 1083, which expands the narrow circumstances under which a recount can be held for an election. Current state law only requires a recount if the margin of victory is within one-tenth of 1% of the combined vote total of the top two candidates, or between 10 and 200 votes, depending on the race, whichever is less.
SB1083 would require a recount if the margin of victory is within one-half of 1% of the combined vote total.
“Had the proposal been law last year, there would have been a mandatory recount of the presidential race in Arizona, in which President Joe Biden defeated Trump by 10,457 votes, which is just over three-tenths of a percent of the two candidates’ vote total,” the outlet added.
SB 1241, on the other hand, is about voter signatures. The measure would, according to AZMirror, “require county election officials to send information about mismatched signatures to county attorneys or the Attorney General’s Office for possible investigation.”
When a voter casts an early ballot, which the vast majority of Arizona voters choose, they sign their names on the envelopes in which their votes are sent to election authorities. To authenticate the voters’ identity, election officials verify the signatures to the signatures on file for those voters. If the signatures don’t match, the voters are contacted and given the chance to “cure” their ballots.
When signatures do not match and election officials are unable to contact voters, the votes are simply ignored and not counted.
According to the United States Election Assistance Commission, 1,894 votes were rejected in Arizona during the 2020 general election because election workers were unable to verify signatures.
The amendment was approved 31-29 on party lines.
Rep. John Kavanagh of the Republican Party said he hopes the measure would help fight fraud.
“That is almost the biggest yellow flag for voter fraud that I can think of — the signatures don’t match and you can’t contact the voter. There’s a chance there that that’s a fraudulent ballot. And that should be investigated. It’s easy to claim there’s no fraud in early ballots if you never look for fraud, even when it may be staring you right in the face.” said Kavanagh.
The amendment, according to State House Minority Leader Reginald Bolding, a Democrat, reinforces the “Big Lie” that voter fraud changes election results.
“This idea is simply predicated on one thing, which is to chase and continue to utilize this ‘Big Lie’ that, somehow, someplace, we have these fraudulent ballots that are changing the outcome of elections,” said Bolding.
“We don’t know what the scope of the problem is because right now nobody investigates potentially fraudulent ballots,” Kavanagh said.
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