Election workers open 2024 election ballots at the Maricopa County Tabulation and Election Center in Phoenix, Arizona, on Nov. 5. Maricopa’s two-page ballot took longer than anticipated to remove from envelopes and prepare for counting. Photo by Courtney Pedroza | Votebeat
The Maricopa County Board of Supervisors certified results of the general election Thursday afternoon, clearing the way for recounts to officially begin.
Maricopa County Election officials and some members of the board stressed that the county tallied a record-breaking number of ballots in a shorter period of time than in previous elections, seeming a response to calls for reforms to the counting process.
The county took 10 days to count 2,078,460 two-page ballots, which effectively was twice the work for election officials. The vote total is the second-highest in the county’s history, only being surpassed by the 2020 election — which took 10 days to count, as well.
Maricopa County Elections Director Scott Jarrett also pointed out that the county surpassed similarly sized counties in voter turnout. The 80% turnout in Maricopa County was higher than Harris County (Texas), Miami-Dade (Florida) and Cook County (Illinois).
The turnout was also higher than the county’s presidential year average of 77%.
Maricopa County has become the focus of national and international news agencies in the wake of the 2020 election, when the state flipped blue for President Joe Biden, sparking fabricated claims of widespread election fraud in the state. The county issued 686 media credentials to journalists from 17 different countries, Assistant County Manager Zach Shira said to the board.
Election officials and the board also emphasized that their preparations ahead of the election to deal with the two-page ballot helped them count those more than 4 million pages of ballots.
This year was the first time ballots have spilled onto a second sheet of paper since 2006. The average ballot in Maricopa County contained 79 races, and there were more than 13,000 different ballot styles due to the different local races, bond issues and propositions.
When asked by the board how a one-page ballot would have changed the counting process, Jarrett said that he believes that 99% of the results would have been reported on election night.
“There is a lot of inaccurate information out about this,” Jarrett said on the speed of counting ballots in Maricopa. “We are counting ballots faster than we ever have.”
But at least one of the supervisors has voiced that he believes the county could count faster.
Republican Maricopa County Supervisor Thomas Galvin has been calling for changes to early voting aimed at speeding up tabulation — at the expense of limiting voters’ options for casting an early ballot.
Galvin wants legislators to change state law to bar the practice of voters dropping off early ballots at polling sites on Election Day. Instead, he wants the deadline to do so set for the Friday before the election, similar to a deadline in Florida that Republicans routinely point to when they criticize Arizona’s slower ballot counting process.
Legislative Republicans and Maricopa County Recorder Stephen Richer have backed similar proposals in the past, but Gov. Katie Hobbs has said she won’t support any changes to early voting that take away options from voters.
Galvin also has suggested using more government buildings as polling places, similar to a recommendation made by Hobbs’ elections taskforce.
However, some of Galvin’s fellow supervisors did not agree.
“Scott (Jarrett) is a gentleman, so he won’t point the finger, but I will,” Democratic Maricopa County Supervisor Steve Gallardo said. “It is the legislature…I point the finger at the Capitol and the legislature for not listening to the election experts.”
Gallardo said that lawmakers sending nearly a dozen measures to the 20204 ballot to avoid Hobbs’ veto pen, and changing up election procedures in prior years, is the root cause of Maricopa’s counting problems.
But Galvin said he has support from both sides of the aisle, citing a statement from Democratic Pima County Supervisor Rex Scott voicing support for his proposals.
The board approved the canvass of the election and now the races in the county that triggered the state’s automatic recount law will be able to begin that process. There are three races in Maricopa County that will see automatic recounts:
- Maricopa County Board of Supervisors District 3: Kate Brophy McGee (R) and Daniel Valenzuela (D) are separated by 0.04%
- State Representative for Legislative District 2: Justin Wilmeth (R) and Ari Daniel Bradshaw (R) are separated by 0.08%
- Fountain Hills Town Council: Matthew Corrigan and Clayton Corey are separated by 0.03%
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