An Arizona state Republican lawmaker introduced a bill that gives the state legislature power to reject election results.
Rep. John Fillmore’s (R) bill would drastically change the way the people of Arizona vote by eliminating no-excuse early voting, requiring people to vote in their home precincts, rather than at vote centers set up around the state, and would require that all ballots not only be counted by hand, but that those tallies be completed within 24 hours of the polls closing on Election Day.
The biggest change though is that the bill empowers the state legislature to overturn the results of legislative, congressional and statewide elections after calling a special session to “review the ballot tabulating process.”
After the review, lawmakers would decide whether to accept or reject the results. If the legislature rejects the results, any qualified voter can go to court to ask a judge to order a new election.
According to AZ Mirror, election experts find that provision the most problematic out of all the changes outlined in Fillmore’s bill.
Jennifer Morrell, a former deputy of elections in Arapahoe County, Colo., who is now a partner at The Elections Group calls the suggestion “terrifying.”
“This type of activity, when you look at it all in one comprehensive way, it’s anti-democratic, it’s authoritarian, and it’s not the sort of activity and actions you see in a healthy democracy,” Tammy Patrick, the former head of federal compliance at the Maricopa County Elections Department who is now the senior advisor for elections at the nonprofit Democracy Fund, said.
Experts also noted that counting millions of ballots by hand within 24 hours after polls close is not realistic. Cyber Ninjas, the company hired by Arizona Senate Republicans to conduct a so-called audit of 2.1 million ballots in Maricopa County alone took several months to count. Also, counting ballot by hand increases the likelihood of human error.
However, Fillmore remains unconvinced by these arguments
“I don’t care what election officials are going to tell me. I’ll tell you what I know in my heart. I know that if you were the election officer and you held that election in your precinct, and those are the people that are going to be counting, I trust you,” he said.
The bill will likely not go far but it shows that some Republicans support the idea that GOP state legislatures should have the power to overturn the results of any election they do not like following Donald Trump’s loss in the 2020 presidential election which he falsely claim was due to fraud.
President Joe Biden won Arizona in the 2020 presidential election by about 11,000 votes, becoming the first Democratic candidate for president to do so since Bill Clinton.
