Arizona has the most comprehensive threats to democracy after new laws passed this year and because of GOP candidates who have endorsed lies about the 2020 election. Photo by Drew Angerer || Getty Images
By Caitlin Sievers || Arizona Mirror
Election denial. Ballot initiatives that would make voting more difficult. Extremist groups watching ballot drop boxes. Efforts to derail election certification processes. These are some of the most worrying threats to democracy in Arizona listed in a new report by the Defend Democracy Project.
Among the seven states the project profiled, Arizona was at the top of the list, facing the most comprehensive threats to democracy, according to Defend Democracy.
“We want people to understand that these complaints about elections are not rooted in fact, but part of a plan to disinform people on purpose and make them lose faith in elections,” said Rodd McLeod, a spokesman for Defend Democracy.
While all of the points mentioned in the report have already been publicized, the project sought to bring all of the information together in one place to show just how dire they believe the situation is in Arizona.
The Defend Democracy Project was created in response to rampant denial of the true outcome of the 2020 presidential election by supporters of former president Donald Trump. Its objective is “that American voters determine the outcome of elections.”
To create the report, the group’s representatives said they spoke to Arizona grassroots organizers and reporters, as well as legal analysts.
Top threats listed in the report were the 35 bills passed by the state legislature this year that create barriers to ballot access, including House Bill 2237, which bans same-day voter registration — something that was already not allowed under Arizona law.
Republican state Sen. Kelly Townsend had justified the new law by saying that disallowing same-day registrants to vote would reduce fraud, adding that a person who just registered might be given a provisional ballot and be able to circumvent the traditional registration process. But voting experts said her claims are unfounded, since provisional ballots are thrown out if the voter can’t verify their identity or if their voter registration is inaccurate or incomplete.
Townsend did not respond to a request for comment on the report.
