Voting in Maricopa County, AZ

[honorentheos]

I saw Fox News is running a headline about this so I thought I'd share my experience voting in person this morning in Phoenix. From arrival to leaving took 1 hour and 10 minutes.

I arrived at the polling location closest to where I Iive a little before polls opened at 6 AM and found an expected line of maybe 100-150 people. The doors opened and immediately the line began moving quickly...but all largely due to about half of those waiting having drop off ballots. Once the folks with drop off ballots had cleared, the line came to a halt. Roughly every five minutes or so for the better part of twenty minutes a person would come out, count how many people were in line, and make an announcement that there were technical issues they were working on fixing.

Those technical issues turned out to be problems with the system that allows a Maricopa County voter to show up at any poll station regardless of where they live. The system is supposedly automated but monitored. I was able to scan my ID and review my information easily, but the touch screen used to collect my signature was problematic, requiring a poll worker to confirm my photo ID against the screen. This seemed to be the case for most people registering.

The issue that delayed voting occured after this step. Once a voter had registered at the polling station, a ballot and receipt was printed for the voter to fill out but the system had not been connecting with the printers initially. So no ballots were able to be printed until the connection issue was resolved. It took 15 to 20 minutes for the poll workers to get it working. Once that was fixed it seemed this ran smoothly the rest of the time I was there.

Voting itself was straightforward enough if oddly exposed. A line ran directly behind my little popup table "voting booth" so I listened to a handful of people disparaging the 2020 election results and all things Democrat standing 6 or so feet away while I was filling out my ballot. Had they wished they could easily have watched me fill in my circles. This wasn't due to the line being planned to run behind polling "booths" but rather due to people making their own lines waiting to have their ballots scanned and collected.

This is where the Fox News story focuses. The machines that collected the ballots were scanners about the size of a desktop printer. The scanner requires the voter to insert their own ballot into the machine which it then draws in, scans, and either accepts or rejects. Almost every person I saw ahead of me had to make a couple of attempts. It was very very similar to being in line at a vending machine where every person approaching it only has dollars, most of which did not get accepted initially. This started to become the new hang up in the process as people would make a few attempts to have their ballot accepted, then move to the other machine to see if it worked better there. One of the machines seemed more tolerant than the other.

Because this took so long to get through I was able to observe it also rejected ballots with issues such as people having filled in two options where only one was allowed. It also asked a person to verify if they intended to not cast a vote for categories and told them which sections were missed.

My ballot was accepted first try. There were a few immediately ahead of me who were also lucky.

I also declined to fill out a survey regarding my voting experience.

[Moksha]

Were there armed observers standing around the polling place itching to prevent any suspicious behavior with their assault rifles?

[honorentheos]

Were there armed observers standing around the polling place itching to prevent any suspicious behavior with their assault rifles?

No.

[honorentheos]

my wife voted in person this afternoon. It took her 90 minutes to get through the process, almost entirely due to the counting scanner/ballot collector issues. She messaged me to say hers wouldn't scan after numerous attempts so she opted to have it manually counted. She said the mood this afternoon was much more angry over the issues than what I observed this morning.

Again, I expect this will continue to be in the news nationally as Arizona's races are being watched.

[Gadianton]

This is interesting, H, so what's the Fox takeway? How are Democrats the problem?

I'm also curious to know what was different this time than last time?

I've never voted in the tent thing in my illustrious voting career. I did fill out the ballot and drop it off in person a few days ago. I was hoping to be confronted by a right-wing poll watcher but no luck.

[honorentheos]

This is interesting, H, so what's the Fox takeway? How are Democrats the problem?

I've only seen the reporting from Fox, not opinion pieces. The reporting is aligned with other news outlets, which note the RNC in Arizona attempted a lawsuit to extend voting in Maricopa County with the claim voters were unable to vote due to the issues. The judge who reviewed it denied the request, noting that there were no indications people were unable to vote due to the issues. It sounds like the issue hinges on the condition my wife experienced where her ballot could not be tabulated by the machine so her ballot will be among those counted manually. Additional reporting is the scanner counter issue was resolved once it was determined it stemmed from printers not printing dark enough for the scanner marks to be read, so an adjustment to the printer settings fixed the problem.

But, and it's a big but, the entire time I was at the polling location the election skeptics were not quiet about disparaging the issues as casting doubt on the election results. It's important to keep in mind Arizona mail in and drop off voting tends to lean heavily in favor of Democrats while "day of" in person voting leans heavily in favor of Republicans. And Maricopa County is a recent Democrat favoring urban county since McCain died. We will almost certainly hear conspiracy theories about this if/when Masters and Lake are defeated as it is impossible for the Maricopa numbers to not be a major source of Kelly/Hobbs votes. Rural Arizona kinda hates urban Maricopa and Pima Countries. Shenanigans will be claimed. I'm surprised Culty isn't already in with his conspiracy of choice. Think 2,000 Mules. I'd eat a hat if it turns out there isn't some version of this regarding Maricopa County in the future.

I'm also curious to know what was different this time than last time?

I've never voted in the tent thing in my illustrious voting career. I did fill out the ballot and drop it off in person a few days ago. I was hoping to be confronted by a right-wing poll watcher but no luck.

2020 is the only year I voted via drop off ballot. Most people did. It went pretty smooth. The argument should be drop off is better, and less fraught with tech hurdles but we won't hear that.

We've had many last years with issues, though. Too few polling locations in midterms at least once since I've lived here.

[Gadianton]

okay, I'm not following this at all really, but one YouTube clip I watched had Mike Lindell talking about your county and all the in-person voting issues and how its indications of major fraud going on.

So the system was brought to a halt by in-person fraud this time...

we'll see where it goes from there. (Will binger have the spine to disagree with Lindell?)

[honorentheos]

Kari Lake, the Trump-backed Republican candidate for governor just finished telling her supporters she thought the County was guilty of incompetence and calling the election into question. She's avoided saying she'd concede if she lost. We're likely heading for trouble.

[honorentheos]

okay, I'm not following this at all really, but one YouTube clip I watched had Mike Lindell talking about your county and all the in-person voting issues and how its indications of major fraud going on.

So the system was brought to a halt by in-person fraud this time...

we'll see where it goes from there. (Will binger have the spine to disagree with Lindell?)

Systemic fraud seems to be the claim. The suggestions I've seen is this is a ploy to block Republicans from voting who were most likely to vote in person on election day. It's a conspiracy brains dream. Tech issues with no evidence of any voter not being able to vote? Clearly an operation to mask a deliberate sabotage of Republican voters who watched the machine reject their ballots that then went into a box to be "counted later". Read that as if you were Culty. Yeah.

For the record, my wife did not vote R. Of course, conspiracy brains will have explanations.

[Brack]

I'm a Maricopa County resident, and I'm glad that I voted by mail. I don't like waiting in long lines.

It is looking very likely that Kari Lake is going to win, but I'm really hoping that Mark Kelly and Adrian Fontes will hold onto their leads and win. AZ Election Results