In loss for Stephen Miller but win for voters, Arizona court rejects sweeping anti-voting challenge

Arizona voters secured another victory after a state appeals court rejected a sweeping lawsuit brought by American First Legal Foundation, founded by Trump adviser Stephen Miller. It’s the latest in a string of failed efforts by right-wingers to upend how elections are run in the battleground state.

On Wednesday, the Arizona Court of Appeals affirmed a lower court’s dismissal of a lawsuit challenging election administration practices in several counties, including Maricopa County, Yavapai County and Coconino County. The court agreed the plaintiffs lacked standing — a basic legal requirement that plaintiffs show they were personally harmed — meaning the case could not move forward.

The lawsuit targeted multiple aspects of how Arizona counties run elections. 

The anti-voting plaintiffs challenged the use of ballot drop boxes, procedures that allow voters to fix — or “cure” — signature issues on mail-in ballots, and how counties verify signatures in the first place. They also attacked how counties maintain voter rolls and raised concerns about voting equipment issues like printer malfunctions.

In effect, the lawsuit sought to force counties to overhaul core election procedures — changes that could have disrupted voting across some of the state’s largest and most diverse counties.

Courts, however, were not persuaded. 

A trial judge dismissed the case last year, and the appeals court has now upheld that decision, shutting down the challenge before it could proceed. By affirming the dismissal, the court left existing election systems fully intact — including access to drop boxes, signature curing and established verification practices.

Wednesday’s decision marks the latest in a series of courtroom losses for efforts to reshape Arizona’s election rules. 

Just days earlier, the state Supreme Court declined to hear three separate cases that sought to restrict mail ballot verification, allow full hand counts of ballots, and weaken protections for early voting and election certification.