Judge Denies Right-Wing Request to Purge 1.2 Million Arizona Voters
A federal judge rejected a right-wing request on Friday to order the removal of 1.2 million allegedly ineligible voters from the Arizona voter rolls just four days before the election.
Judge Steven P. Logan found that the right-wing group lacked standing to bring its request to purge over a million voters on the eve of an election. Logan, an Obama appointee, said the claim that there are over a million ineligible voters was “wholly speculative.”
However, he did allow the group to obtain the state’s voter roll maintenance records and ordered the state to provide those documents by Dec. 2.
On Oct. 30, the 1789 Foundation, also known as Citizen_AG, and a voter filed a lawsuit against the state of Arizona and Secretary of State Adrian Fontes (D) claiming that Fontes failed to maintain voter rolls in line with the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA).
The NVRA requires states to place voters who may no longer reside in the state on the inactive voter list if they fail to respond to a notice asking them to confirm residency. If that person does not vote in two subsequent federal election cycles, they are removed from the state’s voter list.
According to the plaintiffs, there are more than 1.2 million voters who may no longer be eligible after they failed to respond to notices issued in 2020 asking them to confirm their change of residency. Citizen_AG asked Fontes for records of whether those individuals voted in the 2020 or 2022 elections and was told the records do not exist.
The plaintiffs asked the court to order Fontes to provide the records and direct county election officials to remove ineligible voters from the rolls before the Nov. 5 election.
A similar lawsuit was also filed this week in Pennsylvania, where Citizen_AG is seeking to remove over 277,000 voters.