The Arizona Supreme Courtroom declined to increase the state’s deadline for voters to repair issues with their mail ballots after discovering no proof of disenfranchisement.
The American Civil Liberties Union’s (ACLU) Arizona arm and the Marketing campaign Authorized Middle raised considerations that hundreds of mail ballots received’t be processed till after Sunday’s 5 p.m. MST deadline, which means some voters received’t know if their poll has a difficulty till it’s too late to treatment it.
The state’s prime court docket declined the teams’ emergency petition, which was filed Saturday, that sought to increase the statutory deadline. The petition requested the court docket to supply voters with 4 days to treatment their poll after being notified of a deficiency.
No county that responded requested for an extension, and every asserted they made affordable efforts to inform voters with inconsistent signatures, the court docket famous.
“Thus, the Court is not presented with evidence that any voters will be prevented from curing a defective ballot by today’s 5:00 p.m. deadline. In short, there is no evidence of disenfranchisement before the Court,” the court docket’s order reads.
The ACLU filed its petition alongside the League of United Latin American Residents. The Republican Nationwide Committee (RNC) filed court docket papers opposing the request.
“ACLU lost its hail mary last minute lawsuit to extend the cure period for mail ballots lacking signature matches. Ballot curing is now over in Arizona. Let’s finish the tabulation and wrap this up,” Harmeet Dhillon, who represented the RNC, wrote on X.
Arizona State Senate President Warren Petersen (R), who equally filed a quick opposing the ACLU, wrote “Court ruled as predicted. ACLU lost. We won.” The Hill has reached out to the ACLU of Arizona for remark.
Earlier than mail ballots are tabulated in Arizona, every county recorder processes them to confirm the voter’s signature. When points are found, state legislation requires officers to make affordable efforts to inform the voter and supply them a chance to treatment their poll.
However state legislation additionally offers that voters have till 5 days after the election to take action.
Greater than 67,000 early ballots had but to be processed as of Sunday, in accordance with estimates from the Arizona secretary of state’s workplace. The bulk — 57,000 — are from Maricopa County, the state’s most populous space that features Phoenix.
“All responding counties advise that all such affected voters have received at least one telephone call along with other messages by emails, text messages or mail,” the court docket wrote in its order.
