Bill Gates, chair of the Maricopa Board of Supervisors, told reporters on Thursday there is no reason to be upset at how slow Election Day vote counting has been in one of the biggest counties in Arizona because that's how it has always been done in the state.
Maricopa County officials said they had hoped to have all the votes county by Friday after many polling locations have voting machine issues that lasted for hours on Election Day. Now, they will miss the deadline because of the high number of ballots dropped off on Tuesday, according to KTAR.
"So, why is it taking the amount of time it's taking [to count the votes]. All lot of people are talking about this. First of all, it's very standard. This is how things work in Arizona and have for decades. And this is due, in part, because of mail-in voting," Gates said.
Maricopa County Board of Supervisors Chairman:
— Greg Price (@greg_price11) November 11, 2022
"Why is it taking the amount of time it's taking [to count the votes]. First of all, it's very standard. This is how things work in Arizona." pic.twitter.com/1pbcRxez0L
Our RedState colleague Cameron Arcand is on the ground in Arizona and has been following the drawn-out process closely since Election Day. He writes:
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County officials said that these ballots were cast before Election Day, particularly Saturday, Sunday, and Monday, according to ABC15 Arizona’s Garrett Archer. The batch broke 54.8 percent for Hobbs and 45.1 for Lake in the governor’s race. For the senate race, it broke 55.7 percent for Kelly and 42.6 percent for Masters.
In Maricopa County alone, there are 340-350,000 ballots still left, according to a Thursday night press release. A significant portion of these is early ballots that people dropped off at a vote center on Election Day.
Gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake (R) stated the number of votes left to be counted are sure to be mostly for her and will give her the lead over Democrat Katie Hobbs (D).
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