For once we agree @AZAGMayes your lawsuit was a waste of time. You spent four weeks refusing to provide the citizenship verification we requested. Then you went to court, provided exactly what I asked for, and agreed to dismiss your own lawsuit. This isn't your victory lap, it's a concession speech with confetti.

For four weeks, AG Kris Mayes refused to provide the citizenship verification we requested. Then, in court, she provided exactly what we had asked for all along—and dismissed her lawsuit. All 24 voters have been restored. We stood firm, did our duty, and upheld Arizona law.

Arizona law requires the Recorders to obtain Documented Proof of Citizenship for every Arizona Voter. AG Mayes could resolve this dispute immediately by simply providing the evidence of citizenship she claims her office already obtained. My office stands ready to restore every eligible voter to full-ballot status the moment we receive the documents we have requested. But Arizona's citizenship requirements cannot be replaced by political demands.

Unlike some of my colleagues in County government, I trust the voters of Maricopa County. And I believe the only way to earn their trust is through complete transparency - especially when election security is at stake. This morning, we identified a potential security issue at one of our early voting locations. We took immediate action. Here’s what happened, what we know, and what we’re doing about it.

EARLY VOTING UPDATE: Today, we received approximately 80,000 early ballot packets. All packets were processed, and signature verification was completed by 2:00 p.m., breaking our previous record! We continue to see higher daily voter turnout at our early voting locations compared to previous elections. Now that the Recorder’s early voting staff are informing voters of their options, more than 80% of voters bringing in their green early ballot envelopes are choosing to have them ID-verified and stamped. This is a dramatic increase from the Primary and clear evidence that voters welcome this new option. HAPPY VOTING!

ELECTION UPDATE: This morning my office received ~75,000 early ballots from the USPS. All these ballots were processed and signature verification was completed by 3:00 p.m. today. However, we are still receiving reports that some voters have not yet received their mail ballots from the USPS. We saw some similar delays during the primary. We are monitoring the situation and expect any remaining ballots will delivered by the USPS this week. We urge any voters who have requested a mail ballot and not received one by weeks end to contact our office so we can send a replacement ballot.

ELECTION INTEGRITY UPDATE: Last night the County Recorders received years of felony records withheld by the Secretary of State. Fontes blamed the DOJ. I called the DOJ directly: they had provided the reports for years. After we exposed his failure publicly, the missing files suddenly appeared. Our pressure delivered results for all 15 counties. Now Recorders across the state must tackle his backlog just days before early voting begins.

Adrian Fontes is lying. Secretary Fontes blamed the DOJ for more than a year of missing federal felony reports. I spoke with DOJ officials directly who have confirmed that all reports through the first quarter of 2026 have been previously provided to the AzSOS. Additionally, in response to my release, the DOJ sent the files for the second quarter of 2026 to the SOS this morning. By law, the DOJ can only provided these files to the Secretary of State. Secretary Fontes now needs to provide those reports to the County Recorders so we can ensure felons are not permitted to vote in this comming election.

RECORDER HEAP: SECRETARY OF STATE’S FAILURE TO PROVIDE FELONY RECORDS JEOPARDIZES VOTER REGISTRATION LIST MAINTENANCE AHEAD OF GENERAL ELECTION PHOENIX, Arizona — Maricopa County Recorder Justin Heap is calling on Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes to immediately address his office’s failure to provide county recorders with timely, complete, and usable federal felony-conviction data as Arizona approaches the November General Election. This announcement follows months of administrative outreach and technical follow-up by county election officials to resolve the issue. Under A.R.S. § 16-165(A)(4), county recorders are required to cancel the registration of electors convicted of a felony who have not had their civil rights restored. To carry out that responsibility, recorders depend on the Secretary of State to obtain and provide critical voter-eligibility information from state and federal agencies. When the Secretary fails to provide that information, county recorders cannot identify and cancel every ineligible registration the law requires them to cancel. One of those critical sources is federal felony-conviction data obtained by the Secretary of State from the U.S. Department of Justice. The most recent federal felony report received by the Maricopa County Recorder’s Office covers only the second quarter of 2025. That leaves more than a year of federal felony conviction data unavailable to the Recorder’s Office as it conducts list maintenance ahead of the General Election. The problem is not limited to the missing 2025 and 2026 data. The federal felony records provided by the Secretary contain sizable gaps dating back to 2022, and the Secretary’s Office has been unwilling or unable to confirm that the records it has provided are complete. Even when felony records are provided, the Secretary of State fails to provide them in the proper electronic format and import them into the statewide voter registration system as required by his own Election Procedures Manual. Instead, the Secretary only provides static statewide PDF reports, bypassing the automated hard match system and forcing Recorder staff to manually identify Maricopa County records, cross-reference them, and manually enter the information one record at a time. Bypassing the automated imports destroys statewide uniformity across Arizona’s 15 counties under federal law (52 U.S.C. § 20507(b)(1)) by forcing each county to implement ad hoc manual workarounds. What should be routine voter-registration maintenance has instead become a labor-intensive manual process. “This is not a minor administrative delay. It is a failure that directly affects our ability to keep the voter rolls accurate,” said Recorder Heap. “Arizona law requires my office to cancel the registration when we receive qualifying felony-conviction information. But we cannot remove an ineligible elector we have not been told about. The Secretary of State has allowed the federal felony data to fall years behind, cannot assure us that prior records are complete, and has made the limited records we do receive harder to process.” “With the General Election approaching, this needs to be fixed now. County recorders are prepared to do our job. The Secretary of State needs to do his.” The Maricopa County Recorder’s Office is calling on the Secretary of State to immediately obtain and provide complete and current federal felony-conviction data from the Department of Justice, account for the gaps in previously provided records, confirm that the information supplied to county recorders is complete and current, and restore the automated electronic import process into the statewide voter registration system to ensure uniformity and accurate list maintenance.

🚨ELECTION UPDATE: Despite receiving the final batch of late-early ballots at 2:40 a.m., my Office completed signature verification on all Election Day early ballots by 8:00 a.m. A huge thank you to the dedicated staff who came in at 2:00 a.m. to ensure we delivered the fast, accurate, and transparent results we promised Maricopa County voters. The verified ballots have now been transferred to the Board's Election Department for tabulation.

Early voting for the Primary Election has now concluded. Beginning tomorrow, in-person voting through Election Day will be administered by the Maricopa County Elections Department. The Recorder's Office now shifts our full attention to signature verification, ballot curing, and ensuring every eligible voter's ballot is accurately processed and counted.

I am fighting to ensure elections are run in accordance with Arizona Law. I'm very grateful to @votewarren for twice stepping forward as Senate President to defend the Legislature's intent and lawful election administration through amicus briefs supporting the Recorder's Office. Thank you for your principled leadership, President Petersen.

Cute catchphrase, Kate. While you and the Board are breaking the law, I’m fighting to hold you accountable and make sure the law is followed. On the note of “running elections,” I was at MCTEC today. Since I’ve been in office, I don't recall seeing you there once.