Arizona Election

The year is almost over, so it is good to look back. First, the numbers, as of December 15, 2022. This year we have published 1,555 fact checks in English (so far ...) 283 fact checks about COVID misinformation; 244 debunks of Russian propaganda and false claims about the invasion of Ukraine; 140 debunks of false claims about election fraud,…

Were ZIP codes for 31,000 mail-in ballots changed before they were sent out, quietly changed back when they were returned as undeliverable and then fraudulently used to vote in Arizona? No, that's not true: The secretary of state's office told Lead Stories the claims were incorrect and baseless. An election expert said they had never heard of a situation involving…

Did Arizona drag out midterm election ballot-counting for a week so that the tally would award the governor's race to Katie Hobbs -- the Democrat in charge of all state elections -- despite voters going "red in every other category"? No, that's not true: election results showed several other races in Arizona -- known for split-ticket ballots -- went blue…

Did Arizona Secretary of State Katie Hobbs' office contact Twitter to have posts removed to censor political opponents? No, that's not true: Hobbs' office asked the Center for Internet Security in 2021 to alert Twitter about an account that was making false claims about the state's voter information database. The tweets that were flagged had nothing to do with the…

If Arizonans voted primarily for Republican candidates in the November 8, 2022, election, but a Democrat still won the race for governor, was the election rigged? No, that's not true: Election data from past years show ticket-splitting is common in Arizona. An Arizona pollster with two decades experience tracking election data told Lead Stories it is not unusual for the…

Did Maricopa County, Arizona, lose some 292,000 votes in its final vote tally for the November 8, 2022, elections? No, that's not true: The tweet making that claim left out voters who returned their mail-in ballots in person and people who cast provisional ballots. The implied claim that Maricopa County had misrepresented the true number of voters who took part…

Does an increase in inactive voters show evidence of criminal intent in Arizona for the 2022 election? No, that's not true: The numbers in Maricopa County, Arizona, shown in the claim are accurate, representing tallies after several mailings were sent to voters to update information as required by state law, a county official told Lead Stories. The claim appeared in…

Does a video show Arizona ballots falling out of trash can on an escalator, implying possible election fraud? No, that's not true: The footage, taken in Australia, was uploaded two months before the November 2022 Arizona mid-term election. The 7-second clip is from a YouTube channel that publishes "funny, interesting and strange stuff." The claim appeared in a video published…

Did Arizona election officials say "we accidentally mixed un-counted votes with counted votes, maybe 15 to 17 thousand"? No, that's not true: The elections department spokesperson told Lead Stories that Maricopa County officials never said that and there is no record of news organizations reporting Arizona election officials saying that. The claim appeared as an Instagram post on November 17,…

Does a video showing people dropping off multiple ballots at one time in a drop box prove election fraud and what "really happened" in Arizona? No, that's not true: Delivering more than one ballot for other voters is legal in Arizona. Individuals can return someone else's ballot if they are a relative, share a household or are a caretaker, a…