America First Legal files lawsuit against Maricopa County, alleging officials violated election laws

America First Legal on Wednesday announced that it had filed a lawsuit against Maricopa County in Arizona, arguing that the election officials broke the state's election laws in 2022. 

"Maricopa County refuses to maintain the mandatory chain of custody for ballots," the group announced. "In 2022, these failures resulted in a discrepancy of over 25,000 votes – larger than the margin of victory in the state governor’s race."

Numerous issues occurred at vote centers on Election Day in Maricopa County in November 2022, from election machine problems to hours-long lines, Just the News previously reported.

America First Legal criticized the vote centers in their announcement of the lawsuit, arguing that they are "poorly run" and an "irrational substitute for election day precinct voting."

The lawsuit also accuses election officials in Maricopa County of violating Arizona state law by maintaining "unstaffed, unsupervised ballot drop boxes, facilitating illegal ballot harvesting."

According to the Arizona Mirror, Democrat Gov. Katie Hobbs, who served as Secretary of State in 2019, implied that not all drop boxes need to be staffed in a 2023 Elections Procedures Manual.

Maricopa County has not responded for comment. 

“The legitimacy of our government relies on the people’s trust that elections are free and fair. Maricopa County’s errors, lapses, and mistakes in administering elections have seriously eroded that trust," America First Legal Counsel James Rogers said in a statement. "This lawsuit seeks to hold Maricopa County accountable for its failures and to restore Arizonans’ trust in their elections."