Republican primary voters in Arizona’s largest county have fired their election official who has endured years of attacks.

PHOENIX (AP) — Maricopa County Recorder Steven Richer He has battled death threats, near-constant harassment and a flood of misinformation during the nearly four years he has overseen elections in one of the nation’s most high-profile political battlegrounds.

He lost his reelection bid. Republican who relentlessly defended the legitimacy of Arizona’s election Lost in the primary election The vote this week could have a major impact on how elections are conducted in one of the most closely watched counties in the country.

Richer lost in a three-way Republican primary that ended Tuesday to state Assemblyman Justin Heap, who has questioned certain aspects of how the election is run. Richer will stay in office through the November election, but his resignation early next year will mark the end of a term plagued by controversy. His office, which shares election duties with the county Board of Supervisors, has had to fend off attacks over the election results. 2020 Presidential ElectionFormer President Donald Trump and his allies False claims He lost the election because of widespread fraud.

The outcry from a vocal and determined group of Republican lawmakers, local officials and grassroots activists escalated into protests, threats and ultimately galvanized a movement to oust him.

In a post on social platform X, Richer congratulated Heap on moving forward in the general election and promised a smooth transition, while also sending a message to counter the hostility and distrust in the system that has animated many Republicans in the state in the election. Things didn’t go as plannedThere are winners and losers in elections, “so let’s accept that and move on,” he said.

Trump has contested each result. Six Battleground States He lost to Democrat Joe Biden in 2020, but perhaps nowhere else has the Republican backlash been more powerful or lasting. Arizonahis margin of defeat was Less than 11,000 votes.

After the election, Republicans in the state Senate hired Trump supporters led by a firm called. Cyber ​​Ninja overhauled Maricopa County’s handling of elections, but the widely mocked effort ultimately Biden’s victory confirmed. since then, Several counties in the state Election officials are exhausted by virtually constant criticism and harassment from activists and county commissioners who spread conspiracy theories about everything from voting machines to mail-in ballots.

Despite not being in office in 2020, Richter has consistently defended the way elections are run and votes are counted in Arizona’s most populous county. I mistakenly believed Mr. Richer had similar feelings after learning the last presidential election was rigged and two years later after Republican Kali Lake lost the gubernatorial election. In one case, the day after Mr. Richer spoke at a chaotic public meeting where county officials certified the results of the November 2022 election, he received two voicemails on his cellphone telling him to “run” and “hide.”

The caller was a man from California, and in his expletive-filled voicemail he claimed Richter was trying to “rig the election” and “rob Americans of their real votes.” Department of Justice.

Election officials and good government advocates across the country responded to Richer’s primary defeat by saying his transparency and courage in standing up for the facts were inspirational.

David Becker, founder and executive director of the nonprofit Center for Election Innovation and Research, said he attends a conference of election officials where Richter isn’t held up as a positive example.

“He has endured as much abuse and harassment as almost any election official in the country and handled it with grace, transparency and humor,” Becker said. “It’s because of him that people like me have the job we do.”

Heaps did not respond to an emailed request for comment. He posted on X on Wednesday soliciting donations for the November election, which he called “the second most important election after the re-election of President Donald Trump.”

“This November, we will end the laughable elections that have plagued our county, state and nation,” he wrote.

He has not said the 2020 or 2022 elections were stolen, but he has characterized the state’s handling of early voting as insecure and questioned the chain of custody of the ballot. Multistate Initiative To manage voter rolls.

During a debate in late June, Heap denied stoking discord over the election for political gain and said the state’s voting system was not run properly and voters had no confidence in it.

“It’s not because we believe the misinformation on social media,” Heap said during the debate, “but because we see the same issues repeated every election cycle and we can’t even get our elected officials to acknowledge that this is a big problem and address the concerns.”

Stan Barnes, a Phoenix-based political consultant and former Republican state senator, said it has become difficult for the average voter in Maricopa County to know what is true and what is not on issues related to election integrity, and they can find the answers they want depending on their political views.

“I don’t think we should panic, but we should acknowledge that, for better or worse, a great many voters have a negative impression of the integrity of Arizona’s elections,” he said. “In the long run, it’s in all of our interest to improve that in some way.”

In November, Heaps will face Democrat Tim Stringham, who faced no challenger in the primary and said he was encouraged by how many Republicans voted for Richer.

“I believe those who voted for Steven Richer did so because he was honest in the face of the lies of the past four years,” Stringham said in a post on social media platform X. “I urge everyone to continue to vote for honest candidates and consider voting Democrat this time.”

While several election deniers won Republican primaries for Arizona’s congressional and House seats, the results were mixed in races for the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors, which shares responsibility for overseeing elections: Establishment-backed Republicans won several seats, while incumbents who had consistently defended the county’s elections suffered crushing defeats.

Jack Sellers was the committee chair when Republican lawmakers pushed for the Cyber ​​Ninja audit in 2021. In that position, he drew the ire of the party’s right wing by opposing the audit and defending the county elections office and its operations.

While Sellers congratulated the candidates for advancing to the general election, he had a stern message for critics.

“To the election deniers who have spent so much time, energy and money trying to take me and others down, I say: be careful what you wish for,” he said in a statement. “At some point, you must be held accountable for your attempts to undermine our democracy. I hope you will finally recognize that Maricopa County remains the gold standard in elections and have the courage and bravery to admit you were wrong.”

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Swenson reported from New York. Associated Press writers Jonathan J. Cooper, Gabriel Sandoval, Sejal Govindarao and Jacques Billeau contributed to this report.

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