Maricopa County Recorder Stephen Richer speaks about voting machine malfunctions on the Maricopa County Tabulation and Elections Heart in Phoenix on Nov. 9, 2022. Richer misplaced a Republican major on Tuesday, in line with a race name by The Related Press.
Olivier Touron/AFP through Getty Pictures
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Olivier Touron/AFP through Getty Pictures
PHOENIX — Stephen Richer, who’s been a fierce defender of the integrity of Maricopa County elections since he was elected as county recorder in 2020, has misplaced a Republican major to maintain that position, in line with a race name by The Related Press.
Maricopa County consists of Phoenix and is Arizona’s inhabitants middle. The recorder helps run county elections.
In accordance with the AP, Richer was defeated by GOP challenger Justin Heap, a state consultant backed by the far-right Freedom Caucus and different conservative teams. With 81% of estimated votes in, as of 5 a.m. ET, Heap had 42% of the vote, whereas Richer had 36%. One other challenger had 22%.
Richer’s defeat is a loss for many who’ve spent the previous 4 years defending Maricopa County election directors towards baseless claims.
Richer, in addition to the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors, has been on the frontlines of efforts to battle again with correct details about the voting expertise, how votes are counted and when outcomes are launched.
For his protection of elections, Richer has drawn the ire of fellow Republicans, together with one state occasion official who not too long ago called for his lynching in a newly discovered video. And in 2022, federal prosecutors charged a Missouri man for allegedly threatening to kill Richer after he criticized fellow Republicans who performed a deeply flawed overview of Maricopa County’s 2020 presidential election. There have been “a lot extra the place that got here from,” Richer mentioned on the time.
“It takes a powerful abdomen to work on this area,” Richer not too long ago informed NPR.
Heap has been as soon as supply of that criticism, having attacked Maricopa County’s election administration in previous years as a humiliation. However on the marketing campaign path, he declined to say that widespread fraud performed a job in Maricopa County’s election leads to 2020 or 2022.
However that’s a place supported by most of the GOP lawmakers and activists supporting his candidacy. And Heap was recruited to run by state Sen. Jake Hoffman, a Republican who’s since been indicted for his position in an alleged “pretend elector” scheme to undermine the outcomes of the 2020 presidential election.
Heap additionally frolicked criticizing Richer for points exterior the purview of the recorder’s workplace, like lengthy traces at polling locations on Election Day.
Richer’s workplace is in command of early voting by mail, whereas supervisors are answerable for Election Day voting.
Army veteran Tim Stringham received an uncontested Democratic major for the job.