Fontes says GOP lawsuit to purge at least 500,000 AZ voters should be tossed from court

Sadiq and Dana Daniels cross the street after voting at the Surprise Court House polling location on Nov. 3, 2020, in Surprise. Photo by Christian Petersen | Getty Images

Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes is asking a judge to dismiss a lawsuit brought by the leaders of the AZGOP and a conservative dark money group demanding the state purge at least 500,000 voters from its rolls, saying the suit is not based on reliable data.

In the suit, Scot Mussi, the head of the Arizona Free Enterprise Club, and Arizona Republican Party Chairwoman Gina Swoboda claim that the state’s voter rolls are overpopulated by people who have either died or moved out of state, in violation of the federal National Voter Registration Act. The pair, who is joined by Steve Gaynor, a Republican who unsuccessfully ran for secretary of state in 2018, also say that the state has failed to develop a maintenance program to remove ineligible voters from the roll.

But the data used in the suit is inconsistent and unreliable, Assistant Attorney General Kara Karlson wrote in a motion to dismiss filed on behalf of Fontes.

The Republicans claim there are “at least 500,000 registered voters” in the state who should be removed from voter rolls, and that “other reliable data sources” show “between 1,060,000 and 1,270,000 unaccounted for voters on the state rolls.”

Those numbers, according to Karlson, are “so disparate that it can only mean one thing: Plaintiffs are guessing.”

Additionally, the motion to dismiss claims that the state is complying with federal and state election laws, which the suit says are being flouted. In August 2023, Fontes’ office reviewed the data provided by Swoboda and compared it to state policies, finding that voter rolls were in compliance with the National Voter Registration Act.

Another motion to dismiss the case has been filed by the Arizona Alliance for Retired Americans and Voto Latino, two voter advocacy groups who are seeking to intervene as defendants in the case.

Those groups also claim that the suit does not have legal standing and relies on cherry-picked data.

No date has been set for a hearing in the case.

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