Maricopa County election officials praise smooth Primary Election process
Maricopa County calls primary a success
Election officials report a smooth primary process and are now preparing for a larger turnout in the upcoming general election. FOX 10's Jacob Luthi reports.
PHOENIX - Maricopa County election officials are calling Tuesday's primary election a success, even as ballot processing continues and preparations begin for November's general election.
What we know:
On Thursday, crews were still counting provisional ballots while returning signs, chairs and other equipment from all 236 vote centers across the county.
Election officials said a smooth voter experience was the result of months of preparation.
"We plan for a year so that hopefully voters only have to think about voting for a few minutes if they vote in person," said Jennifer Liewer, Maricopa County's deputy elections director.
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By the numbers:
Liewer said voter turnout reached about 26%, with the county saying around 675,000 ballots were cast in the primary election.
One of the biggest changes this year allowed voters to drop off their early ballots, verify their identification and have those ballots tabulated on the spot.
According to a post from Supervisor Mark Stewart, 77,000 early ballots were dropped off on Election Day, and about 23,000 voters used the new process.
"Our poll workers had new training and a new process to learn, and they executed it seamlessly," Liewer said. "And the community took advantage of it, which we’re really excited about that."
Dig deeper:
Attention is now shifting to the general election, which Liewer said will present new challenges with higher turnout and a double-sided ballot that will take voters longer to complete than the primary ballot.
Maricopa County said they saw nearly 80% voter turnout in 2024, one of the highest rates in the nation.
Election officials are also conducting focus groups with poll workers to evaluate the primary election and identify areas for improvement before November.
"One of the things that makes us successful is we have backup plans, and we have redundancies," Liewer said. "We plan for the worst so that when things pop up that maybe wasn’t on our list, we are still able to pivot and position ourselves so that every voter can cast their ballot on election day."
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Maricopa County completed primary election signature verification ahead of schedule. Election officials hope to repeat the fast process during November's higher-turnout general election.
Even without a presidential or U.S. Senate race on this year's general election ballot, Liewer said she expects Arizona voters to continue turning out.
"We are a swing county in a swing state," Liewer said. "We have races that can be separated by a couple hundred votes, we had a race in the primary in 2024 that was separated by, I believe 16 votes. So that really creates an urgency for people to get out and vote."
What's next:
As of Wednesday, the county said around 1,000 provisional ballots were still being processed. They also said that 3,000 ballots still needed to be verified by the voter, a process called "curing."