Maricopa County judge rejects Republicans request for extended poll hours.

A judge in Maricopa County, Arizona rejected a request from Republican candidates and organizations to extend voting by 3 hours to address widespread issues with tabulation machines rejecting votes due to printer problems.

• The RNC and other plaintiffs wished that polling places in the county remained open until 10 p.m. instead of closing at 7.
• Judge Timothy Ryan stated that he had not seen any evidence that voters were denied the right to vote.

Driving the news Officials in Maricopa County say that tabulation machines rejected ballots at 25% of all voting centers on Tuesday due to printer settings.

• Around 2pm, eight hours after polls opened, they released a press release stating that they had discovered the problem and that technicians were working to fix it.
• The county does not know how many ballots were affected but they will all be counted.

The latest: The Republican National Committee In response to the tabulation problem, the National Republican Senatorial Committee filed the lawsuit Tuesday afternoon on behalf of Arizona GOP candidates Kari lake (governor), and Blake Masters (U.S. Senate).

What happened? Tabulation machines in about 60 voting centers in the Phoenix metro area rejected ballots printed on-site because the markings used by tabulators to read them were too light.

• The settings of the printer were the same ones that were used for the August primary election.
• Megan Gilbertson, spokesperson at County Elections Department, stated to Axios that all tabulators/printers are tested prior the general election. However, it is unclear why the testing did not detect the problem.
• Context: All in-person Election Day voters can have their ballots printed onsite.

State of the art: Voters whose ballots were not accepted were asked to place their ballots in a container so that they could be transported to Maricopa County Tabulation and Election Center.

• The central tabulators at MCTEC will count the affected ballots on Wednesday.
• Maricopa County voters can cast a ballot at any location regardless of where they live. Therefore, instructions were given to voters who did not want to leave their ballots in boxes to go to another place to receive a new one.

They are saying: “We don’t believe anyone has been disenfranchised, because no one was turned away,” Bill Gates, Chairman of Maricopa County Board of Supervisors, told reporters at a press conference.

What we are looking at: It’s not clear if the problem will affect the speed of the vote-counting process.

• Gilbertson said that the central tabulators of MCTEC, which have larger and more advanced computers than those used at voting centres, have not had problems reading early ballots (cast before Election Day), produced from the same printers.
• Fields Moseley, a spokesperson of the county, said that the central tabulators work “incredibly fast.”
• If the central tabulators cannot read the ballots they will use a process known duplication where election workers copy the voter’s choices onto another ballot.

Take note: Many prominent Arizona Republicans, including those who have promoted false claims of rigging the 2020 election, used social media Tuesday to make the issue seem like evidence that it was. mismanaged These Arizona election laws are in need of an overhaul.

• Mark Finchem and Lake, a Republican candidate for secretary-of-state, unsuccessfully sued the state earlier in the year to prohibit the use of machines to vote.

Editor’s Note: This headline and story have been updated to reflect the decision of a Maricopa County Judge in the lawsuit brought by Republicans.