State legislatures need to restore election procedures

After careful review of these messages and input from my constituents, supporters, election observers, election experts, and poll watchers, I introduced a bill to help secure, adjudicate, and audit ballots with the hope of restoring confidence in our electoral process. House Bill 2720 amends parts of Arizona’s election law pertaining to ballots, elections, and certificates.

During the last election cycle, many voters expressed frustration with not knowing how many mail-in ballots were printed, mailed, on-hand, etc., throughout the state, or how many were still left to be counted in the days after the election. People need certainty, and this bill will bring much-needed transparency and accountability to address some of these outstanding issues while creating a legislative check and balance over certifying presidential electors.

Right now, only one individual in Arizona is vested with the power to certify electors — the secretary of state. My plan would include 90 elected members of the House and Senate in the process.

It is time for the Arizona Legislature to regain the power it delegated to certify the electors, as stated in Article 2, Section 1 of the U.S. Constitution. HB 2720 allows the Legislature to revoke the secretary of state’s decision to certify an election but not to pick its own winner.

One way to accomplish this goal would be to create a Joint Legislative Election Oversight Committee. Two years before a presidential election, the Senate president and Senate minority leader and the speaker of the House and House minority leader would select legislators from both political parties to serve on this oversight committee for the next two years. The crux of the JLEOC’s work would occur between our state’s primary and the November general election.

The JLEOC would review the vote counts and canvasses presented by the counties and keep tabs on court challenges and potential misconduct if reported. It would have the ability to call witnesses to ensure no violations to the state’s election procedures occurred. If misconduct was found to have occurred, the Legislature would need to determine which slate of electors was chosen by the voters and release a report of its findings. The Legislature would then meet in its second regular session. Otherwise, the Legislature would send the legitimate slate of electors to the secretary of state.

To further protect the voters’ intent, I recommend modifying our state’s elections procedures on how to select electors by relying on the U.S. Constitution. After the presidential election and before the certification deadline for the slate of electors to be sent to Washington, D.C., the Legislature would be called into a second regular legislative session to consider the JLEOC findings. For the House and Senate to sign off on our slate of electors, they would need a two-thirds majority.

Now that the Democrats have total control of the U.S. House of Representatives, U.S. Senate, and the White House, our voting rights are under attack. With the Left’s reintroduction of H.R. 1, it is time for states to step up and protect against the impending incursion by the rule of one like we see in Communist China. Look no further than President Biden’s avalanche of executive orders issued in his first days in office.

H.R. 1 is the Left’s dream bill to take away our liberties and freedoms as Americans, and it would nationalize our elections and remove states’ ability to decide their own election procedures.

That’s wrong. States should control how their elections are conducted, and we all should be fighting for more transparency in the process, not less. That’s what my bill does. I was reelected to restore the integrity of our elections, and that is what I intend to do.

Shawnna L.M. Bolick is an Arizona state representative, chairwoman of the Ways and Means Committee, and vice chairwoman of the Criminal Justice Reform Committee. Rep. Bolick started her second two-year term in January 2021. Reach her at [email protected].