Fact check: False claim that Arizona ballot machine error was cheating – USA TODAY

Following the 2020 presidential election, some conservatives and supporters of former President Donald Trump spread baseless claims that Maricopa County – Arizona’s most populous county – was rife with election fraud.
Claims of voter fraud in the county circulated once again after in-person voting began on Election Day for this year’s midterms.
“Breaking: Up to 15 locations reported in Maricopa County with tabulator malfunctions,'” reads a Facebook post shared Nov. 8. “Translation: They’re cheating again.”
Follow us on Facebook! Like our page to get updates throughout the day on our latest debunks
A tweet with the same claim generated over 20,000 likes. Similar posts have spread widely on Facebook, and some Republican politicians have similarly claimed this shows evidence of wrongdoing.
But the claim is baseless.
At an Election Day press briefing, Maricopa County officials explained that some printers at vote centers in the county were not producing dark enough formatting marks on ballots, meaning the counting machines couldn’t read them. But voters had multiple options to ensure their ballots were still counted in the affected locations.
There was no evidence of impropriety, and it was not indicative of fraud or cheating, a senior U.S. cybersecurity official said.
USA TODAY reached out to the social media users who shared the claim for comment.
Election machines at about 60 voting sites in Maricopa County experienced a simple ballot printing glitch.
In Maricopa County, printers at polling sites produce ballots on demand so voters can vote at any location in the county, rather than being assigned a polling place, the Arizona Republic reported. The formatting marks on the ballots produced by some printers weren’t printed dark enough for the tabulators, which count the ballotsto read, Maricopa County officials said.
In places that were impacted, voters had the option of placing their ballot in a secure box to be tabulated later, going to another location to vote or returning later in the day to the same location when the issue might be resolved, the Arizona Republic reported. 
Maricopa County tweeted about 2 p.m. on Nov. 8 that county technicians resolved the issue by changing printer settings on the machines.
Fact check roundup: False claims about election fraud, candidates swirl ahead of 2022 midterms
Federal officials confirmed nothing improper occurred in Maricopa County at a joint Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency and Department of Homeland Security briefing on Nov. 8. A senior cybersecurity official said there is no evidence of malfeasance associated with the glitch, and allegations to the contrary are incorrect.
Superior Court Judge Timothy Ryan rejected a request to keep county polls open an extra three hours as a result of the glitch, saying, “The court doesn’t have any evidence that a voter was precluded the right to vote.”
USA TODAY has debunked similar claims about election fraud in Maricopa County during the 2020 presidential election, including baseless assertions that more than 70,000 mail-in ballots counted in Maricopa County were never sent and that an Arizona recount found 250,000 fraudulent votes.
And this is not proof of “cheating again” since there was no prior widespread fraud. There is no evidence that voting systems were rigged in 2020, as the results have been confirmed by an array of recounts and audits conducted by both parties. Security experts and election officials have called the 2020 elections the “most secure in American history.” 
AFP Fact Check also debunked the claim.
Based on our research, we rate FALSE the claim that Arizona ballot machine glitches show “they’re cheating again.”  Printers at 60 voting sites in Maricopa County had produced ballots with formatting marks that weren’t dark enough to be read by tabulators, according to county officials. All voters affected were still able to submit ballots to be counted. A senior cybersecurity official said there is no evidence of impropriety linked to the printing problems.
Contributing: Josh Meyer
Thank you for supporting our journalism. You can subscribe to our print edition, ad-free app or electronic newspaper replica here.
Our fact-check work is supported in part by a grant from Facebook.

source

Leave a Comment