Hand Counting Ballots

The all-Republican Mohave County Board of Supervisors voted against hand-counting ballots after receiving a letter from Attorney General Kris Mayes saying it would be illegal.

Mohave County supervisors may be breaking state law if they choose not to use machines to count all ballots cast in the presidential election.

Here are the consequences when Republican activists in Texas, California, Arizona, and elsewhere push local officials to ditch machines and count ballots by hand.

How a Kerr County commissioner’s unfounded distrust of voting machines took “a wrecking ball to one of the finest election departments.”

Evidence shows hand counts require many people and take far longer than machines

The debate over legality is pulling attention from the well-known problems that crop up when trying to hand-count ballots, an especially challenging task in a presidential election.

Secretary of State Adrian Fontes told the county’s supervisors in a letter Tuesday that he’s concerned moving forward would put the county’s election officials in “serious legal jeopardy.”

Pinal County’s inaccurate counts in 2022 were caused by human error. Counting ballots by hand won’t prevent that again.

Everything you need to know about Senate Majority Leader Sonny Borrelli’s letter asserting the Legislature has “plenary authority” over how elections are run.

Vote totals change slightly but not enough to impact the outcome of any race.

County employees hand counted more than 59,000 ballots in two and a half days, a task resulting from petitions and pressure from election conspiracy activists.

The Republican supervisors are asking a judge to compel the elections director to expand the hand count audit of ballots in the midterm election.

Ruling caps month-long spectacle marked by confusing proposals from Republican officials, warnings from the state, and arguments from lawyers who defended Cyber Ninjas.

Republican supervisors, defying county attorney, intend to vote on plan next week.

Cochise County board’s two Republicans seek emergency vote, against attorney’s advice, on manual vote tally for November election.

Cochise County officials consider plan for manually tallying votes in November — a method that produces inaccurate results and takes much longer, research shows.

Nostalgia, faulty assumptions, conspiracy theories fueling the push to hand-count ballots

Some election critics want fast results and hand counting. It’s impossible to have both.