Navajos: Arizona restrictions will complicate voting
FLAGSTAFF, Ariz. — Arizona Republicans say the voter restrictions they’re pushing after President Joe Biden’s win in the state last year are designed to strengthen the integrity of future elections.
To some, the changes will make voting more difficult than it already is.
The bills, some signed into law this past week by Gov. Doug Ducey, are worrisome for Native Americans who live in remote areas, other communities of color and voters whose first language isn’t English.
One codifies the existing practice of giving voters who didn’t sign mail-in ballots until 7 p.m. on Election Day to do so, defying a recently settled lawsuit that would have given voters additional days to provide a signature. Another will result in potentially tens of thousands of people being purged from a list of voters who automatically get a ballot by mail.
Navajo Nation President Jonathan Nez said Ducey’s actions belittle tribes and fail to recognize the unique challenges Native Americans face when casting ballots. That includes driving hours to reach polling places, unreliable mail service and the need for more Native language translators.
“This is an assault to the election process for people of color throughout this country,” he said. “Here in Arizona, it’s pushing back on the voters of tribal communities, and we came out in big numbers to vote our candidate of choice, which is President Biden.”
The bills’ sponsor, Republican state Sen. Michelle Ugenti-Rita, said claims of retaliation or voter suppression were “outrageous” and “unfounded.” Elections aren’t a surprise, she said, and voters want them to be run efficiently with timely results.
“Not everything has to do with Biden and [former President] Trump,” she said. “These are important cleanups and fixes. It makes sense.”
Arizona is among several states controlled politically by Republicans that are tightening election rules this year, primarily around early and absentee voting. Democrats say the new rules will disproportionately affect minorities and lower-income voters. Florida, Georgia and Iowa already have enacted voting restrictions, and Texas is debating its own set of tighter rules.
In March, Biden issued an executive order creating a Native American Voting Rights Steering Group. It’s tasked with consulting with tribes nationwide to address barriers to voting, among other things.
Despite the coronavirus pandemic, voter turnout on swaths of tribal land in Arizona surged in 2020 compared with the 2016 presidential election, helping Biden to victory in a state that hadn’t supported a Democratic presidential candidate since 1996. Trump and a legion of his supporters have refused to accept his loss in Arizona and other battleground states, resulting in a partisan review of the ballots cast in the state’s most populous county.
The Navajo Nation sued the secretary of state and county officials in 2018 to force changes in election procedures for the tribe’s voters.