Brnovich loses bid over 2019 elections manual
Arizona’s elections will happen this year without any last-minute changes to procedures, a court ruled late Friday, rejecting a challenge from Attorney General Mark Brnovich against Secretary of State Katie Hobbs.
The ruling from Yavapai County Superior Court Judge John Napper means the state’s Elections Procedures Manual from 2019 will remain in effect through 2022, barring any appeals from the attorney general.
The manual details everything from how early ballots should be handled to how to handle an extension of election deadlines, if needed.
An updated version of the manual became a point of dispute between Hobbs and Brnovich late last year. The attorney general objected to large portions
of the manual that Hobbs had compiled.
But the two could not resolve their differences before the Dec. 31, 2021, deadline set by law for the manual to be finalized — in part because Brnovich waited until nine days before the deadline to demand that nearly one-third of the 300-page manual get revised or excised.
While Hobbs agreed to make some changes, she rejected others.
As a default, the manual that was written in 2019 remains as the guiding document for this year’s elections. That manual was approved by Brnovich three years ago without any objections.
In April, four months after the deadline for a new manual, Brnovich and the Yavapai County Republican Party sued, arguing Hobbs had failed to present a “lawful” manual.
Napper conducted two hearings on the matter, including a nearly threehour proceeding June 10 at which he expressed frustration that the attorney general and secretary of state should have resolved the dispute last fall.
In his Friday ruling, Napper said there isn’t any time left for him to provide guidance on how to create an updated procedures manual.
“The complaint was filed far too late for this to occur without disrupting elections that have already begun,” he wrote.
Saturday is the deadline to have mailed out ballots to military and overseas voters. Early ballots for Arizona residents are mailed July 6 and the primary election is Aug. 2.
Neither Hobbs’ nor Brnovich’s offices returned requests for comment on the ruling.
On Twitter, Hobbs called the ruling “a win for the rule of law” and Arizona voters. She criticized Brnovich for trying to rewrite the election rules to suit his own political preferences.