Election certification delays few, but a ‘test run’ for 2024
Before November, election officials prepared for the possibility that Republicans who embraced former President Donald Trump’s lies about voter fraud would challenge the verdict of voters by refusing to certify the midterm results.
Three weeks after the end of voting, such challenges are playing out in just two states, Arizona and Pennsylvania, where Democrats won the marquee races for governor and Senate.
Legal experts predict the bids are doomed because local governmental agencies typically don’t have the option to vote against certifying the results of their elections. But experts also say the delays are a signal that the United States must brace itself for similar disruptions in the next presidential contest.
“It is one of the few places where election deniers have a lever of power,” Rick
Hasen, a law professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, said of the local political authorities responsible for certifying election results in most states. “It’s a good test run for 2024, showing state courts they’re going to have to step in.”
For now, the certification delay in a smattering of rural counties in just two states reflects the limited ability of election conspiracy theorists to disrupt the midterms. One rural Arizona county has drawn court challenges after its refusal to certify, but a second one that was flirting with blocking certification backed off amid legal threats.
In Pennsylvania, a handful of the state’s 67 counties have delayed certification because of recounts demanded by local conspiracy theorists in scattered precincts. But in most states, certification has gone smoothly.
“Before Election Day, I thought Republicans would exploit the certification process to undermine election results,” said Marc Elias, a Democratic lawyer who has sued to compel the lone Arizona county to certify.
That there’s only one county delaying so far in that important battleground state, where Republican candidates who denied Joe Biden’s victory in the 2020 presidential race ran unsuccessfully for governor and secretary of state, is “good news, and a bit of a surprise,” Mr. Elias said.
In Wisconsin, where Mr. Trump pressured Republican lawmakers to decertify the 2020 results, the chair of the state elections commission certified the results of the midterm election during a quick meeting Wednesday without fanfare. Minnesota, where the failed Republican secretary of state candidate had cast doubt on the legitimacy of the 2020 presidential election, the state canvassing board certified this year’s results without drama on Tuesday.
The smooth outcome in most of the country is a reflection of the diminished opportunities election conspiracy theorists have to control elections after a number of their candidates were routed in statewide elections for positions overseeing voting. They’re largely left with a footprint in conservative, rural counties. Still, that’s enough to cause headaches for having the election results certified on a statewide basis, raising concerns about how rural counties might respond after the next presidential election.
The movement that embraces Mr. Trump’s lies about voting hoped it would have many more levers after November. Candidates who backed Mr. Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election ran for top posts with power over state voting — including secretary of state, which in most states is the top election position — in five of the six swing states that were key to Mr. Trump’s 2020 loss. They lost every race in those states.