Arizona AG Kris Mayes Issues Felony Threats to County Recorders Over DOJ Election Probe
Marxist intimidation tactics: officials threaten criminal charges for aiding federal voter fraud investigators
On March 9, Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes (D) fired off a threatening letter to every county recorder in her state, warning them that local election officials will face a Class 6 felony if they comply with Department of Justice requests for voter registration records.
This comes amid escalating federal scrutiny into Arizona's election practices, including potential voter fraud during the 2020 and 2024 cycles. Far from a routine advisory, this letter smells of Marxist-style intimidation designed to harass witnesses and bury evidence that could expose irregularities in the state's voter rolls.
The letter references the DOJ's subpoena to the Arizona State Senate for records, including voter registration data, from its 2021 audit of Maricopa County's election materials. Mayes reiterates her office's stance against disclosure, framing it as a heroic stand against federal overreach.
Familiar Election Integrity Obstruction Cast as Privacy Protection
Mayes’ letter is nothing more than a desperate attempt to prevent President Donald Trump’s DOJ from investigating allegations of non-citizen voting, duplicate registrations, and other fraud that could undermine Arizona’s election integrity.
Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes (D) is already battling the DOJ in court over the same issue in the case United States v. Fontes. He's filed motions to dismiss and oppose the DOJ's demands for the statewide voter database, echoing Mayes' claims that the federal government lacks authority to access that data.
“Arizona state law also clearly prohibits disclosure of unredacted voter files. A.R.S. § 16- 168, for example, explicitly prohibits the disclosure of the exact information the DOJ has requested,” Mayes writes.
She adds that Recorders should notify her office immediately if subpoenaed by a federal grand jury, promising to "pursue all legal actions available" to block any such orders. The letter even invokes the officials' oath of office, suggesting that cooperating with federal oversight would betray their duty to Arizona's constitution and laws. No mention of the oath to the United States Constitution.
Voter Reference Foundation Executive Director Joe Benson told Restoration News that the Title 16 Mayes references, “specifically ARS § 16-168, permits the Recorders to produce this data for the DOJ because it falls within the scope of their official duties.”
The ERIC Hypocrisy
The strongest evidence that Arizona’s Democrats are using privacy protection as a shield for shoddy voter roll maintenance lies in Arizona being one of 25, mostly blue, states that participate in the Electronic Registration Information Center (ERIC).
A Restoration News expose on ERIC showed it is nothing more than a Democrat front group pretending to be non-partisan. It sells itself as a way for states to easily maintain clean voter rolls—for a hefty fee, of course. Its close ties with leftist nonprofits and its requirements that states take proactive measures to register likely Democrat voters make it ripe for Democrat partisans to use as a “nonprofit” vote harvesting machine.
“AG Mayes and Secretary Fontes have conveniently overlooked the fact that they already share this protected information with ERIC, so it is not unprecedented,” Benson said. “Attempts by Republican legislators to withdraw from the ERIC datasharing agreement have been opposed or vetoed by Democrat officials in the past, so this particular opposition appears to be motivated by partisanship, not policy.”
In her letter, Mayes cites lawsuits in Michigan and Oregon in which judges ruled against the Trump administration on this issue. Both, incidentally, are ERIC members. These blue states are more than willing to hand over voters’ personal data to leftist-backed private organizations that charge them fees and place costly, onerous responsibilities on them but are unwilling to share them with the federal government.
The DOJ Should Strike Back
Arizona's voter database has long been plagued by accusations of bloat. For instance, in 2024, Restoration News uncovered 1,348 voters on Arizona’s rolls over the age of 101, with 34 of them implausibly over 113 years old, born during President Teddy Roosevelt’s administration.
These inactive or ineligible entries make ballot harvesting and non-citizen participation easy. The DOJ's push for unredacted data simply aims to verify eligibility and prevent fraud, as mandated by the National Voter Registration Act.
By threatening county Recorders with felony charges for responding to federal requests and potential subpoenas, Mayes is effectively gagging county officials who might otherwise cooperate with federal probes, turning them into unwilling accomplices in a scheme to withhold evidence. Intimidating potential local witnesses to derail federal investigations is common with petty local tyrants seeking to cover their own corruption.
The implications are chilling not only for election integrity but for the rule of law.
Arizona citizens deserve transparent elections, free from the appearance of fraud. The DOJ and FBI should investigate this letter as potential witness tampering and obstruction of justice. Bringing federal charges against Mayes while she is in office should not be off the table and would set an example for other Democratic Attorneys General who consider similar tactics.
MORE ELECTION INTEGRITY NEWS:
EXCLUSIVE: How the Voter Reference Foundation Provides Election Transparency
NEWS: DOJ Suing Arizona for Hiding Voter Data
WISCONSIN: Mandela Barnes: Yet Another Democrat Ignoring Voters' Demand for Voter ID
VIRGINIA: Judge Blocks Democrats' Gerrymandering Power Grab—Here's What Happens Next.
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