Arizona Secretary of State Warns Trump Seeks Master Voter List to Control Elections

Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes warned that the Trump administration's push to obtain voter files from 30 states is part of a broader plan to create a centralized database of all U.S. citizens, allowing the president to target opponents.

"Trump is trying to amass a master list that will allow him to declare someone an enemy of the state," Fontes, a Democrat, said in an interview from his Phoenix office. He said Trump wants to create the equivalent of "apartheid in the United States" and likened his actions to those of North Korea. With personal information on all Americans, Fontes said, the president could regulate key aspects of opponents' lives, including "shutting off their bank accounts, or keeping them from getting healthcare." "This is Donald Trump trying to pick his own voters," he added.

Fontes won a major victory on Tuesday when a federal judge threw out a Justice Department lawsuit against Arizona over its refusal to hand over its voter roll. The judge, Susan Brnovich, a Trump appointee, ruled that the Department of Justice was not entitled to the document under federal law. The suit was part of a DoJ push to obtain voter roll information from all 50 states; the department sued 30 states that refused to cooperate. At least 13 states have voluntarily complied, but many others are resisting.

Courts in California, Oregon, Michigan, Massachusetts, and Rhode Island have also ruled against the administration, making Arizona the sixth federal court to reach the same conclusion. "Arizona acted correctly in refusing this request, and today's ruling vindicates that decision," Fontes said. He had declined to hand over the data, arguing it would be illegal under state law to divulge sensitive personal information about nearly 5 million Arizonan voters.

Fontes was elected secretary of state four years ago as part of a Democratic sweep that also elected Katie Hobbs as governor and Kris Mayes as attorney general. All three now face re-election battles against Republican challengers who have embraced election denial conspiracy theories.

In March, the FBI seized digital data compiled by Cyber Ninjas' audit of Maricopa County in 2020 under a federal grand jury subpoena. The material was handed over by the Republican president of the Arizona state senate, Warren Petersen. Fontes said Petersen turned over the material "as a political favor to Donald Trump," suggesting it may have broken state data-protection laws.

Trump's executive order last month tries to limit mail-in voting by creating a national voter file to which the U.S. Postal Service would have to defer before delivering mail ballots. The order, challenged as unconstitutional, is especially sensitive in Arizona, where 80% of votes are cast by mail. "This is a bald-faced attempt at completely controlling American democracy according to the whims of one political actor, and that's not just un-American, it's absolutely anti-American," Fontes said.

The two Republicans vying for their party's candidacy in the secretary of state race both have election-denial records. Alexander Kolodin, a lawyer, was placed on probation by the state bar association after filing lawsuits challenging Biden's 2020 victory that a judge slammed as full of "gossip and innuendo." The other candidate, former Arizona Republican Party chair Gina Swoboda, was Trump's campaign director of operations on election day in 2020 and claimed in a dismissed lawsuit that more than 1 million ineligible voters may have been on the rolls.

Fontes said he was "cautiously optimistic" about re-election but noted two factors making the race harder: no U.S. Senate race in Arizona this year to draw Democratic voters, and the growing influence of Turning Point USA, the rightwing activist group headquartered in Arizona whose leader Charlie Kirk was killed by a gunman in September. "We've got to be cautious because we're going to be running against the conspiracy theories, lies and misrepresentations," Fontes said. "The stakes of this election are enormous, and every voter will be impacted by the outcome."