by Natalia Mittelstadt
Following the 2024 presidential election, some states are already focusing on implementing election security legislation, such as requiring proof of U.S. citizenship and reducing the time it takes to count ballots.
Republicans in Ohio, North Carolina, and Arizona are all zeroing in on election integrity following this month’s election, and ahead of newly-elected officials taking office next year.
On Election Day, Election Integrity Network Founder Cleta Mitchell posted on X that she was looking forward to the work that the election integrity movement still has to do. “The next chapter of election integrity after this election will be a greater push for changes in state AND federal law to close loopholes and strengthen accountability and transparency,” Mitchell wrote.
“We still have a lot of work to do to permanently protect against noncitizen voting, to clean the voter rolls in every state, to require authentic post-election audits, to ensure there is reconciliation to make sure every vote is tied to an actual ballot and that the number of voters, ballots, and votes match – and a ton of work to do on transparency of elections. We have much yet to do to restore fair elections in many states – where convoluted voting systems imposed by the left are repealed. Every state must have a level playing field for all candidates and parties. Work to do, people!! Lots of it!”
Honest Elections Project Executive Director Jason Snead previously told Just the News that there is still a lot of election integrity work to be done on the state level. Voter ID laws need to be strengthened, especially for mail-in ballots, he said, as well as better maintenance of voter rolls, creating state offices “to investigate and prosecute election fraud,” ban “Zuckerbucks 2.0,” and ban foreign funding of state ballot measure campaigns.
Republicans on state and county levels are already working on implementing such election integrity measures.
Ohio
In the Ohio state Senate, a bill was introduced by Republicans last month that would require proof of U.S. citizenship to both vote and to update voter registration. Another GOP bill that was introduced the day after Election Day would both require proof of U.S. citizenship to vote and eliminate ballot drop boxes.
While non-citizens are prohibited from voting in federal, state, and most local elections, municipalities in California, Maryland, and Vermont, and Washington, D.C., allow non-citizens to vote in local elections.
States also continue to find non-citizens on their voter rolls, and some who may have voted in federal elections, after being registered to vote through the states’ motor vehicles department.
North Carolina
The North Carolina House of Representatives on Tuesday passed a disaster relief bill that would also take power away from the governor to appoint members of the state election board. The state House has a Republican supermajority while the current governor and governor-elect are both Democrats. However, Republicans will no longer have their supermajority next year, following this month’s elections.
The governor is allowed to appoint a majority of members to the board who are from his party, but the new bill provision would transfer that power to the state auditor. A Republican just won the state auditor election, which has been held by Democrats for 16 years. The North Carolina State Board of Elections was sued multiple times by the Republican National Committee over election guidance in the months leading up to Election Day.
The bill also includes a provision that would shorten the time that voters would be allowed to cure their provisional ballots, and another provision that would require provisional ballots be completely counted by the third day after Election Day.
Arizona
Republican leaders in the Grand Canyon State are hoping to make ballot counting more efficient so that election results are in on election night, rather than nearly two weeks later.
Arizona state Senate President Warren Petersen (R) posted on X on Tuesday that he met with the Florida secretary of state to learn best practices for counting ballots quickly. “Just finished a great meeting with FL SOS [Cord Byrd] and his staff discussing what they do to get election results quickly. As expected a big difference is that we do not have a cutoff for early ballot dropoffs at polling places like they do. But we also learned of other ways to be more efficient,” Petersen wrote.
In Arizona, voters can drop off their absentee ballots on Election Day.
“I look forward to passing legislation so that AZ will have election results night of,” he added.
Petersen reposted an X post by Turning Point Action COO Tyler Bowyer last week that criticized how long it took the state’s most populous county to count ballots. “Maricopa County got caught days behind counting before [Election Day] and it took them a week [and] a half to finish the election. Make AZ more like FL voter laws immediately. If Hobbs won’t pass it, send to voters,” Bowyer wrote.
Maricopa County will have a new Republican recorder next year, current Arizona Freedom Caucus member and state Rep. Justin Heap. The day after Election Day, Heap posted on X that his Democratic opponent had conceded the race and explained what his focus will be once he enters office.
“It is undeniably true that past elections, under both parties and spanning more than a decade, have denigrated our county’s reputation and made us the laughing stock of the nation. That ends today,” Heap wrote. “Throughout my campaign, I made my promises to restore trust in our elections and respect all voters an issue of paramount importance — and I intend to deliver on those promises.”
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Natalia Mittelstadt is a reporter for Just the News.
Photo “People Voting” by Lorie Shaull. CC BY 2.0.
