PHOENIX — As early as 2017, Arizona Secretary of State staffers identified driver's license computer miscoding that allowed noncitizens to register to vote despite a state law that requires documentary proof of citizenship, according to an internal review.
One of those instances occurred when Governor Katie Hobbs served as Secretary of State. In response to the review's conclusions, Hobbs sent current Secretary of State Adrian Fontes a letter critical of the taxpayer-funded report that was "focused not on solving the issue, but presumable focused on identifying someone else to blame."
Through a public records request, ABC15 obtained copies of the internal review report, dated Dec. 13, 2024, and the subsequent letters between Hobbs and Fontes.
The systemic database issues did not come to the public's attention until just before the 2024 election. Last September, then-Maricopa County Recorder Stephen Richer and Fontes announced they had found a data coding error in Arizona’s driver's license database that allowed at least one non-citizen to register to vote.
Initial estimates found the data errors affected an estimated 218,000 people, 5% of all Arizona voters, who may not have provided documentary proof of citizenship (DPOC) to register as required by Prop 200, which became law in 2004. The people involved had been initially issued a driver's license prior to 1996.
Since then, further research was able to confirm that DPOC was provided for about 20,000 registered voters, according to the Secretary of State's Office. The names of the remaining 195,000 identified voters have been shared with the county recorders who will be responsible for reaching out to those people to provide DPOC in order to remain registered.
It's unclear whether any recorders have begun that process, but the governor has earmarked $200,000 to help with expenses.
An ABC15 investigation in October also found data coding issues affecting Arizona voter rolls just before the 2024 presidential election could have been identified and fixed years ago.
In October 2016, ABC15 reported that a non-citizen was able to register to vote in Maricopa County. At the time Alan Faygenblat described his actions as an attempt to see “if the system really worked” in preventing voter fraud.
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Last fall, Fontes hired an outside law firm to conduct the internal review of Secretary of State records to determine how the MVD issue went unknown prior to 2024, and if it was known, what was done to alert the MVD or mitigate the issue.
Fontes' internal review discovered staffers in 2017 and 2020 looked into two instances when noncitizens were able to register to vote in Arizona. Both people had driver's licenses first issued prior to October 1996 when the Motor Vehicle Division started requiring proof of citizenship or authorized presence. These discoveries did not lead to a systematic review in either case, according to records provided to ABC15.
Hobb's letter indicated the Maricopa County Recorder's Office, which Fontes previously headed, had also been made aware of the 2020 noncitizen voter.
"This isn't Washington D.C. Arizonans expect leaders to accept the responsibility to solve problems, not point fingers," Hobbs wrote.
Hobbs noted, after the 2024 discovery, that the data issue was "quickly resolved" in the MVD interface with the state's voter registration database. She hired two county recorders to audit MVD policies and procedures to identify any additional disconnects and suggest system improvements.
Arizona is the only state that requires proof of citizenship to vote a full ballot, although people who don’t provide proof can sign an affidavit to vote only in federal races.
MVD previously told ABC15 that it "identified a decades-old policy that allowed licenses issued after 1996, including duplicates issued after 1996, to be accepted as proof of authorized presence for reinstatements and renewals.” That policy was created in 1997 in response to a 1996 law.
The MVD policy was made years before election law changed in 2004 under Proposition 200 saying driver's licenses and IDs issued after Oct. 1, 1996, could serve as proof of citizenship when registering to vote for the first time.
You can reach Melissa by email at melissa.blasius@abc15.com or call 602-803-2506. Follow her on X (formerly Twitter) @MelissaBlasius or Facebook.
