Arizona

Status of Audit Legislation: 
Signed into law 2006
Link to Text of Legislation: 
Arizona's law (Section 16-602, "Removal of ballots... hand counts, vote count verification committee")
Notes: 

State Summary

 

Signed into law 2006, Arizona's audit law is not only binding on official results, but can lead to a full recount. The audit calls for one federal, one statewide, and one legislative contest to be audited, in addition to one ballot measure and the presidential contest.

 

Unless otherwise noted, all citations below are from the Arizona Revised Statutes, Section 16-602, “Removal of ballots from ballot boxes... hand counts; vote count verification committee”:

http://www.azleg.state.az.us/FormatDocument.asp?inDoc=/ars/16/00602.htm&Title=16&DocType=ARS.

Sampling Method: 

2% of the precincts in each county, or 2 precincts, whichever is greater. 1% of early ballots.

Trigger: 

If a discrepancy equal or greater than the designated margin is discovered, a recount of the audited ballots will take place. If the recount verifies that discrepancy, then the audit will be expanded to include twice the orginal number of audited precincts for that county. If the expanded audit reveals a discrepancy equal or larger to the designated margin, the audit shall be further expanded to include the entire jurisdiction for the race in question.

Oversight: 
Secretary of State
Who Conducts the Audit?: 
The County Officer in charge of Elections conducts the audit. Additionally, each Party Chair assigns two persons per precinct to be audited. If at least 4 counters per precinct do not show up, the audit is cancelled. County parties can opt out if they so choose.
Location of Random Selection: 
The Central Counting Center for each County
Types of Voting Machines in Use: 
Optical Scan Machines. Each precinct also has one DRE to meet HAVA accessibility guidelines. For more information, see Verified Voting's website: http://www.verifiedvoting.org/verifier/map.php?&topic_string=5std&year=2008&state=Arizona
Races that are Audited: 
One Federal race, one statewide race, one ballot measure and one legislative race. Presidential races as well, when they occur.
Voting Units that are Audited: 
Randomly selected precincts. For mail-in ballots selected mixed-precinct "batches" each consisting of about 200 ballots
Timeline for Audit: 

The hand counts prescribed by this section shall begin within twenty-four
hours after the closing of the polls and shall be completed before the canvassing of the election for that county.

Completed Before Certification?: 

Yes

Absentees, Provisionals and Early Voting: 
the county officer in charge of elections chairmen or the chairmen's designees shall randomly select one or more batches of early ballots that have been tabulated to include at least one batch from each machine used for tabulating early ballots and shall securely sequester those ballots along with their unofficial tally reports for a postelection manual audit.
Is the Audit Publicly Observable?: 
Yes
Comments from Local Activists: 

"Arizona's precinct audit is a valid end-to-end audit because the hand count is checking a figure that appears in the final canvass. Our early (absentee) ballot audit, however, is not end-to-end because it checks randomly selected "batches" of mixed-precinct ballots and these batch counts do not appear in the canvass. So it checks the accuracy of the central count scanners, but not the election management software that collects and reports all the early ballot results. In order to do the latter properly, mail-in ballots would have to be sorted by precinct, something the election officials have refused to consider."

Local Contact Person: 
Tom Ryan, Arizona Citizens for Fair Elections
Email contact form
Additional Resources: 
Arizona Revised Statutes - Title 16 - Elections
Arizona Secretary of State
Arizona Election Procedures Manual
Arizona Audit Info from CEI