Officials in Pinal County, Arizona announced on Thursday that elections director, David Frisk, is “no longer employed” with the country two days after more than 20 voting sites either completely ran out of ballots, or were very short on ballots on AZ Primary Election Day, leaving a number of in-person voters unable to cast their ballots.
Pinal County Elections Director David Frisk "is no longer in the position of Elections Director and is no longer employed by Pinal County" after ballot shortages on Arizona Primary Election Day. https://t.co/NaB4Z2ZJyR
— FOX 10 Phoenix (@FOX10Phoenix) August 4, 2022
FOX 10 received several calls and emails on Election Day from viewers reporting a variety of problems with in-person voting, including a shortage of ballots. Some people at precinct 15 in San Tan Valley said they couldn’t get a ballot to vote because the location ran out.
They were given a card telling them to come back later.
Following reports of the ballot shortage, RNC Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel and Arizona GOP Chairwoman Kelli Ward released a joint statement demanding that Frisk, “immediately” resign for failing and disenfranchising Arizonans.
Pinal County Elections Director David Frisk should resign immediately. pic.twitter.com/ZCayzZgrn2
— Ronna McDaniel (@RonnaMcDaniel) August 3, 2022
The joint statement read:
During Arizona’s primary elections, the RNC and Republican Party of Arizona’s poll observer program documented and reported multiple failures by Pinal County’s Elections Administrator, including 63,000 mail-in ballots delivered to the wrong voters and multiple Republican-heavy precinct locations running out of ballots. This is a comprehensive failure that disenfranchises Arizonans and exemplifies why Republican-led efforts for transparency at the ballot box are so important. Pinal County Elections Director David Frisk should resign immediately.
County officials on Wednesday said the ballot shortages were due to “human error,” because a higher than expected number of voters required in-person ballots, and because so many Democrats were running unopposed in major races.
In addition to miscalculating the number of ballots needed, Frisk’s office also reportedly botched mail in ballots that were sent out early in July. “Many were missing city races and the county — a growing suburban area south of metro Phoenix and home to over 425,000 residents — was forced to send supplemental ballots to those voters,” Fox 10 reported.
On Tuesday, that earlier issue played a role during in-person voting at some of the county’s 95 polling sites. Each site may have had as many as 10 ballot styles.
A surge of people going to the polls led to some sites either running short or out of ballots. The county tried to print new ballots, but old printers were limited, and it took a long time in some cases to get new ballots to the affected polling sites.
The county announced on Aug. 4 that Frisk “is no longer in the position of Elections Director and is no longer employed by Pinal County.” Frisk is reportedly being replaced by the county recorder. “Recorder Virginia Ross has resigned from her elected office and has been appointed Elections director effective immediately,” officials said.
INBOX: following ballot supply issues on Primary Day in Pinal County, David Frisk is no longer the county’s elections director.
Virginia Ross, the current county recorder, will now take over. Here’s a portion of @PinalCounty’s announcement ⬇️ #azfamily pic.twitter.com/ft9UdVEQ5a
— Whitney Clark (@whitneyclarktv) August 4, 2022
Kari Lake, the presumptive winner of the Republican primary for governor of Arizona took to Twitter Thursday afternoon to say that Frisk “officially resigned.”
“If your right to vote was literally taken away, is this person’s resignation enough to remedy that?” she asked. “How much bigger would our win be if all these people were allowed to vote?”
🚨 PINAL COUNTY UPDATE
The Elections Director has officially resigned.
2 Questions: ⤵️
If your right to vote was literally taken away, is this person’s resignation enough to remedy that?
How much bigger would our win be if all these people were allowed to vote?
— Kari Lake (@KariLake) August 4, 2022