Key Points: 

• Arizona counties want to permanently move the state’s primary date from the first week of August to the final week of July

• Federal law shortens the time Arizona has to submit primary election results before the general election

• Counties say the change likely has to be enacted during February

Just as in 2024, one of the first issues lawmakers must tackle in the upcoming legislative session will be the state’s primary election date. 

Arizona did move its primary election date from the first week of August to the final week of July in 2024, but that was a temporary measure. Now, with another upcoming midterm election, lawmakers will attempt to move the state’s primary election date to July permanently. 

The 2024 law resulted from the Electoral Count Reform Act of 2022, which changed the procedure for the counting of electoral votes. 

Under those changes, election officials across the state worry that they could miss federal deadlines to submit election results if a recount is triggered. A recount is required if the race is within one-half of a percent, instead of one-tenth of a percent, which was the requirement before a 2022 law went into effect.

Rep. Alex Kolodin, R-Scottsdale, prefiled House Bill 2022 for the upcoming legislative session. His measure would permanently move the primary date to the last week of July while also allowing county party chairs to designate observers at voting locations.

“This is another commonsense measure that recent election cycles have demonstrated is critical to clean elections in Arizona,” Kolodin said in a statement. “The bill ensures that Arizonans will not be disenfranchised by Congress’ mistakes and clarifies that independent observers are permitted at all voting locations.”

Getting observers at voting locations has been a goal for Kolodin and other Republican members of the Legislature in recent years under Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs. In 2024, Hobbs vetoed a bill from Rep. Rachel Keshel, R-Tucson, which would have established the practice into law. 

The governor wrote in her veto letter of House Bill 2153 that she didn’t object to uniform laws regarding political party observers but wasn’t sure whether counties could implement them. 

“I am concerned this bill will strain the resources of counties that already struggle with recruiting poll workers by adding additional responsibilities to manage observers who would be required to act as challengers,” Hobbs wrote in her letter. 

Jen Marson, executive director of the Arizona Association of Counties, told the Arizona Capitol Times that the counties have not yet taken a position on whether to include the ballot observer language in the bill.

The counties plan to run their own mirror bills through both House and Senate election committee chairs, Sen. Wendy Rogers, R-Flagstaff; and Rep. John Gillette, R-Kingman, Marson said. Those bills were not drafted to include the language about ballot observers.

Lawmakers had to act quickly with the 2024 temporary measure. Hobbs signed the bill in early February of that legislative session after the counties warned the Legislature that they might not have enough time to secure polling places and voting locations before the primary election if the bill remained in session. 

This year, the counties have run into the same problem.

“We tried to do it last (session) and we had what we thought was a pretty good vote count, but then we got word that we should not move forward this year and we should wait and do it first out of the gate in 2026, so that’s what we’re doing,” Marson said. “We did take a lot of heat for changing the primary in the year of the primary and I did not want to do that again, but here we are so that’s what we’re going to need to do.”

Kolodin was one of the key negotiators of the 2024 temporary measure with former Democratic state Rep. Laura Terech. Both he and Terech described the negotiations over the bill as an exhausting ordeal, leaving some lawmakers in tears of triumph when they knew the bill would become law. 

It was also an opportunity for Kolodin and other Republicans affiliated with the Arizona Freedom Caucus to negotiate election policies they had previously been unsuccessful in getting signed by Hobbs, including requiring county election officials to compare voters’ signatures from their voter records with a list of specific characteristics. Many election workers were already doing that, but the law established it as a required practice. 

Kolodin’s bill for the 2026 legislative session would also change the amount of time voters have to correct any problems with their mail-in ballot signatures from five business days to five calendar days, which was also implemented in the 2024 measure.

Some Democrats opposed going to five calendar days because they believed it could disenfranchise voters who rely on public Wi-Fi and public transportation which have reduced service on weekends.

Marson said the counties requested that change because it helps give election workers enough time to gain days before federal deadlines if a recount is triggered.