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At the Oct. 8 meeting of the Navajo County Board of Supervisors, a settlement was reached in the U.S. District Court Case Navajo Nation v. Katie Hobbs. Hobbs became the Arizona Secretary of State after the 2018 election, but was named in this case because she holds the position.
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The case, which stems from a November 2018 complaint by the Navajo Nation resulted not in monetary settlement but an agreement to make voting more accessible for all citizens of Navajo County.
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According to documents provided by Deputy Navajo County Attorney Jason Moore, “The plaintiffs filed a lawsuit in the United States District Court against Navajo County alleging that certain Arizona electoral practices violated the federal and state constitutions as well as the Voting Rights Act.”
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Moore explained, “This case involved a couple of salient points. The first, was that the Navajo Nation said that there were early ballots mailed into the county in the 2018 election cycle that were unsigned. The county recorder has always had a policy of if we get an unsigned early ballot, we reach out to the voter and ask if they realized they had sent it in unsigned and give them some options to cure their ballot.
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“Those options include, spoiling the ballot and requesting a new one by sent, having the voter cast a new vote at an early polling place, or having the voter come to the recorder’s office to sign the original ballot. The issue was that after 7 p.m. on election night, there was nothing in Arizona law that allowed anyone to cure ballots. So, we didn’t do any curing after 7 p.m. Same as the other counties named in the lawsuit: Coconino and Apache counties. The Nation filed the lawsuit, and it was only four ballots that were not signed, because they felt their votes were not being counted.”
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Moore continued, “The only way to fix this, because we were following the law, was for the Navajo Nation to go to the Arizona State Legislature and change the law. They needed to go to the Arizona Secretary of State who adopts the elections procedures manual. All elections officers in the state are required to follow that manual.
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“After the lawsuit was filed, they attempted to get a legislative change but were not ultimately successful. They did, however, convince the new Secretary of State, Katie Hobbs to include provisions in the new procedures manual, which is supposed to arrive before the election in November. The currently adopted elections procedures manual, from 2014, has a lot of outdated material. It sorely needs an update.”
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The new manual is part of the agreement between the Navajo Nation, Navajo County and Secretary of State Hobbs. Moore said, “It will allow us to cure unsigned early ballots up to five days after the election. It doesn’t cause us any additional administrative burden. Provisional ballots are still being counted up to five days after the election.”
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Another consideration agreed upon by the parties is, “The guarantee of language assistance for limited English proficient Navajo voters.”
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Moore said, “Providing Navajo language interpreters is something we have always done at our poling sites and we will continue to do so. One of the other things we needed to do was make sure there were multiple, accessible early voting sites on the reservation. In the past, we have had a mobile early polling place that traveled throughout the Nation. Now, we will have three early voting sites for two weeks prior to general elections. Those will be located in Kayenta, Dilkon and Pinon so they are spread out and hopefully more accessible to voters.”
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Navajo County Manager Glen Kephart joined the conversation by saying, “Making voting as accessible as possible to everyone that chooses to exercise their vote is so important. So, we will be enhancing that a bit. It doesn’t change much from what we were already doing but for those that it affects, it is a big step. These are good things and great improvements. We value the partnership that we have with the Navajo Nation and we understand why these were issues. We had discussions with their leadership and President (Jonathan) Nez is satisfied with the steps we are taking. Everyone is in agreement with the provisions we have made.”
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Moore added, “It doesn’t do us well to fight over this. It is an easy fix and we value our partnerships with our neighbors. Just these three northern counties and the Secretary of State’s office were named in the lawsuit and we are all working to remedy the situation. Ultimately, it doesn’t cost the county much monetarily and we recognize the importance of making voting easier for everyone.”
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