Advocates celebrate expanded Maricopa County early voting sites

Maricopa County will have more than a dozen early voting sites open ahead of the state’s primary election on July 21, an expansion that activists are hailing as a win amid ongoing spats between the county’s election officials. 

Standing down the street from the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors offices in downtown Phoenix, Gina Mendez, an organizer with Living United for Change in Arizona, called the increase in voting sites a “victory for voting access.” The board approved an early voting plant that increased the number of voting sites from 12 to 16.

“That means that voters will have more opportunities to cast their ballots,” Mendez said. “More working families, seniors, students, rural voters, voters with disabilities, Black and brown and indigenous communities, Latino and immigrant communities all across Maricopa County will have access to early voting.” 

Mendez lauded the board’s actions as “holding the line” against Maricopa County Recorder Justin Heap, who has been criticized by progressive groups for what they view as efforts to chip away at trust in the county’s election processes. Heap and the county board of supervisors have been at odds since he took office and the two have been entrenched in a legal battle over election duties for more than a year. 

In June 2025, Heap filed a lawsuit against the board over an agreement made with his predecessor that stripped the recorder’s office of much of its control of early voting processing. While a recent ruling from the Arizona Court of Appeals leaves the board in charge of early voting ahead of the primary, litigation continues. Disagreement over who is in control of early voting has resulted in several spats between Heap and the board, including one that arose after surveillance footage caught Heap’s staffers removing voting equipment from the city’s central tabulation center. Heap claimed the equipment rightfully belonged to his office. 

Critics say Heap, a Republican, has used his position to cast doubt on the county’s election processes instead of working to make them more accessible. In March, Heap referred more than 200 names to the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office for investigation he said were noncitizens who were registered to vote. That claim has been frequently advanced by the Trump administration and Republicans across the country in a bid to undermine trust in elections. And the federal database that Heap used to identify the alleged noncitizens has produced multiple false positives in other states. 

Steve Gallardo, who sits on the county board of supervisors and represents District 5, which spans the southwest part of the county, denounced Heap for pushing election conspiracy theories. He accused Heap of purposefully attacking the county’s election processes with the end goal of petitioning the Trump administration to take over. Gallardo said he would continue to oppose Heap’s actions and said voters can remain confident in the county’s oversight of early voting this month.

“This primary election in three weeks is going to be run safe, secure, accurate and transparent,” he said. “Voters can vote with confidence, when they cast their ballots their ballots are going to be counted. That’s the message that we want to send to all the voters across Maricopa County, regardless of all the rhetoric and false statements.”