PHOENIX — Maricopa County Recorder Justin Heap is demanding an apology from the ACLU of Arizona after the group accused a poll worker of giving voters incomplete information about dropping off mail-in ballots.
In a letter Tuesday to Heap and the county Board of Supervisors, the ACLU said its volunteers went to drop off ballots Saturday, Oct. 24, at the early voting center in the A.E. Building in downtown Phoenix. A poll worker told them they had to show identification without explaining that showing ID is optional, the group said, according to KTAR News.
Under a new Arizona law, voters may show ID when dropping off an early ballot so it skips signature verification and is counted faster. They are not required to, and can still drop the ballot in the box without ID.
In a news release sent Thursday, the Recorder’s Office called the ACLU’s letter a “baseless attack” and said poll workers “are not political punching bags.” Heap said the group “owes” the workers an apology, and the office included a statement from the site’s inspector disputing the account.
“All I can do really is condemn what the ACLU has done here,” Heap told KTAR News on Thursday. He said poll workers at the site remembered the group and told everyone about both options, and that signs outside voting locations explain the choice.
The ACLU said it contacted officials privately first to give them a chance to fix any training gaps before going public. “Recorder Heap should be taking constituent concerns seriously and ensuring that our elections run smoothly, not engaging in divisive rhetoric against organizations working to protect the right to vote,” said Darrell Hill, policy director for the ACLU of Arizona.
Heap has said roughly 70% of voters dropping off ballots are choosing to show ID. He has also said Election Day drop-off ballots will be counted by noon the next day, even if there are 250,000 of them.
Sources: Maricopa County Recorder’s Office news release (Oct. 29, 2026), KTAR News. Thee Arizona Times uses AI-assisted reporting reviewed against the sources listed.
Photo: Funknendai / CC0 via Wikimedia Commons.
