An Associated Press analysis shows mixed results for Republican Secretaries of State who promised major changes aimed at keeping fraud out of elections. In some cases, because their rhetoric has bumped up against skepticism from members of their own party. Newly elected secretaries of state in Alabama, Indiana and Wyoming who had questioned the legitimacy of the 2020 election are now facing the task of backing up their campaign pledges in states where Republicans have already set strict election laws.
While Alabama’s Wes Allen and Wyoming’s Chuck Gray were not on the America First coalition’s candidate list, they also raised doubts about the 2020 vote. Allen repeated a debunked claim calling the thirty-one state Electronic Registration Information Center organization a “Soros-funded, leftist group.” That’s a reference to liberal billionaire George Soros. The voter registration data-sharing partnership is designed to maintain accurate voter rolls by identifying people who have moved or died. It’s funded by states after receiving initial startup support from The Pew Charitable Trusts. Allen’s first official act was to withdraw Alabama from the group, citing privacy concerns.
Voters in politically pivotal swing states such as Arizona, Michigan and Nevada rejected candidates seeking to oversee elections who had echoed former President Donald Trump’s false claims about the 2020 presidential election. But newly elected secretaries of state in Alabama, Indiana and Wyoming who had questioned the legitimacy of that election won easily in those Republican-dominated states. They are now facing the task of backing up their campaign pledges in states where Republicans have already set strict election laws.
A large segment of Republicans, 58%, still believe Biden’s 2020 victory was not legitimate, according to an October poll by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.
