Right-wing media’s election deniers have spent the last two years priming their audiences to interpret any new information about the casting and counting of votes as evidence of a sinister Democratic plot to steal elections. So when news broke on Tuesday that vote tabulators were malfunctioning at some polling locations in Maricopa County, Arizona, that news accelerated through the GOP’s extensive network of conspiracy theorists in record time.
Maricopa County voters were still able to cast ballots that would later be tabulated. But efforts by Maricopa Board of Supervisors Chairman Bill Gates and County Recorder Stephen Richer — both Republicans — to keep the public calm and informed about the technical difficulties did little to slow the far-right frenzy.
Election subversion mastermind Steve Bannon’s War Room podcast became a primary source for misinformation about the Maricopa County issue, with a commentator pointing the finger at the Carter Center and describing it as a “globalist” group funded by COVID-19 vaccine manufacturer Pfizer and progressive philanthropist George Soros that has “extensive links to the Chinese Communist Party.”
“Stop the Steal” organizer Ali Alexander said he would organize protests “if there is a theft” in the state, while influencer and podcaster Charlie Kirk called the scene “manufactured chaos” and demanded that those responsible be put “in handcuffs.”
Arizona GOP chair Kelli Ward and gubernatorial nominee Kari Lake, both hardcore 2020 election deniers, each fanned the flames throughout the day. Hyperpartisan election denial site Gateway Pundit got in on the action, while extremist troll Jack Posobiec suggested imprisoning “the people behind the Maricopa County disaster” at Guantanamo Bay.
The story jumped to Fox News, where the network’s purported “straight news” anchors baselessly insinuated that the malfunctioning tabulators targeted Republicans and called the failure “next to inexcusable.”
Within hours, Maricopa County had announced that it had identified a fix — but the conspiracy theories had already caught fire, and there’s little sense they could be extinguished quickly. Right-wing activists are planning protests for Tuesday night outside election offices in Maricopa and Pima counties to demand a “hand count” of ballots, a potential flash point where conspiracy theories could quickly fuel political violence.
The right has a fully operational conspiracy theory manufacturing station, and it is not going to let the midterms pass without taking its shot.
