Mark Finchem.Photo: Ross D Franklin/AP/Shutterstock
Republican Mark Finchem has made Trump’s claims of voter fraud a core part of his platform — both as a candidate for Arizona secretary of state and as a state representative.
He has said he wants to ban early voting,co-sponsored a billthat would allow the state’s Republican-led legislature the ability to overturn election results, and is currently gathering signatures on a petition that says it would decertify the state’s 2020 election results, despite the fact that a petition cannot legally overturn them (and despite the fact that several lawsuits and audits have confirmed Trump’s loss in Arizona).
But he also says he himself will refuse to concede if he loses his own election Tuesday.
Axios reports that, at a June fundraiser, 65-year-old Finchem said, “Ain’t gonna be no concession speech coming from this guy. I’m going to demand a 100% hand count if there’s the slightest hint that there’s an impropriety. And I will urge the next governor to do the same.”
The New York Timesreports that arecent pollshows Finchem with a slight edge in the four-way Republican race, though the outlet notes that a significant majority of voters are still undecided.
Finchem — who has in the pastidentified himself as a memberof theOath Keepers militia group— marched to the Capitol alongside other Trump supporters on Jan. 6, 2021, the day of theCapitol riots.
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Despite losing both the electoral and popular votes in 2020, Trump has continued to claim that he won the 2020 election. CNN reports that in a speech delivered last week, the former president claimed the election was “very corrupt.”
“I ran for president. I won. Then I won a second time — did much better the second time,” Trump said. “What a disgrace it was.”
source: people.com
