Adrian Fontes reacts to executive order overhauling elections

In a statement today, Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes said that he firmly believes that the president is laying the groundwork to cancel elections in 2026.

One of Fontes’s largest concerns is the federalization of elections in the future. He is also concerned about the nine substituents that are large and complicated. Fontes said this is a “very methodical attack against the fundamental precept of our democracy.”

Another part of the order that concerns Fontes is the mention in the executive order of “unsecure elections” in the U.S. because he believes the U.S. does have secure elections and that the country does well in elections.

Since the order requires U.S. citizenship to be proved with selective printed documents, he said, “what you have is an executive that by fiat wants to do something that they can’t do through legislative process and that’s dangerous.”

Fontes said he would look at being a part of a lawsuit against the Trump administration if the order were to take place.

“I can tell you right now there’s a likelihood that for at least some of these sections, we will be joined by Republican secretaries of state across the country because they don’t want the federal government running their elections either,” Fontes said.

He said he believes the Trump administration’s narrative “destroys the trust we have in all of our institutions when the core institution that we can really believe in is eroded that way.”

“I’m not trying to be hyperbolic, but at the end of the day, where does this lead to? There’s only one path I can see, and that’s a real problem for this federal republic,” Fontes said.