More Maricopa County voters likely split their ballots in 2020 election

PHOENIX — Not all Republican voters in Maricopa County toed the line at the top of last week’s ballot, but they seemed to do that further down.

Throughout the 2020 campaign, President Donald Trump polled poorly with suburban voters.

“He has always polled low when it came to Republican women, and so did Martha McSally,” ABC15 Data Analyst Garrett Archer told KTAR News 92.3 FM.

Republican Sen. Martha McSally tied her campaign to Trump, and she went down in defeat with him.

Archer noted more Republicans voted in-person on Election Day. Their ballots are still being counted, meaning close victories for their candidates when the election is certified in the coming weeks.

“If the election would have ended on that Tuesday, Democrats would have taken Arizona with no problems,” Archer said. “They were up by ten points in some situations.”

As of Wednesday evening, President-elect Joe Biden continued to lead Trump by 11,635 votes statewide and by 44,673 in the state’s most populous county.

Archer says all four of the state’s Republican U.S. House members polled better than Trump and McSally.

All nine of Arizona’s U.S. House members — which includes five Democrats — kept their jobs.

Archer pointed to evidence like “sending another Democrat to the Senate, but also voting Republican in most of the Congressional districts, and basically keeping the status quo — in fact, increasing some of the Republican numbers on the county level.”

In Maricopa County, Recorder Adrian Fontes, a Democrat, is trailing in his own re-election race by 4,652 votes to Republican Stephen Richer as of Wednesday evening.

Jevin Hodge, a Democratic challenger for the Board of Supervisors in District 1, was leading incumbent Republican Jack Sellers by just 232 votes on Tuesday, but Sellers regained the lead on Wednesday by 416 votes.

Republicans retained control of both houses of the Arizona State Legislature.

“Both chambers have gone more conservative, with moderates being voted out,” Copper State Consulting Political Analyst Emily Ryan said.

She expects both parties in all levels of government to keep fighting each other, and themselves, with neither side wanting to give the other a political victory, but topics like solutions for the coronavirus pandemic and economic recovery could bring them together.

“If it’s something they believe they can take some credit for back home, they’ll be likely to go along with it,” Ryan said.

Follow @ktarpetersamore