July 13, 2022
Contact: Cory Combs, Senior Communications Manager
ccombs@issueoneaction.org, p: 202-204-8553
Arizona Secretary of State candidate Mark Finchem, who has links to the Oath Keepers, is a “dangerous anti-democratic extremist” warns Issue One Action CEO Nick Penniman
Washington, DC – July 13, 2022 – A dangerous election-denying extremist — who has links to the Oath Keepers right-wing militia and was part of the crowd outside the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, when rioters stormed the building — could emerge next month as the Republican Party’s nominee for secretary of state in Arizona, the top state official who oversees election administration.
Mark Finchem — who is a current member of the Arizona House of Representatives — has been endorsed by former President Donald Trump and is a leading candidate in the competitive GOP primary, which will be held on Aug. 2 and for which voting is currently underway. Finchem also has a record of spreading disinformation about the 2020 election and sowing doubts about the legitimacy of our elections.
“Elections should be run by public servants who are committed to administering free and fair elections, not rogue partisan operatives who will undermine voters’ confidence in the democratic process,” said Issue One Action CEO Nick Penniman.
Penniman continued: “Mark Finchem is a dangerous, anti-democratic extremist who would overturn the will of the people, and he continues to peddle lies about the integrity of our elections to this day. People who do not believe in free and fair elections are unfit for elected office in the United States — especially for the position of secretary of state.”
Across the country this year, election deniers have been running to serve as secretary of state. While election deniers have been defeated at the ballot box in GOP primaries in places including Colorado, Georgia, Idaho, Nebraska, and Ohio, Republicans have also selected election deniers as their secretary of state nominees in states such as Michigan, Nevada, and New Mexico. And Pennsylvania Republicans chose an election denier who was present at the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol to be their gubernatorial nominee.
Mark Finchem’s record as an election denier
After Joe Biden won Arizona in the 2020 election, Mark Finchem, along with 29 of his colleagues in the state legislature, signed a joint resolution calling for all of the state’s Electoral College votes to go to Donald Trump instead.
Finchem spoke at a pro-Trump rally in Washington, D.C., the day before the riot at the Capitol, falsely telling the crowd that the 2020 election was stolen. He was also in the crowd just outside the Capitol as it was stormed by rioters on Jan. 6, but he has insisted that he never entered the building. He has been subpoenaed by the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack.
Finchem has continued to spread lies about the 2020 election. Earlier this year, he introduced a resolution to “decertify” the 2020 election results in three Arizona counties. He also participated in a recent panel held by conspiracy theorist Jovan Pulitzer, who claimed to have developed technology to identify “fraudulent” ballots. At the event, Finchem said he stood with Americans who believe “we have compromised elections in every state and every county” and warned against “moving on” from the 2020 election.
When running for the state legislature in 2014, Finchem described himself as a member of the Oath Keepers, a right-wing, anti-government extremist group that was involved in the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol and is one of the largest far-right anti-government groups active in the United States, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center. The Department of Justice has charged the leader of the Oath Keepers and nearly a dozen other members of the group with seditious conspiracy for their roles in the Jan. 6 attack.
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