Two top Arizona election officials abruptly quit their jobs ahead of the state’s primary election, citing continued threats from supporters of former President Donald Trump after the 2020 election, multiple reports said.
Leslie Hoffman, the county recorder-elect of Yavapai County, said Friday she will step down later this month after facing two years of “nastiness” from election naysayers, The Washington Post reported.
Hoffman said elections director Lynn Constable, who has worked for the county for 18 years, is leaving for the same reason, The Post reported. Constable did not immediately respond to Insider’s request for comment.
Election officials across the country have come under fire after Trump lost the 2020 presidential election and falsely claimed it was fraudulent. However, Trump won Yavapai County in 2020.
Hoffman said, according to The Post, “I’m a Republican on the record living in a Republican district where the candidate they wanted to win won 2 to 1 in that district and I’m still grieving, and so is my staff.”
“I’m not sure what they think we’ve done wrong,” she said. “And they are very nasty. The accusations and threats are nasty.”
Hoffman has accepted another job outside the county, ABC 15 Arizona reported. She said the abuse she received after the 2020 election prompted the local sheriff’s department to provide her with security, the outlet reported.
“The threats I have, the sheriff periodically patrols my house. It’s been a lot, and when the job offer came, I took it,” she said, ABC 15 Arizona reported.
The resignations of Hoffman and Constable come weeks before the state’s primary election, which begins Aug. 2. Advance ballots are due next week.
Hoffman told The Post that she is confident the primaries will go smoothly and that the remaining officials “will be very diligent in vetting anyone they would consider hiring.”
While Trump won Yavapai County in 2020, President Joe Biden ended up winning Arizona, once a Republican stronghold.
Last month, a former Georgia election official testified at the committee’s Jan. 6 public hearing about the attacks on her and her family after Trump’s loss.
Wandrea “Shaye” Moss, who is black, said she received violent and racist threats from an anti-choice group, forcing her to quit her job, hide her identity and live in Airbnbs for two months at the FBI’s recommendation .
“I felt terrible,” she told the panel. “I felt homeless. I can’t believe this person has caused so much damage to me and my family that he has to leave my home.”
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