After a sweeping Democratic win in Arizona on Nov. 3, the state’s top election deniers have largely avoided their usual claims of election fraud. Two appear to have conceded without explicitly saying they lost their races, and the third says he will accept the results once counting is finished.
The muted reactions break from years of fraud claims by Arizona Republicans, and they come as Democrats appear headed for a sweep of the state’s top offices and both chambers of the Legislature, according to KTAR News.
Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs swiftly defeated US Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Gilbert), winning a second term. The race was called by Decision Desk HQ at 8:11 p.m. MST on election night, and a day later, Biggs appears to have conceded in a post on X without explicitly congratulating Hobbs.
“We offer our profound gratitude and sincere thanks to our supporters for doing everything in their power to help our campaign,” Biggs wrote on X. “Thank you, Arizona. May God continue to bless this beautiful state and its wonderful people.”
It was a stark contrast to 2021, when Biggs objected to counting electoral votes from Arizona along with five other states that went to former president Joe Biden over President Donald Trump. The outgoing congressman also allegedly helped organize “Stop the Steal” rallies held on Jan. 6, 2021, according to Ali Alexander, an organizer of the rallies. Biggs denied involvement. He also denied former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson’s testimony to the Jan. 6 committee that he later sought a presidential pardon for it.
Biggs also wouldn’t say whether he accepted Hobbs’ 2022 win over far-right former broadcast journalist Kari Lake, who spread false claims that the election was rigged. When KTAR News asked whether he believed Hobbs was legitimately elected in July, Biggs avoided the question.
“The reality is Katie Hobbs sits in the governor’s chair right now,” Biggs said. “I think every court has said she won, and, guess what, she’s the one who set a record for vetoes. So I’m telling you I think she’s the governor, and I don’t think anybody’s questioning that she’s not the governor.”
In April, Biggs told Capitol Media Services, “Of course, I will accept the results of the election.”
Who else is changing their tune?
Biggs isn’t the only election denier who is singing a different tune this cycle. State Rep. Alexander Kolodin, a far-right extremist who pushed Trump’s 2020 claims of election fraud, appeared to accept his loss to Secretary of State Adrian Fontes in a post on X. Fontes had nearly 55% of the vote to Kolodin’s 44% when the Associated Press called the race Wednesday morning, according to Votebeat.
“Voters delivered a stunning rebuke to the national Republican party in the home of the modern conservative movement,” Kolodin wrote in a Nov. 4 post on X. “Like many of you, I am heartbroken for Arizona. I understand why voters are angry. I regret the harm that the message they sent to Washington will do to the state that I love.”
Trump endorsed Kolodin in the race. The state representative previously joined lawsuits challenging the 2020 election, including the “kraken” lawsuit in Arizona, where he served as a local attorney. That lawsuit claimed that then-Secretary of State Katie Hobbs and then-Gov. Doug Ducey engaged in “massive election fraud” to manufacture a win for Biden, according to reporting by the Arizona Mirror.
The State Bar of Arizona later disciplined Kolodin over his election lawsuits, and in 2023 he was placed on 18 months of probation.
During his time in office, Kolodin has pushed several efforts to make voting harder for Arizonans, including Proposition 144, which would require mail voters to show ID and which critics warned could effectively gut mail-in voting. Prop. 144 has not yet been called as of Nov. 5, but voters were rejecting the measure by 53% in early, unofficial results, according to the Associated Press.
Arizona Senate President Warren Petersen, too, lost his bid to unseat Attorney General Kris Mayes. NBC News called the race for Mayes at 11:22 p.m. MST on Nov. 3. In 2022, Mayes beat Abe Hamadeh, now a Republican congressman, by 280 votes. This time, the margin is much larger, with Mayes leading Petersen 55% to 44% as of Nov. 5, according to NBC News.
Unlike Biggs and Kolodin, Petersen has not yet conceded. In a Nov. 4 post on X, published after NBC News projected Mayes’ victory, Petersen thanked his team and criticized both parties. He added that he would accept the results once counting is over.
“The votes coming in now are overwhelmingly in our favor, but we have a large gap to close,” Petersen wrote. “When the counting is done, we will accept the results.”
Petersen, a far-right Republican backed by Trump, has echoed false claims of mass voter fraud since 2020. In March, he complied with a federal grand jury subpoena and handed the FBI records from the Arizona Senate’s partisan review of Maricopa County’s 2020 election. The review, conducted by a private firm called Cyber Ninjas, ultimately confirmed that Biden won the election.
Petersen later referred both Mayes and Fontes to the Justice Department for investigation after the two asked what records he handed over to the FBI.
“Today I referred Kris Mayes and Adrian Fontes to the Department of Justice for obstruction of justice and tampering with a witness,” Petersen said in April. “The Arizona Attorney General and Secretary of State’s actions may constitute obstruction of justice and witness tampering.”
Mayes said in a press release at the time that Petersen’s actions were about “laying the groundwork to deny the results of the 2026 election if they don’t go their way.”
Who’s to blame?
All three candidates were Trump allies endorsed by Turning Point Action, the political arm of the far-right group Turning Point USA. While Trump has historically pushed claims of widespread fraud after his losses, he’s avoided such claims this cycle, instead arguing that had he been on the ballot, Republicans would have done better.
“I wasn’t on the Ballot and if I was, we would have won IN A LANDSLIDE! Thank you for your attention to this matter,” he wrote in a Nov. 3 post on Truth Social.
Other top Republicans, including Vice President JD Vance, blamed the losses on the Iran war, which Trump launched in February.
“The reason we lost is the war,” Vance wrote in a Nov. 4 post on X. “The president himself said so last night.”
Former US Sen. Jeff Flake, (R-Ariz.), a longtime critic of how his party has changed under Trump, argued that the losses go beyond the war.
“Republicans are blaming the Iran war and rising prices for this week’s electoral shellacking. Fair enough. But the economic damage didn’t begin with the war,” Flake wrote in a Nov. 5 post on X. “It began with indiscriminate tariffs that amounted to a tax increase on American consumers.”
Down the ballot, the Arizona Republic projects that Democrats will take back the state Senate, and they are on track to flip the state House, too. That would give Arizona its first Democratic trifecta since 1966, according to Votebeat.
Gina Swoboda, former chair of the Arizona Republican Party, who lost the GOP primary for secretary of state to Kolodin in July, pointed the finger at Turning Point Action, which endorsed Republicans for every statewide office on the ballot, for costing the GOP its majority.
“I don’t know how many times the voters of Arizona have to say no. No, we do not want Turning Point,” Swoboda said to KTAR News 92.3 FM’s election special Nov. 4.
Maricopa County Supervisor Thomas Galvin, a Republican, went further at a Nov. 4 board meeting. “My fellow Republicans need to stop lying about allegations and conspiracy theories about election fraud,” he said. “It wasn’t just swing voters, it was Republican voters who are just sick and tired of this.”
