Those are wise words when it comes to Elon Musk. After being left alone on the internet again without adult supervision, the billionaire man-child returned to spreading misinformation about Arizona’s voting system to his massive audience, sowing unnecessary doubt about elections and facing no consequences.
On Monday, the owner of X (formerly Twitter) tweeted, “Arizona requires proof of citizenship to vote in state elections, but explicitly does not for federal elections. This is messed up.” As of Tuesday morning, the tweet had been shared more than 45,000 times and liked by 150,000.
While it is true that Arizona does not require proof of citizenship for federal elections, that’s not because Arizona is doing something wild and crazy. It’s federal law that people can vote in federal elections without proof of citizenship. They do so under penalty of perjury, meaning that if they lie about being a citizen, then their vote is illegal.
“Sigh. It's absolutely incredible we have to do this again,” wrote ABC 15 journalist Garrett Archer in a response on X. “Elon and the Musk minions, For the thousandth time. It's Federal law. If you think it's messed up, take it up with them.”
Arizona used to have a law requiring documented proof of citizenship for all voters, but the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 2012 that this regulation conflicted with federal law. Now, Arizona requires proof of citizenship for all state and local elections but does not for a small subset of federal-only voters.
“Arizona is one of only a handful of states to have a documented proof of citizenship requirement,” tweeted Maricopa County Recorder Stephen Richer, a Republican.
Maricopa County Recorder Stephen Richer invited Elon Musk to tour the county's election facility.
Katya Schwenk
Time is a flat circle
This isn’t the first time Richer and Archer have tried to set the record straight in the wake of Musk’s misinformation. Either Musk did not learn after being called out in January and April for misleading people about Arizona’s elections in the same exact way, or he has chosen to malignantly fool his many sycophants wasting their lives on Musk’s crumbling social media site.Isn’t this man, one of the richest in the world, supposed to be smart? Musk may be known to favor a cocktail of LSD, cocaine, mushrooms, ecstasy and ketamine, but even that wouldn’t cloud the mind enough to continuously misunderstand Arizona’s elections when people such as Richer repeatedly take the time to explain them so simply.
Early Tuesday morning, the cycle began again. Musk tweeted that electronic voting machines and mail-in voting — the latter of which Arizona has successfully used for decades — are “too risky.” Paper ballots and hand counts are the only safe solution, the billionaire claimed. Again, Richer chimed in, correcting the record and extending an olive branch.
“Can I please give you a tour of our election facility and mail voting process (Maricopa County, AZ)?” Richer tweeted. “You can go into all the rooms. You can examine all the equipment. You can ask any question you want. We'd love to show you the security steps already in place, which I think are very sound.”
In a reply to another user, Richer noted such a tour is open to anybody and that his office has conducted more than 150 such tours over the last three years. But he shouldn’t hold his breath hoping Musk accepts the invitation.
After all, Musk would have to be willing to learn something.
