Heap wasn’t at work the day mailer screw-up hit Recorder’s Office

On the day his office learned it had committed an epic screw-up, it’s not clear where Maricopa County Recorder Justin Heap was. But one thing is clear, according to records obtained by Phoenix New Times: The MAGA-aligned Heap was not at the Recorder’s Office.

On Thursday, June 26, the Recorder’s Office first learned it had sent erroneous mailers to 83,000 voters in the county. The mailers were supposed to inform the voters that they were required to submit proof of U.S. citizenship in order to vote in future non-federal elections. Instead, the mailers incorrectly told the voters that their registrations would soon be canceled because they had moved out of state.

First reported by Votebeat, the mailers sparked confusion, panic and anger. Voters demanded an explanation and feared they’d be disenfranchised. Many called the Recorder’s Office for clarification but encountered skyrocketing wait times. Meanwhile, no statement about the issue would be issued by the agency until a day later.

As Recorder’s Office staff tried to sort out the mess, Heap was apparently elsewhere. Via public records request, New Times obtained a log of Heap’s badge entry and exit scans into county buildings over his first nine months in office. The log shows that on June 25 and June 27 — the day before the mailer mix-up was discovered and the day after, when the Recorder’s Office finally addressed it publicly — Heap was in the office. But on June 26, the day the issue exploded, Heap never swiped his badge at the county’s government building on West Jefferson Street.

The Recorder’s Office did not respond to a request from New Times for information on Heap’s whereabouts and activities on that day. Based on his public calendar, which New Times also obtained via public records request, Heap wasn’t scheduled to be out of the office. Two days prior, his calendar specifically states he was out of the office, suggesting such absences are usually noted.

The only item on Heap’s calendar for June 26 was a 10 a.m. “Enhanced Voting Implementing Meeting” — apparently virtual and held on Microsoft Teams. An earlier meeting on Heap’s schedule for the day was listed as canceled.

Heap not being in the office isn’t exactly uncommon, records show. 

That month alone, Heap was in the office for only 12 of the month’s 21 business days, according to his badge scan records, meaning he was present for only 57% of the days that month. On three of the days he was out, Heap was attending Certified Elections Registration Administrator courses at an Embassy Suites in Phoenix for at least part of the day. He’s marked as being out of the office one day, while four days don’t have anything on Heap’s calendar to suggest other commitments. 

Through a spokesperson, GOP-controlled Maricopa County Board of Supervisors, with whom Heap has feuded and even taken to court over election duties, declined to comment on Heap’s apparent absence. But Stephen Richer, the previous recorder whom Heap defeated in the GOP primary, told New Times in an email that he routinely worked longer hours than his successor seems to be putting in. “I averaged 6 days a week in the office and about 50-55 hours a week in the office,” Richer wrote. “But, again, I’m a bit of a nut and workaholic.”

Richer allowed that Heap’s first year has been less hectic than Richer’s, which was dominated by conspiracies about the 2020 election. “Maybe Heap can get by with missing some days because of the comparative calm,” Richer wrote. Still, the day the mailer issue surfaced was likely anything but calm.

“If something major happened at the office and I wasn’t there to work on it, to put shoulder to oar, then I would have been embarrassed to face my staff,” Richer wrote. “For what it’s worth.”

A messy first year

Heap’s brief time as recorder has been plagued by issues.

He ran for office by claiming that Maricopa County’s elections were a laughingstock, cozying up to the election-denying elements of the Republican Party. Since taking office, he’s had some trouble sticking to the truth. Early on, he claimed to have fired employees who had in fact left before he took office. Not long after, he threw himself into conflict with the Board of Supervisors, with which the Recorder’s Office shares election responsibilities.

That dust-up has gotten particularly acrimonious at times. Supervisors — particularly board chair Thomas Galvin, also a Republican — have blasted Heap for his bellicose approach to and inaccurate portrayal of negotiations over a new Shared Services Agreement between the two entities.

In May, the board balked at Heap’s stated plan to mail unsolicited ballots to voters ahead of the primary election to fill the seat of late Rep. Raul Grijalva, noting that the plan was illegal. Gina Swoboda, the chair of the Arizona Republican Party and now a congressional candidate, even threatened to sue if the plan were implemented. In July, Heap was caught in text messages claiming he had the support of the board’s lone Democrat, Steve Gallardo. Gallardo vehemently denied that claim and asked for an investigation into Heap.

Heap’s apparent absence on the day the mailer situation blew up wasn’t even the end of that particular mess. Badge records show Heap returned to the office the following day, working from roughly 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. on June 27, though he stopped short of taking accountability. In a statement issued that day, Heap deflected blame, claiming that the mailer SNAFU “was not caused by internal mistakes at the recorder’s office” and that the vendor “has taken full responsibility for the mistake.”

But on June 30, 12 News reported that Recorder’s Office emails — which were later also obtained by New Times — showed that wasn’t necessarily the case. On June 10, a Recorder’s Office employee (whose name and information were redacted in emails released to news outlets) had approved a proof of the incorrect letter sent by county vendor Complete Print Shop.

“These are good to go,” the employee wrote. “Please prioritize printing and mailing these 83K notices first.”

The Recorder’s Office eventually ironed out its own mistake, sending a second letter to affected voters explaining that they must provide proof of citizenship by submitting a copy of their birth certificate or passport. The 83,000 people who received the letter were among the 200,000 voters in the state who were asked to prove their citizenship due to a Motor Vehicles Division database error identified by Richer before the 2024 election.

Other issues may loom for the Recorder’s Office next year. In the November election this year, the Recorder’s Office rejected an unusually high number of ballots for having bad signatures compared to previous elections, which led some supervisors to be concerned that legitimate votes weren’t counted. That puts a spotlight on Heap’s signature verification techniques ahead of the crucial 2026 midterm elections.