Republican Bill Gates, a county official in Arizona whose role overseeing elections in 2022 brought him a torrent of threats that required him to be temporarily moved to an undisclosed location, announced Thursday that he will not seek re-election in 2024.
Gates announced his decision not to seek a third term on Maricopa County’s Board of Supervisors, in a statement Thursday that described his efforts to resist “external pressure,” and tell “the truth about our elections in the face of false information,” in a county that has been at the center of election denialism in Arizona.
Arizona has been the scene of aggressive efforts by Republican candidates to contest their defeats with false accusations of voter fraud. In 2020, former President Donald Trump argued that he had not lost the state’s presidential contest. And in 2022, Republican gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake was defeated, a loss she continues to try to litigate through the courts.
Gates is one of five members of the county’s governing board which was targeted by Lake, who had Trump’s endorsement, as she sought to sow doubt over election results after she lost the state’s 2022 gubernatorial race to Democrat Katie Hobbs. In at least one lawsuit contesting the election, Lake named Gates specifically.
“As this chapter comes to an end, I rest well knowing that I left with integrity, compassion, and dignity. Regardless of personal partisan preferences or external pressure, I remained focused on making our region the best place to live, work, and raise a family,” Gates said. “At Maricopa County, I kept government lean, taxes low, supported our most vulnerable residents, and told the truth about our elections in the face of false information. My will to fight for the truth remains unhindered, and I look forward to Maricopa County running the 2024 election.”
Gates’ plans were first reported by The Washington Post.
While Gates said that he is looking forward to his “next chapter,” he did not elaborate in the statement about his future plans.
In an interview before the midterm elections last year, Gates told NBC News that he had been working with local law enforcement as his county faced a barrage of “vile emails and social media posts.”
Then, just weeks after the 2022 election, Gates and his family were urged by local law enforcement to relocate temporarily as law enforcement investigated mounting threats.
Gates did not immediately respond to a request for comment about whether past incidents with harassment played a role in his decision.
Gates is among a wave of elections workers who described intensifying harassment and safety concerns following the 2020 election and Trump’s efforts to overturn it, with some opting to resign.
A swath of election officials in battleground states like Nevada, Georgia, and Pennsylvania, have resigned, retired or decided against seeking re-election since the 2020 election.
Gates was first elected to the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors in 2016 and previously served on the Phoenix City Council from June 2009 through May 2016. He served a one-year stint as Phoenix’s vice mayor of Phoenix in 2013.
Source: | This article originally belongs to Nbcnews.com
