Matt York/AP Photo
An elections official sorts counted mail-in ballots on the first day of tabulation, October 23, 2024, at the Maricopa County Recorder’s Office in Phoenix, Arizona.
Donald Trump has repeatedly signaled his supporters to conclude that if he loses, the election has been stolen, and to proceed accordingly. There are extensive reports of MAGA plans to harass poll workers, threaten their families, and do whatever it takes to mess with the ballot count. That, in turn, would delay certification of the winner, create space for court challenges, and add to the sense of turmoil and confusion about the legitimacy of the balloting and the question of who really won.
In most states, the work of actually tallying the vote is done in county election centers. So the most dangerous venue for these vigilante tactics is at the county level, especially in counties governed by MAGA Republicans, who would work hand in glove with Trumpers seeking to intimidate poll workers and delay the count.
Trump’s game plan is hardly a secret. He has repeatedly blared it out. And his radical base has responded. The New York Times recently ran a compendium of posts on Telegram, the social media platform used by by far-right extremists to organize disruptions.
According to the Times, in New Hampshire, a Telegram organizer instructed people to personally challenge local officials counting absentee ballots. In Georgia, a local Telegram channel urged followers to attend election board meetings to argue for limits to absentee voting. In New Mexico, people were told to monitor voting stations with cameras.
Unlike in 2020, when Trump as the incumbent tried and failed to use the instruments of government to steal the election, this time the instruments of the federal government are part of a Democratic administration. The Department of Justice has had nearly four years to work with voting rights groups and state officials to frustrate vigilante interference with the count.
In 2021, the DOJ created an Election Threats Task Force, led by the FBI, to coordinate all levels of government including state law enforcement, and respond to threats. Under every state law, interfering with an election is a crime, and in many states it’s a felony.
In some places, like Maricopa County, Arizona, in downtown Phoenix the election counting headquarters has literally been turned into a fortress. Staffers are monitoring social media in real time for threats. There is drone surveillance. County Sheriff Russ Skinner has suspended vacations and mobilized 200 department personnel to monitor polling sites and outdoor drop boxes. There are even contingency plans to post snipers on rooftops. This may seem excessive, but Maricopa was ground zero in the attempts by Trump and his allies after the 2020 election to stop the vote counting, with hundreds of Trump supporters protesting outside of the county’s tabulation center.
But here’s the problem. Maricopa’s sheriff and other county officials are Democrats, committed to an honest and speedy count. But in MAGA-led Republican counties, officials look the other way as threats continue, and even before the election, as counting of mail ballots had begun, the harassment has already commenced.
In MAGA-led Republican counties, officials look the other way as threats continue.
Last Wednesday, according to a report in the respected publication Cal Matters, as election workers at the Shasta County Registrar of Voters office counted ballots that have already been cast, “a group of nine people, holding clipboards and taking notes, stood in a hallway peering through wired glass as workers took ballots out of envelopes. Across the hallway another group of observers hovered over computer screens, watching a live video feed of workers in a room verifying signatures.” One woman demanded, but did not get, access to the room.
This was too much for many of the election workers. According to Cal Matters, 10 out of a staff of 21 have already quit. County law enforcement, unlike in Phoenix, was no help, because Shasta County is MAGA territory. And if there are more episodes like this one that fly beneath the radar of Justice Department surveillance, county counts (which aggregate to state counts) could be impeded and certification of winners thrown into doubt.
In three years, the DOJ task force has prosecuted fewer than 30 people. (It also took years to bring a case against Trump himself for his attempted coup.) A few of the more flagrant offenders have been convicted and sentenced to prison. In late October, the Justice Department announced four more cases, including one conviction. Brian Ogstad, 60, of Cullman, Alabama, was sentenced to 30 months in prison for sending messages threatening violence to election workers with Maricopa County in 2022.
The problem is that these cases take years, and they are a drop in the bucket. Amy Cohen, executive director of the National Association of State Election Directors, has been skeptical. “It is very clear that we are not seeing a deterrent effect,” she told a reporter, adding that “election officials by and large have no confidence that if something were to happen to them, there would be any consequences.”
There is definitely more coordination among various levels of law enforcement than ever before. What’s not clear is whether there will be sufficiently rapid response at adequate scale to combat harassment of election workers in MAGA strongholds. A recent Brennan Center survey found that about 60 percent of local election workers are concerned about their safety.
Prosecutions take months or years. What’s needed in the face of threats and harassment of poll workers is law enforcement responses in hours, or even minutes.
Rapid FBI and DOJ response is complicated by the ambiguity of the effect of the 2013 Shelby County v. Holder decision, which invalidated the preclearance provisions of the Voting Rights Act. When the Justice Department sought to send in monitors to observe polling places in the 2022 election, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis denied them permission to enter, and the Justice Department did not press the point in court. The monitors observed from outside.
DeSantis is taking the same position this year, as is Missouri Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft, and Texas Secretary of State Jane Nelson. It’s not clear how this doctrine would affect possible FBI or DOJ actions in the face of imminent threats to election workers and the ballot count. In an extreme situation, a president may also federalize the National Guard to protect democracy.
On balance, the various levels of government seem better prepared to resist MAGA efforts to intimidate poll workers and delay certification than they were in 2020. We will soon find out if they are tough enough.
