With four days until Election Day, Trump and his allies are doing everything they can to undermine the will of voters to scare them away from exercising the most fundamental right we have in America. Across the country, MAGA Republicans are harassing and intimidating innocent people who are just trying to exercise our democratic right to choose our leaders. Despite the fact that both in-person and absentee voting is safe and secure, extremists are sowing doubt and confusion. They are following the Trump playbook – intimidating voters in order to try and make sure that only their supporters are able to vote. But they will fail – because Americans reject their solutions. MAGA Republicans will stop at nothing to disrupt our elections and threaten voters directly.
VICE: A GOP Official Is Allegedly Knocking on Doors to Tell People They Can’t Vote. “‘We received a very alarming report over the past week about a precinct chair of the Travis County Republican Party, knocking on people’s doors, accusing them of illegally voting by mail, even though the people we spoke with were clearly eligible to vote by mail,’ Christina Beeler, a voting rights staff attorney with the civil rights group, told VICE News. ‘They were being extremely aggressive.’ […] The hostile and confrontational nature of voter intimidation tactics in Texas has increased significantly in recent weeks. Throughout the state, in addition to aggressive door-knocking campaigns, VICE News has also uncovered reports of election officials demanding that voters hand over their smartphones and smartwatches before voting and found that some poll workers looking over voters’ shoulders and wearing obviously partisan attire while inside the polling stations. Threatening letter-writing campaigns to voters have occurred as well.” [VICE News, 11/3/22]
Slate: What the Far-Right Fringe Online Is Planning for Election Day. “If the attack on Paul Pelosi last week brought the threat of the far-right fringe back into national headlines, the people who monitor extremists online had already been seeing warning signs headed into the U.S. midterm elections. Talk of rigged races, conspiracy theories, and instructions for “monitoring” certain polls have proliferated on message boards and other forums, sometimes stoked by the candidates themselves.” [Slate, 11/3/22]
Reuters: In The Hunt For Voter Fraud, Republican Door Knockers Are Intimidating Residents: Officials. “The incidents highlight how a once-routine staple of American elections — door-to-door canvassing — has been adopted by former U.S. President Donald Trump’s supporters since the 2020 election to prove his baseless claims of voter fraud, or potentially disenfranchise voters by stoking doubts about voter registration books. In at least 19 states, pro-Trump canvassers are using their findings to press election officials to clean up what they claim are inaccurate voter-registration lists, saying they could open the door to fraudulent voting. In at least one state, Michigan, they plan to use their list of alleged irregularities to challenge voters in the Nov. 8 election. Canvassers believe such efforts are uncovering evidence that voting machines were rigged in 2020 to steal the election from Trump, according to a review by Reuters of the groups’ literature and reports.” [Reuters, 11/3/22]
New York Times: Election Officials Say Efforts to Intimidate Voters Are Widening. “Drop-box watchers and disinformation about mail-in voting pose threats for election officials, who want to assure the public that voting is secure. In the final stanza of the midterms, election officials in several states are warning that efforts to intimidate voters and undermine public confidence in the electoral process are intensifying, even as voter fraud is rare. At the same time, those officials have sought to reassure Americans that voting is safe and secure despite vigilante drop-box watchers and a disinformation campaign targeting mail-in voting.” [The New York Times, 11/3/22]
Michigan Advance: Misinformation About Voting Crops Up Around The U.S. As Midterm Elections Near. “These efforts, from recruiting a sea of 2020 election denying poll workers and challengers to monitoring drop boxes, are concerning political experts and election workers who worry they could lead to voter intimidation or other illegal activity emanating from the right-wing individuals focused on undermining and attacking democracy. […] Aghogho Edevbie, the Michigan state director for All Voting is Local Action, said that while “everyone has a right to monitor these boxes” because they’re in public spaces, ‘there’s a fine line between monitoring and intimidation. Unfortunately, what we’ve been seeing from the beginning when drop boxes became more prevalent in Michigan is that there’s a group of folks very much in the minority who believe drop boxes should not be used,’ said Edevbie.” [Michigan Advance, 11/3/22]
Spectrum News: Officials Warn of ‘Heightened Threat’ To Midterms. “In a speech Wednesday evening, President Joe Biden issued a stark warning about political violence: ‘We must, with one overwhelming unified voice, speak as a country and say there’s no place, no place for voter intimidation or political violence in America’. Biden’s comments appeared to echo warnings issued by top U.S. intelligence officials in a recent bulletin, which warns that extremists pose a ‘heightened threat’ to the 2022 midterms. Last week, multiple news outlets reported on a joint memo warning that ‘election-related perceptions of fraud’ will likely spur domestic violent extremists in the ‘plotting of violence and broader efforts to justify violence in the lead up to and following the 2022 midterm election cycle.’ Much of the projected violence will likely come from lone actors, officials said, and those extremists are expected to target “states or counties where recounts, audits, or public election disputes occur,’ the memo read in part.” [Spectrum News, 11/3/22]
