Election Officials in Danger: Via Trump'$ "Big Lie" & Con$tant Con to Rai$e Million$

Sample provocation in many locations

(Serious examples seen in video below)

Super article and a dramatic 7-minute video from the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU (formatted to fit the blog) with this headline:

“Attacks Against Election Officials Are Taking a Toll”

A new Brennan Center poll finds that election officials are under attack and leaving their jobs. They need Congressional help now.

Between Janu­ary 31 and Febru­ary 14, the Benen­son Strategy Group published a poll with nearly 600 local elec­tion offi­cials about their jobs. 

Their responses should set off warn­ing bells across all levels of govern­ment and provoke action from Congress. 

More than half of the respond­ents said they’re concerned about the safety of their colleagues. Nearly one in three know at least one colleague who quit their job in part or entirely because of safety concerns, increased threats, or intim­id­a­tion. 

Of those who have been threatened, more than half have exper­i­enced it up close and personal. Why is this happen­ing? Well, the “Big Lie,” of course.

Nearly two in three local elec­tion offi­cials we polled said that false inform­a­tion about elec­tions makes their jobs more danger­ous, and 95% blame social media compan­ies for allow­ing their plat­forms to peddle outright lies and conspir­acy theor­ies.

It should­n’t come as a surprise why these public servants are look­ing over their shoulders when you hear some of their stor­ies: Racist harass­ment. Death threats. Private personal inform­a­tion released online. From GA this fright­en­ing story of someone showed up at the door of an elec­tion worker to make a “citizen’s arrest.” But the elec­tion worker didn’t live there anymore. It was her grand­mother’s place, and her grand­mother was under­stand­ably terri­fied.

Incid­ents like these have even led some elec­tion offi­cials to flee their homes for safety.

For a more visceral taste of what elec­tion offi­cials have faced since the 2020 elec­tion, watch the following 7-minute video:

Election officials threatened across America

(Note: Harsh language in video)

Elec­tion offi­cials also warned of another threat as we charge full steam ahead toward Novem­ber’s midterms and then on to the 2024 pres­id­en­tial elec­tion: polit­ical inter­fer­ence. 

Nearly one in five respond­ents worry they will face pres­sure to certify elec­tion results in favor of a specific candid­ate or party. These polit­ical attacks are taking their toll with 20% polled plan on leav­ing their jobs before the 2024 elec­tion, and of those, 1/3 cite polit­ical lead­ers’ dishon­est attacks on the legit­im­acy of our elec­tion systems as one of the top reas­ons. 

Despite the hard­ships they face, most elec­tion offi­cials enjoy their jobs, explain­ing they took the job to serve their communit­ies and make sure our elec­tions run smoothly and fairly. 

If we want these honest public offi­cials to stay in their jobs, they need help with three out of four elec­tion offi­cials believe the federal govern­ment should be doing more to support them. 

It’s time for Congress to take these threats seri­ously and protect them against the viol­ent conspir­acy theor­ists and partis­ans who continue to under­mine the legit­im­acy of our elec­tion systems. 

These are many ways Congress can help:

1. Set aside funds for election worker’s home and office secur­ity.

2. Make it a crime to intim­id­ate, threaten, or attack elec­tion work­ers during the process.

3. Make it a crime to “dox” elec­tion work­ers and reveal their personal inform­a­tion.1

These things are the least Congress can do for these unsung heroes of our demo­cracy who are under attack as and seen and stated above.

My 2 Cents: A lot has to be done to protect election workers, period – no excuses but rather positive action.

Thanks for stopping by.