When Hope Springs from Field PAC placed poll watchers in North Carolina and Georgia in those state’s primaries this year, one of the things we didn’t expect was the fact it was reassuring to poll workers. We wouldn’t have known this if we hadn’t set up polling place observer tables outside of the polling locations 36 precincts in 11 counties in North Carolina with historical patterns of late openings or intermittent closings. While poll workers (paid, “volunteer” staff inside of polling locations who work for Board of Elections (or Registrar) in their counties) will often thank poll watchers for coming, you would think this is just normal, polite conversation with people who plan to spend the next ~14 hours with. But thanking outside volunteers who manned our poll observing tables went well beyond that. Some of them made it clear that our presence was reassuring given fear of disruptive poll watchers assigned to them by the Republican Party of GOP campaigns.
The AP picked up on this disruptive behavior on the part of GOP poll watchers this weekend. The headline was clear, “Election officials brace for confrontational poll watchers.” The article notes that despite the fact that the North Carolina State Board of Elections had written rules to prevent incidents at polling places in the primaries, the Republican Party had challenged those rules and the North Carolina rules review board had blocked their implementation. Poll workers will go into the November elections without the needed protections that will prevent GOP poll watchers from trying to frustrate and intimidate voters — especially minority voters. (All the incidents that we recorded on election day or subsequently in Incident Reports we gathered at the door during canvassing were with black voters and white Republican poll watchers.)
The worries this year are similar to those during the 2020 election, when Trump began railing against mail voting and the Republican National Committee launched its first national operation in decades. It had recently been freed from a consent decree that limited its poll watching operation after it previously was found to have targeted Black and Latino voters.
The need to maintain a Democratic presence at the polls — and, especially, at locations with majority Democratic or minority voters — is even more critical in light of training, claims and preparation by groups like True the Vote, the Election Integrity Network and dozens of state affiliates and offshoots. Even the Republican National Committee is using the “Stop the Steal” activists to man precincts in Democratic areas. What we have seen is two year’s of harassment and intimidation from these GOP and conservative activists evidenced by the hundreds of complaints and rulings against them from counties across the country. They won’t stop and we can’t fail to at least try to mitigate it.
Activists driven by false theories about election fraud are working to toss out tens of thousands of voter registrations and ballots in battleground states, part of a loosely coordinated campaign that is sowing distrust and threatening further turmoil as election officials prepare for the November midterms.
These volunteer poll workers are the guardians of democracy, but they are having to endure “thousands and thousands of violent threats going to election workers and secretaries of state.”
In the meantime, the harassment and death threats haven’t stopped. They have contributed to an exodus of election officials across the country and made recruiting poll workers even harder — adding to the challenges of conducting smooth elections in the fall.
Periods between elections have generally been down time for elections administrators allowing them to prepare for the next elections. The fact is, elections are extremely underfunded in this country — and elections workers are now being overworked. This has results in 1 in 5 elections workers quitting before the November election according to a Brennon Center survey.
But intimidation tactics against elections staffers leads inevitably into intimidation tactics against (“volunteer”) polling place workers and voters when voting begins. “Poll watching, a normally mundane duty where volunteers sit for hours watching for any possible rule violations at voting sites, is emerging as a flashpoint in the fight over U.S. election rules after former President Donald Trump falsely claimed that widespread election fraud cost him the 2020 race.” “Election officials have raised concerns about poll watchers in other states. In North Carolina, local election officials reported a number of incidents during the state’s May primary, saying that some observers interfered with voters.” Anything to keep Democrats and minority voters from casting a ballot.
Here’s the thing: we aren’t without countertactics that we can use to protect voters and poll workers (Democratic poll watchers, as well). There are a series of steps, refined over the years, for curbing this form of intimidation and election suppression. And Hope Springs from Field PAC has incorporated them into our model for expanding the Democratic vote:
- Warnings on Election Eves about what we have found in Incident Reports, prior elections and court cases that we have collected to local District Attorneys, States Attorneys and the Department of Justice Civil Rights Division
- Placement of poll watchers inside problematic polling locations and poll observer tables outside to collect as much information as possible about intimidation and voter suppression
- Readiness to use this data to go to court on Election Day, if necessary, or to local Elections Administrators for resolution
- Willingness to take action against poll worker intimidation to the Public Integrity Section of the DoJ Criminal Division
- Ballot curing, for those Senate Swing states that allow it, for issues raised that could prevent votes from being counted
Hope Springs from Field PAC has been knocking on doors, serve as a resource to Elections Committees in Black Churches and partnering with local civics and civil rights groups to raise awareness of the fact that Democrats care about our voters and are working to protect their rights. We are thinking about how to mitigate Voter Suppression efforts, get around them and make sure we have "super compliance," both informing and helping our voters meet the requirements and get out and vote.
Obviously, we rely on grassroots support, so if you support field/grassroots organizing and our efforts to protect our voters, we would certainly appreciate your support:
https://secure.actblue.com/donate/2022electionprotection
Hope Springs from Field PAC was started by former Obama Field Organizers because field was the cornerstone of our success. Election Protection was central to the Obama primary effort in 2008 because we were running against a party favorite with strong roots in state and local party organizations and we needed to appeal to voters outside that framework. We are returning to the old school basics: looking for patterns, addressing issues that have come up in the past and making sure authorities know about issues that are likely to (or even just may) come up in this election. Especially in light of True the Vote activities in majority minority areas.
This work is not intended to replace local party or campaign activities. In fact, if we know that the campaign (especially) wants to place someone inside the polls, and we have volunteers willing to do that, we point them towards our volunteers. It is not uncommon that we will identify the same worrisome polling locations. And we encourage both party orgs and campaigns to use both the generic Incident Reports we use as well as consult the database we have built from collected reports. But just because a troublesome polling location is not a majority or significant precinct in terms of campaigns or candidates, that does not mean they should be overlooked. We are making every effort to cover the most worrisome, most frequently troublesome locations as established by our collection of historical patterns of Voter Intimidation and Suppression.
We’ve known for awhile that Republicans, especially Trump Republicans, wanted to slow down the process and funnel Democratic voters into long lines, with excessive challenges and frustrate voters to stop them from participating in the democratic process. Republican voters don’t, for the most part, face these kinds of challenges (no one is trying to keep them from voting). But their aggressive stance is taking a toll on poll workers, as well, and their replacements — even replacements from the “Stop the Steal” canard — face a “steep learning curve” to learn how to do the job.
A recent report by the staff for Democrats on the House Oversight and Reform Committee concluded that “coordinated campaigns of election disinformation are disrupting the crucial work of local election officials,” overwhelming their limited resources and subjecting workers to violent threats.
Republicans plan to recruit 45,000 Poll Watchers, an increase of 12,000 more from July. The number keeps growing as Republicans continue to meet and exceed their prior goals. But this year has made it clear that Republicans are eager to confront not only voters they believe don’t support their candidates and/or cause, but poll workers who are trying to do their best to help people vote. Republicans want to stop them. “Poll challengers also have become more aggressive in their approach to dealing with election officials and poll workers.”
Hope Springs from Field is committed to continue to serve as a deterrent, resource and action-center for these issues from Early Voting until the last vote is counted. And we do need your help.
One thing i would ask from DKos readers is to consider serving as a poll worker on Election Day. It’s increasingly critical that we blunt the efforts by Republicans to dominate the polling places (even though, in most states, election day poll workers aren’t identified as Republicans or Democrats). Contact your Board of Elections, Registrar’s office or Supervisor of Elections to find out how (most of them have this prominently on their websites). If you are interested in serving as a poll watcher, check our mobilize.us for poll watcher opportunities in your area.
Hope Springs from Field PAC is trying to reinstitute best field practices, such as canvassing with people who look like the voters we are talking to and targeting former voters thrown off the rolls. But we have also want to adopt best practices we find “out in the wild,” like these first time voter parties. But because we study and teach field work as a profession, we bring in skillsets and tactics that may be new to the Democratic party regulars as well as activists in the area. But it is a two way street. That’s why it is so important to start developing Election Protection strategies now, and not wait until a couple of weeks or so before the general election. We have a lot of work to do. Can you help?
If you are able to support our efforts to protect Democratic voters, especially in minority communities, expand the electorate, protect the vote, and believe in grassroots efforts to increase voter participation and election protection, please donate:
secure.actblue.com/donate/2022electionprotection
Thank you for your support. This work depends on you!