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Election officials combat voter intimidation across U.S. as extremist groups post armed militia at some polls [1]

['Rocio Fabbro']

Date: 2022-11-06

A voter places a ballot in a drop box outside of the Maricopa County Elections Department on August 02, 2022 in Phoenix, Arizona. Justin Sullivan | Getty Images

Follow CNBC's live blog covering Tuesday's midterm elections here. A pair of armed and masked men in tactical gear stood guard at ballot drop boxes in Mesa, Ariz., on Oct. 21 as people began early voting for the 2022 midterm elections. They belonged to an election monitoring group called Clean Elections USA, which has echoed former President Donald Trump's false claims that the 2020 election was stolen. The group says it's watching early voting in select counties for signs of fraud. But its presence caused unease among Maricopa County voters, who saw these "drop box watchers" as a blatant attempt at voter intimidation.

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"Uninformed vigilantes outside Maricopa County's drop boxes are not increasing election integrity. Instead they are leading to voter intimidation complaints," Maricopa County election officials Bill Gates and Stephen Richer said in a joint statement the next day. A U.S. District Court judge appointed by Trump, Michael Liburdi, ordered members of Clean Elections USA to stay at least 75 feet away from drop boxes and not to follow or speak to voters. They were also told they couldn't openly carry weapons. The ruling was in response to a temporary restraining order filed by two voter advocacy groups, alleging the poll watchers were trying to "bully and intimidate lawful Arizona voters."

Two armed individuals dressed in tactical gear were onsite the Mesa ballot drop box. Source: Maricopa County Recorder's Office and Maricopa County

"We are deeply concerned about the safety of individuals who are exercising their constitutional right to vote and who are lawfully taking their early ballot to a drop box," Gates and Richer said. While Arizona has seen a host of voter-intimidation reports, the state is certainly not alone. Fears about voter intimidation and suppression have been brewing nationwide since the 2020 presidential election, when Trump refused to accept his loss and accused several states of voter fraud. The rising rhetoric has tensions running high going into Tuesday's midterms. Two in five U.S. voters said they were worried about threats of violence or voter intimidation at the polls, according to a new Reuters/Ipso poll. The same disinformation about election fraud that fueled the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot is the same disinformation that's "threatening political violence related to our elections," Mary McCord, the executive director of the Institute for Constitutional Advocacy and Protection and former federal prosecutor, said in an interview on PBS Newshour: "And by political violence, I don't just mean physical violence. I mean intimidation, voter intimidation, intimidation and threats and harassment against our election workers, aggressive recruitment of poll watchers from groups like the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers to be really a force for intimidation at the polls, and other types of really anti-democratic processes that are being driven, again, by the same disinformation and lies about the 2020 election," McCord said. President Joe Biden noted the rise in political violence in a speech Wednesday night, calling on voters to go to the polls next week to help preserve democracy. "There's an alarming rise in the number of people in this country condoning political violence or simply remaining silent," Biden said. "In our bones we know democracy is at risk, but we also know this: It's in our power to preserve our democracy." His remarks also came on the heels of the violent attack against House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's husband, Paul, in their San Francisco home. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-NY, said the country was facing an "environment of fascism." "This type of intimidation at the polls brings us to Jim Crow," Ocasio-Cortez said in an Oct. 28 interview on MSNBC's "All In With Chris Hayes." "It brings us back and harkens back to a very unique form of American apartheid that is not that long past ago."

Two armed individuals dressed in tactical gear were onsite the Mesa ballot drop box. Source: Maricopa County Recorder's Office and Maricopa County

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[1] Url: https://www.cnbc.com/2022/11/06/election-officials-facing-armed-militia-presence-at-some-polls.html

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