Election officials feel besieged by conspiracy theorists and fear that a lack of support for their work is going to squeeze experts out of the field, according to a new poll. The survey from the Brennan Center for Justice, a liberal-leaning think tank and advocacy group, showed that nearly 8 in 10 local election officials feel that threats against them and their colleagues have increased in recent years, and a majority say that they are either very or somewhat concerned about the safety of their fellow administrators. The question of how to deal with threats has become a constant conversation among election officials at all levels of government, many of whom fear that it could discourage people from staying in their field of election administration, or even joining it in the first place. “Over the long run, if this continues, it will be a lot harder to get folks to stick around,” said Natalie Adona, the assistant county clerk-recorder of Nevada County, Calif. “People will retire maybe because they’re just ready to retire because they’ve been doing this for so dang long — or maybe because they feel that the risk is not worth it. But there will be more retirements.” The poll results confirm Adona’s feeling, with 3 in 10 of the officials surveyed saying they know at least one or two election workers who have left their jobs in part because of fears for their safety. Sixty percent of the respondents said they are concerned that those issues will make it more difficult to retain or recruit election workers in the future.
Some in GOP want ballots to be counted by hand, not machines | Holly Ramer and Christina A. Cassidy/Associated Press
Growing suspicion about the security of voting systems has kindled a back-to-the future moment among conservatives in some parts of the U.S. Republican lawmakers in at least six states have introduced legislation that would require all election ballots to be counted by hand instead of electronic tabulators. Similar proposals have been floated within some local governments, including about a dozen New Hampshire towns and Washoe County in the presidential battleground state of Nevada. The push for hand-counting ballots comes amid mistrust of elections among many Republicans who believe the false narrative that widespread fraud cost former President Donald Trump reelection in the 2020 presidential contest. Despite no evidence of widespread fraud or major irregularities, conspiracy theories have proliferated among his allies that voting systems were somehow manipulated to favor Democrat Joe Biden. That has prompted calls to ban electronic tabulators used to scan ballots, record votes and compile race tallies.
Full Article: Some in GOP want ballots to be counted by hand, not machines | AP News