The local election office in Lynchburg, Virginia, has been tense for weeks. That’s partly because the gubernatorial race between Democrat Terry McAuliffe and Republican Glenn Youngkin has evolved into a neck-and-neck contest that both national parties are watching closely to divine their fortunes in next year’s midterms.
It’s also because the office has been inundated with GOP poll watchers, who signed up in unprecedented numbers this year to observe voting in the state’s Nov. 2 election, says the city’s director of elections, Christine Gibbons. “We feel like we’re being harassed and hindered in being able to do our daily work,” she says.
[time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”]
Last year, Lynchburg didn’t have any poll watchers during its early voting period, according to Gibbons. Then President Joe Biden flipped Lynchburg, a longtime Republican stronghold, beating out Donald Trump. This year, the city has had a poll watcher in their office every day since early voting began on Sept. 17. Most of them have been Republican, Gibbons says, and many have had “preconceived ideas about the voting process.” One GOP poll watcher, who was later removed, accused her staff of stealing the election from Trump, she recalls. “Our office has been on edge.”
Poll watchers, individuals who are often appointed by political parties to observe election proceedings, are a regular feature of most American elections. Both Democrats and Republicans send poll watchers to observe the voting process, make sure votes are counted correctly and report any irregularities to local officials.
But in the last year, the push for more poll watchers to closely observe elections has become a more prominent strategy of local, state and national branches of the Republican Party, which says they are imperative to ensure transparency in the voting process. In Virginia alone, the Republican National Committee (RNC) says that it has so far trained 3,500 prospective poll watchers this year. Observers expect that…
Source : time
