Election workers watched along with the rest of America as a violent pro-Trumpmob ransacked the Capitol on January 6, leaving five people dead.
They were horrified and shocked, but not surprised.
“I think, in the back of our minds, it was like an attack on our country was underway,” said Arizona Secretary of State Katie Hobbs in an interview. “We have all said that this type of disinformation is dangerous and, unfortunately, this is the result of this type of disinformation.”
Hobbs, a Democrat, was cursed, threatened and harassed last year, enduring months of continued abuse as a consequence of the electoral lie stolen from then President Donald Trump. There were incidents at the beginning that suggested the potential for real-world action behind a mostly verbal and virtual dam: furious Trump supporters showing up at his home in mid-November, waving flags and shouting because they refused to believe Joe Biden had won the state. What she experienced was not what any public official signed up for, she said, and is still struggling to process what happened to her and the country.
She is one of a dozen election officials and officials interviewed by NBC News who told a similar story: months of nightmare trying to put aside violent threats, afraid of themselves and their families, to do vitally important work that they have already done. it had been made more difficult by the pandemic. They spoke of persistent traumas, missed warnings and fears for the future amid what the Department of Homeland Security recognized as a growing threat from domestic extremists, fueled at least in part by the “presidential transition, as well as other perceived complaints fueled by narratives. false, ”and possibly now further encouraged by the attack on the Capitol.
Gabriel Sterling, a Republican and a senior election official in Georgia, tried to raise the alarm in December about what he considered the potential for imminent violence. At a hard-hitting press conference, he warned that “someone is going to be shot” as a direct result of the misinformation and lies about the election results promoted by Trump and repeated and embraced by his supporters.
Sterling said watching the deadly violence on the Capitol made him feel sick. He knew something like this could happen, but he didn’t think it would actually happen.
“You could see the logic train going from point A to point B and, if you didn’t, again, that would be irresponsible,” he told NBC News last week.
‘You just feel dejected’
Georgia election workers at all levels have described some of the most alarming threats and abuses. They increased the minute it became clear that Biden had turned to Georgia, a traditionally red, blue state for the first time in decades, state officials said.
Everyone from Sterling, the electoral systems manager, to hourly officials and Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, also a Republican, was flooded. With the two state disputes for the United States Senate advancing to the second round, which would not happen until January – and would decide to control the Senate – the workers were targeted last November.
“We were very aware of what was happening around us all the time,” said Deputy Secretary of State Jordan Fuchs, a Republican.
Fulton County, Georgia, election director Richard Barron said his office was flooded with threats of violence and verbal abuse.
“There were people who were nervous about being here every day,” said Barron, a county official. “At one point, there were many threats about people who were going to shoot us in our office. These calls were very disturbing to the team. “
His office faced a bomb threat and officials reported being followed and filmed. Voters trying to pick up and deliver absent ballots in hanging boxes were blocked by people in cars, Barron said.
His office shared 85 voicemail messages that Barron received in the six days leading up to the second round of the Senate on January 5, almost all angry and accusatory. At least one seemed to refer to the pro-Trump protests that were being planned for Washington the next day, although the interlocutor apparently confused the month. The extremists openly planned to “occupy” the Capitol with deadly force on January 6, the day the Constitution reserves for Congress to count and certify state voters in the presidential race. Trump urged his supporters to assemble for a demonstration before the count and told them to march on the Capitol afterwards.
“You are clearly an accomplice to the betrayal,” said a man in a voice message left on Sunday, January 3. “We will be thinking about you on January 6th in DC”
“Which side will you be on when the —— shooting starts, brother?” said another man the same day.
Barron said the majority of black officials in the Fulton County election department faced frequent racism, with callers using the word N.
“This is in your work environment, unfortunately. You take it on the chin, ”said Barron’s assistant, Mariska Bodison, who is black. “You just feel dejected. It was one election after another, one phone call after another. “
Fuchs said the state received many bomb threats at polling stations, while police investigated and alerted an individual who was threatening election officials in Gwinnett County. She also described how Raffensperger’s wife received text messages with sexualized threats, and said that one of Raffensperger’s relatives was the victim of a robbery.
“Someone entered the house, turned on all the lights and left – it was a very clear message that we can send to you at any time,” said Fuchs. “It really scared the family.”
Transparency efforts – such as live broadcasts showing election workers doing their jobs, which other states have also created – have exposed lower-ranking officials to relentless abuse. A woman packing ballots in their appropriate holders ended up at the center of an unfounded conspiracy theory repeated by Trump. A contractor from Dominion Voting Systems, the electoral equipment manufacturer who became the target of wild conspiracy theories, was filmed by research observers and threatened with an animated online snare, triggering Sterling’s fierce warning of what he saw as the potential growing violence.
“The reason they have a video of the guy is because the process is so transparent that we allow them to film it,” said Sterling. “We are trying to be open and transparent, and they are distorting that.”
‘We want to help voters and we couldn’t do any of that’
Authorities across the country described experiences similar to those of their colleagues in Georgia.
“We had to spend an excessive amount of time trying to educate people that these things just weren’t true,” said George Christenson, the county clerk in Milwaukee, of the misinformation that circulated on social media.
Janine Eveler, director of elections in Cobb County, said: “Something would be tweeted and we would end up getting hundreds of calls. We want to help voters – and we couldn’t do any of that because our phone lines were full ”.
All of this came amid what the authorities said was the most challenging election they have ever worked for. The pandemic has changed the way the United States votes in the middle of a presidential primary cycle, and a few months before a presidential election that should generate historic participation.
Lisa Deeley, one of three commissioners in Philadelphia who run the city elections, said she used to feel that the job was very similar to that of a wedding planner. But in 2020, she was approached on the street and needed police escort wherever she went.
And it took its toll.
“I often feel insecure as a result of the November elections,” she said. “I’m looking over my shoulder, I’m looking in the rearview mirror, I had nightmares. It definitely had a pronounced effect on me – and my family. “
Experts note that despite Trump’s claims to the contrary, the presidential election has been remarkably successful – marked by high turnout and relatively short waiting times at the polls. Government cybersecurity experts have declared it to be “the safest in American history”.
The authorities said this was only possible thanks to sleepless nights and weekends spent working.
In Pennsylvania, Monroe County’s election director, Sara May-Silfee, said she worked 15 to 16 hours a day, seven days a week for months, trying to keep up with voters’ questions, changing policies and the sheer volume. correspondence needed for the new wave of postal voting.
She didn’t have to deal with the same level of conspiracy theories as many of her colleagues, but angry voters were the norm. Once, a group shouted outside their office about the alleged suppression of the voter, because they did not understand that the state’s initial voting process used paper ballots, not machines. She lost 16 pounds between the primaries and the general election, eating all three meals at her table every day.
For some, it was clearly unsustainable: electoral offices across the state are registering staff turnover. May-Silfee said that a third of the state’s 67 electoral officers retired or resigned in early 2020.
She said she lost two of her three employees in the days leading up to the general election.
“They said they didn’t get enough,” she said.
‘We redefine’
Many election officials told NBC News that they were concerned about future elections.
“We rebooted,” said Scott McDonell, the Dane County, Wisconsin county clerk. “It will take a long time to get back to the level of confidence we had a year ago.”
Restoring that trust will not be easy either.
“We have been working throughout this election cycle to really help increase transparency and maintain confidence,” said Hobbs. “Now we are the ones who have the task of restoring that trust, when we were not the ones who helped to destroy it.”
Many said they feared that state legislatures would try to draft new laws to prevent fraud that did not occur.
“Despising” Trump from social media – after five died in the Capitol attack, while Trump tweeted in support of the rioters – helped, many said. Their phone lines were quieter now, although some said they were still being harassed.
Many took additional precautions to protect themselves and their staff during the opening.
“The damage this has done to voters and the integrity of the elections is incalculable,” said Deeley.
In the future, she said, her main objective is to restore that confidence.
“As [how] people heard repeatedly about the fraud and there were bad things happening, we have to start beating the drum back, ”she said. “It is a fair and free election.”