Election-Fraud Conspiracy Theorists Have Been Monitoring Ballot Drop Boxes And Signing Up To Be Poll Watchers. What Actions Will They Take On Election Day?
Despite virtually no evidence of widespread voter fraud, election-denying citizens have been recording voters depositing their ballots in drop boxes, in what might amount to voter intimidation.
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A little over two weeks before Election Day, armed individuals dressed in tactical gear, with their faces masked, sat outside a ballot drop box in Maricopa County, Arizona. This was one of the more extreme examples of a trend of drop box “watch parties,” encouraged by Republicans across the country.
The activists organizing these watches are well aware of the limits of their activities. In October, I sat in on a virtual training session for poll watchers organized by the election-denying group Audit the Vote PA. The training itself covered regular protocols for poll watchers, but toward the end of the session, individuals on the call began casually and confidently discussing drop box monitoring. They said their local Republican groups were organizing “watch parties” and encouraged others to attend and even take photos or video of voters depositing ballots, or of voters’ license plates.
Spurred by false conspiracy theories that drop boxes attract voter fraud and ballot-box stuffing, individuals across the country have been monitoring drop boxes as voters deliver their ballots, leading to some reports of voters feeling intimidated. In Arizona, the League of Women Voters filed a lawsuit to try to prevent this type of monitoring, but a federal judge ruled that activists have a right to gather around ballot drop boxes. But while these groups may be allowed to continue their watches, federal and state laws prohibit voter intimidation or harassment of any kind, which limits what they can do while monitoring the drop box sites.
“You can’t harass [voters] but you certainly can take pictures and videos of them, as you have the constitutional right to do so in public,” one participant claimed. One of the organizers then noted activists monitoring drop boxes should “err on the side of polite and overly cautious,” to avoid running afoul of voter intimidation laws.
Depending on the circumstances, photographing or video-recording voters depositing their ballot in a drop box may amount to voter intimidation, according to Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro, who warned the Trump campaign about this kind of behavior when it filmed voters at a drop box in the 2020 election. But even if not illegal, drop box monitoring is motivated by misinformation about voter fraud that doesn’t exist, and it can be difficult to gauge the exact impact of having activists stationed around voting sites on prospective voters. Sitting in on that Zoom call was eye-opening and showed just how commonplace these views and activities have become. I’ll be watching today for reports of poll watchers and activists who may step over the line in an attempt to combat the phantom voter fraud they see lurking around every corner.