Civil rights groups train thousands of poll observers for midterms

DOJ plans largest poll monitoring effort in history amid partisan mobilization

At the offices of Living United for Change in Arizona in Phoenix, a small group of volunteers gathered one recent evening for loteria night — a bingo-like card game with prizes including a camping chair, reusable water bottles and coolers. The prizes, organizers noted, would be useful for volunteers who planned to camp out somewhere for a while. LUCHA, a left-of-center community organizing group, was using the evening as the first of what it said would be many in-person trainings for volunteers it calls “constitutional observers” ahead of this year’s midterm elections.

Carime Rodriguez, who led the training, told volunteers that their primary job was to observe. “Monitor the polling environment,” she said. “Stay aware of what’s happening on the ground … just make sure you are kind of keeping your eyes open.” Groups have fanned out to monitor polling places in many election cycles before, but organizers said the charged political environment has them stepping up their efforts, with plans to deploy thousands of individuals with eyes on the election.

For LUCHA, immigration enforcement is the central concern. Rodriguez told training volunteers that during Arizona’s primaries earlier this year there was an uptick in immigration enforcement, including around polling sites in Maricopa County, where Phoenix is located. LUCHA and similar groups said they want people on the ground to keep watch for activity they think could intimidate voters, with their chief worry being ICE agents at election sites.

Alejandra Gomez, LUCHA’s executive director, said the environment has reshaped the group’s preparation. “I feel like these last two years, everyone has been holding on by the edge of their seats,” she said. “And so that has made us incredibly forward thinking and making sure that we are preparing. We’re hoping for the best, preparing for the worst.”

It would be illegal for the Trump administration to send armed agents to polling sites, and administration officials have said ICE has no plans to target polling locations. But right-wing political figures close to President Trump, including Steven Bannon, have called for him to send them anyway, and Trump officials have said ICE could serve warrants at polling places.

Mary Corcoran, co-founder and executive director of the left-leaning Save America Movement, said the public discussion is enough for her to take the potential threat seriously. “The point is to scare people and use fear as an intimidation factor to keep people home,” she said. “So, our perspective was that the way that we could make a difference in this election was working in communities that would be most likely impacted by the threat of ICE coming to the polls this fall.” Corcoran’s group is partnering with the Rev. Al Sharpton’s National Action Network and unions including the American Federation of Teachers in an effort they are calling Vote Safe.

Corcoran said the Vote Safe coalition plans to be in major population centers with large and growing Black, Latino, Asian and immigrant populations — particularly in states with key Senate races, including Ohio, North Carolina, Georgia and Michigan. “The volunteers are not there to engage with any ICE folks that could show up,” she said. “It’s really about having a de-escalatory impact by way of really bearing witness.” She said the presence of clergy, veterans, teachers and nurses from the community will hopefully have “a de-escalatory impact and a deterrent impact.”

Left-leaning groups will not be the only ones at the polls. Harmeet Dhillon, the head of DOJ’s Civil Rights Division, said on Real America’s Voice that she plans to send a thousand people from the agency to monitor polling sites. “This is going to be the biggest DOJ election observer effort in history,” she said. “And I’m so excited to be leading that effort.” Dhillon said DOJ staff will play a similar role to other observers at the polls: “They’re not going to be interfering in any way or running the election, they’re going to be observing, making notes.”

The Republican National Committee also recruits observers to keep elections secure and transparent. On the other side, Jane Kleeb, who leads the Association of State Democratic Committees — which is part of the Democratic National Committee — said the party wants people on the ground documenting activity at polling sites. “We’re going to record any bad behavior,” she said. “So that might be on audio. It may be still pictures, and it will be video that will then be sent to each state party. So, then they can get that information up to the DNC. So, we have a very clear process to make sure that we’re documenting all of this in case lawsuits have to be filed.” Kleeb said the stakes for political parties are particularly high in close elections, where lawsuits are common.

Tammy Patrick, with the National Association of Election Officials, said election administrators have been hearing of large observer deployments for some time. “Every two years it seems, for at least the 20 or so years I’ve been doing this, we hear that there’s going to be massive observation, and thousands of people are going to show up to observe at the polling place,” she said. “It hasn’t manifested in that way in the past, but these are not normal times.” Patrick said election administrators are educating the public, because rules about who can observe, and how close they can be to a polling site, vary from state to state.

Patrick also noted that observers can do only so much at the polls. If something goes wrong, she said, election workers and local law enforcement handle it. Patrick said most years many observers get bored and leave. “The actual process tends to be … pretty dry,” she said. “And one might even say boring to watch people walk in, give their name, sign their name, get their ballot.” Wyoming’s Republican governor criticized the actions of DOJ observers in the state in August.