![]() ![]() Some targeted election officials in states where Trump lost by substantial margins, such as Colorado – or even Vermont, where Biden won by 35 percentage points. But the threateners are targeting workers far from home: Seven of the nine harassed officials in other states. America’s federal elections are administered by state and local officials. Six were in their 50s or older all but two were men. Some said they were preparing for civil war. Nearly all of the threateners saw the country deteriorating into a war between good and evil – “patriots” against “communists.” They echoed extremist ideas popularized by QAnon, a collective of baseless conspiracy theories that often cast Trump as a savior figure and Democrats as villains. Capitol on January 6, trying to block Democrat Joe Biden’s certification as president. The harassers expressed beliefs similar to those voiced by rioters who stormed the U.S. In an interview, Miller said he would continue to make such calls “until they do something.” He added: “We can’t have another election until they fix what happened in the last one.” Ross Miller, a Georgia real-estate investor, warned an official in the Atlanta area that he’d be tarred and feathered, hung or face firing squads unless he addressed voter fraud. The seven others were unrepentant, with some saying the election workers deserved the menacing messages. Just two expressed regret when told their messages had frightened officials or caused security scares. The people who made those threats told Reuters they never heard from police.Īll nine harassers interviewed by Reuters said they believed they did nothing wrong. In the seven cases that legal scholars said could be prosecuted, law enforcement agencies were alerted by election officials to six of them. Eight did so on the record, identifying themselves by name. All admitted they were behind the threats or other hostile messages. ![]() Reuters was able to interview nine of them. Reporters submitted public-records requests and interviewed dozens of election officials in 12 states, obtaining phone numbers and email addresses for two dozen of the threateners. Supreme Court hasn’t formulated a clear definition of a criminal threat.įor this report, Reuters set out to identify the people behind these attacks on election workers and understand their motivations. Adding to the confusion, legal scholars say, the U.S. Other instances were complicated by America’s patchwork of state laws governing criminal threats, which provide varying levels of protection for free speech and make local officials in some states reluctant to prosecute such cases. Some messages were too hard to trace, officials said. But law enforcement agencies have made almost no arrests and won no convictions. Department of Justice launched a task force to investigate threats against election staff and said it would aggressively pursue such cases. After Reuters reported the widespread intimidation in June, the U.S. The examination of the threats also highlights the paralysis of law enforcement in responding to this extraordinary assault on the nation’s electoral machinery. The news organization has documented nearly 800 intimidating messages to election officials in 12 states, including more than 100 that could warrant prosecution, according to legal experts. They are part of a broader campaign of fear waged against frontline workers of American democracy chronicled by Reuters this year. These cases provide a unique perspective into how people with everyday jobs and lives have become radicalized to the point of terrorizing public officials. federal standard for criminal prosecution, according to four legal experts who reviewed their messages at Reuters’ request. Seven made threats explicit enough to put a reasonable person in fear of bodily harm or death, the U.S. In all, they are responsible for nearly two dozen harassing communications to six election officials in four states. They were among nine people who told Reuters in interviews that they made threats or left other hostile messages to election workers. And none have been charged with a crime by the law enforcement agencies alerted to their threats. They are regular consumers of far-right websites that embrace Trump’s stolen-election falsehoods. All described themselves as patriots fighting a conspiracy that robbed Donald Trump of the 2020 election. ![]()
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