(Headline USA) Election officials in several states said Thursday complained about the safety of their staffs amid a stream of threats and gatherings of protesters outside their doors, drawn by reports of widespread fraud in the race for the White House.
Many of the president’s supporters were objecting to the illegal efforts to prevent poll watchers from observing the counting of ballots in areas with a long history of vote fraud as the razor-thin margin in seven states appears likely to impact the nation’s most important decision.
But Democrat officials sought to play the victim, claiming—without evidence—that they felt intimidated by the demands for transparency.
“I can tell you that my wife and my mother are very concerned for me,” complained Joe Gloria, the registrar in Clark County, Nevada, which includes Las Vegas.
He said his staff was bolstering security and tracking vehicles coming and going from the election offices.
But he added that he and others would not be stopped from “doing what our duty is and counting ballots.”
Groups of Trump supporters have gathered at vote tabulation sites in Phoenix, Detroit and Philadelphia, decrying counts that showed Democrat Joe Biden leading or gaining ground under often suspicious circumstances.
While the protests have not been violent or very large, local officials were distressed and concerned by the relentless accusations.
Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel, a Democrat, tweeted a plea to “stop making harassing & threatening calls” to her staff.
“Asking them to shove sharpies in uncomfortable places is never appropriate & is a sad commentary on the state of our nation,” wrote Nessel, referring to reports from Arizona that Trump supporters’ votes were invalidated after they were told to fill out ballots with Sharpie markers instead of regular pens.
Arizona’s Democrat secretary of state, Katie Hobbs, speaking on CNN, said her main concern was staff safety but that sheriff’s deputies were providing protection.
She griped that the protesters were “causing delay and disruption and preventing those employees from doing their job” as ballot counting that should have been completed by Election Day stretched into its second day of delays.
On Thursday, about 100 Trump supporters gathered again in front of the Maricopa County election center in Phoenix.
Authorities used fences to create a “freedom of speech zone” and keep the entrance to the building open. The crowd took turns chanting—“Count the votes!” and “Four more years!”—and complaining through a megaphone about the voting process.
In Atlanta, roughly 100 chanting Trump supporters gathered outside State Farm Arena as votes were being counted. Several Atlanta police officers monitored the scene.
Tom Haas, 50, who said he was visiting Atlanta from Chicago on business, said he was convinced Trump had won the election. “There’s obvious voter fraud, and it’s coming out of the larger Democratic-run cities,” he said. “Atlanta is one of them.”
“Our democracy is under attack,” he said. “We’re losing America because we’re losing a fair election for the nation.”
In Detroit, a few dozen Trump supporters gathered outside the city’s convention center Thursday morning as election workers counted absentee ballots inside. The protesters held signs that read, “Stop the steal” and “Stop the cheat.”
Rioters associated with anarchist and social-justice groups like Antifa and Black Lives Matter have been causing mayhem in many of these same cities for month and have threatened even further violence if Trump prevails.
Democrat leaders have often downplayed that unrest, insisting that they are “peaceful protests” and sometimes suggesting that the more violent and subversive anti-government groups were nothing but a myth.
Biden refused to denounce groups like Antifa during the first Democrat debate, something that many consider to be a factor in his party’s surprise defeats and underwhelming performance on Tuesday.
Adapted from reporting by the Associated Press
