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Senate approves new protections for election officials

Mrs. Gemstone via Wikimedia
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Since the election in 2020, many election officials — from the Secretary of State to local poll workers — say there has been a rise in intimidation and harassment.

A law now moving through the Roundhouse would try to protect them. SB144 would expand the scope of the crime of intimidation beyond voters and some other categories to include election workers and election officials.

One backer is Doña Ana county clerk Amanda López Askin, who says after the 2020 election, which former President Donald Trump and his supporters falsely claimed he had won, there was, "an increase in hostility, anger on the part of individuals who are frustrated, and then connected to that has been more aggression."

She says she and her colleagues receive threats by phone, email, social media. Some say they have been followed home, and the problem is ongoing.

"I thought that after 2020, the election results were certified," she says, "I was hoping – I think as most election officials were – that then we could start turning to work on our next election."

But, "we've just never really stopped dealing with 2020. It is almost sad, disturbing that it's become a way of life of doing a job as an election official."

Secretary of State Maggie Toulouse Oliver also went into hiding after the 2020 election after receiving threats.

Other states including Vermont, Maine and Washington are also considering similar laws after nationwide reports of an uptick of threats against election officials.

An amended version of the bill passed the Senate Monday with unanimous support and is set to head to the House.

Alice Fordham joined the news team in 2022 after a career as an international correspondent, reporting for NPR from the Middle East and later Latin America and Europe. She also worked as a podcast producer for The Economist among other outlets, and tries to meld a love of sound and storytelling with solid reporting on the community. She grew up in the U.K. and has a small jar of Marmite in her kitchen for emergencies.