By: Elizabeth Green, Founder and CEO
In 2020, our organization decided to build on our work of local education reporting. We started a new operation devoted to covering the administration of elections, Votebeat. We did this because I couldn’t sleep at night. I worried that, amid then President Trump’s allegations of fraud and a global pandemic, the United States might fail to pull off a peaceful, fair election.
Four years later, my worries have changed. In 2020, I feared that the process would simply fail — that a president would not be selected, and a constitutional crisis would erupt. I now see that the voting and elections system as a whole is strong and arguably has never been stronger. Long-shot catastrophes remain possible, but focusing on them distracts us from a greater danger, which has already arrived.
The danger of disbelief
The real danger is right before our eyes: One third of Americans have lost confidence in our elections, and their mistrust has led significant numbers of them to attack the very system they want to protect.
Despite headlines about threats to a smooth counting of votes in 2024, those paying the most attention — including the editors and reporters at Votebeat— agree that by far the most likely outcome is that the votes will be fairly counted, the election will be called for the rightful winner, and the result will be duly certified, on time.
How do we know the process is strong? One example is certification. To refresh your memory: before the Electoral College tallies up each candidate’s votes, local and state officials are required to “certify” the final results. But what if skeptical officials refuse to certify a vote count? What if Trump advisers again attempt to organize electors to defy duly counted results?
A few months ago, rules changes in Georgia got me and others worrying about certification malfeasance scenarios. Looking closely at battleground states where we have reporters, as well as those where we don’t (yet), our Votebeat team pointed out what people panicking had missed: Since 2020, some local officials in Georgia, Arizona, Michigan, Nevada, and Pennsylvania have already declined to certify elections, “often at heated public meetings packed with people airing unsupported conspiracy theories or baseless allegations of election fraud. In every such case, after intervention by state officials or the courts, the election was certified.”
What about activists who have spent the years since 2020 running for rarely regarded local positions that turn out to hold powers like deciding how elections are run? Last year, Carter Walker, our Pennsylvania reporter, worked with Spotlight PA to review all 400 candidates running for county commissioner and county council in the state of Pennsylvania. Forty-five candidates, all Republican, expressed skepticism about the integrity of elections. Eighteen of those won their primaries, and now hold a majority of board of election seats in three counties. But even in those counties, our reporting has found that those skeptics have failed to implement new voting rules that would threaten a fair count.
The lesson here is that when large numbers of people believe election conspiracy theories, some of them will seek, and obtain, public offices that hold power over voting and vote-counting. They aim to purify elections, but wind up threatening them more by advocating for practices like throwing out voting machines in favor of counting votes by hand — which, it turns out, is a practice far more susceptible to error — or by refusing to certify fair elections.
So far, policies pushed by conspiracy theorists have failed in the courts, in secretary of state offices, and in county commissions. “U.S. elections are one of the things we do best as a country,” Mark Lindeman, the policy and strategy director at Verified Voting, a nonpartisan election technology group, told Votebeat’s Jessica Huseman last week. “Vast numbers of good people work together across party lines to keep our elections free, fair, and honest. Well-designed procedures help them prevent, detect, and correct any problems.”
But there is no guarantee that this protective layer will hold. This July, five of the key Republicans in Arizona who have protected the election system against conspiracy theorists lost their primaries. Their opponents are also on the ballot tomorrow.
What happens next
While local elections have the potential to strengthen, or to undercut, the election process, we should expect more attacks no matter who wins the presidency.
As president, Trump could eliminate federal support that has buoyed local election officials or, as an example in Project 2025 outlines, use the Justice Department to prosecute states for election practices. If Harris is elected, the scenario for elections could also be dark. Already, Trump has declared the only way he could lose is if Harris and the Democrats cheat, setting the stage to reignite his supporters’ election concerns — and their activism — if he loses again.
The protective layer that has served us well the last four years will continue to bat away new attacks. But the protective layer is wearing thin. I haven’t even mentioned the problem of election director turnover, fueled by mounting stress. Like too many other public servants, election officials have faced harassment and even death threats, causing some to resign.
Heider Garcia, the former elections director in Tarrant County, Texas, whom our reporter Natalia Contreras profiled in Votebeat and on This American Life, resigned after that broadcast. Our editorial director Jessica Huseman memorably profiledCathy Darling Allen, the longtime chief election official in Shasta County, California, who retired this May, following harassment by activists accusing her of witchcraft and satanism. At 55, Allen had no history of heart problems but was recently diagnosed with heart failure related to stress.
The inexperienced directors who replace those departing do not have to be misguided activists to pose a problem; with less experience, they simply make more mistakes. And, as a recent Department of Justice report made clear, fodder for the Jan. 6 riot on the Capitol stemmed in significant part from a minor clerical error by a temporary election worker in a single Pennsylvania county.
With every outcome fraught, it’s clear what needs to be done. We need to bolster that protective layer before it becomes threadbare, so that elections can remain “one of the best things we do as a country,” to use Lindeman’s words.
We know this protective layer can work. Consider the high-profile case of voting machines, like those produced by Dominion Voting, which received groundless accusations of inaccuracy and manipulation. Faced with overwhelming evidence that the alternative — hand-counting — actually increases errors, local officials across the country have declined to put hand-counting into practice. That includes Republicans who fought back against members of their own party. It happened in Potter County, Texas, in 2021, and it happened in 2023 in Mohave County, Arizona.
One common denominator in both of those cases: Votebeat. I’m incredibly proud that, since 2020, our editors and reporters have operated as part of elections’ protective layer.
In Potter County, Texas, it was Votebeat’s Jessica Huseman who learned of plans by the county’s Republican Party chair to take over elections and implement hand-counting. Her reporting helped make clear what was happening and what the consequences would be for Republican officials’ ability to run in trustworthy elections. The chair stood down.
In Mohave County, Arizona, it was Votebeat’s Jen Fifield whose reporting prompted the Arizona secretary of state to stop a hand-counting plan. And it was Fifield’s reporting that led residents to pressure an official to vote against a second effort when the county tried again.
As the person responsible for keeping Votebeat going, I know better than most people that none of this protective layer is guaranteed. We must continue to fight for it. For my part, I will do everything I can to keep Votebeat going. You can join me. Subscribe to our newsletters, send us feedback, and, if you feel moved, make a gift in support of our work.
Journalism, like democracy, is ultimately a team sport, and we welcome all the help we can get.