U.S. Braces for Post-Election Violence, Chaos

DETROIT (Reuters) -- With the U.S. election days just away, officials in the most competitive battleground states are bracing for misinformation, conspiracy theories, threats and possible violence.

In Philadelphia, Detroit and Atlanta, three of former President Donald Trump’s favorite targets for false claims of voter fraud, officials have fortified their operations against a repeat of the chaos of 2020. Philadelphia’s ballot-counting warehouse is now surrounded by fencing topped with barbed wire. In Detroit and Atlanta, some election offices are protected by bullet-proof glass.
In Wisconsin, election workers have been trained on de-escalation techniques and polling stations rearranged so workers have escape routes if they are menaced by protestors.
In Arizona, an epicenter in 2020 for false claims by Republicans about rigged voting, the secretary of state is working with local officials on how to respond to misinformation, including deep-fake images of purported fraud.
As opinion polls show Republican Trump and Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris neck and neck, heading into Tuesday’s vote, officials say there’s one thing they can’t predict or control: What Trump and his allies might say on election night as the votes are still being counted.
“If it’s razor thin, then they’re going to throw everything they got, right?” said Philadelphia City Commissioner Lisa Deeley, a Democrat, in an interview. “There’s nothing we can do to stop the former president from continuing his campaign of misinformation and disinformation. But what we can do is continue to push back on that with facts.”
Deeley and 30 other election officials from both parties told Reuters they are preparing for a replay of 2020, when Trump and his lawyers pushed charges about late-night ballot dumps and rigged machines in an effort to overturn his loss. In the wake of those claims, clerks around the country have been subjected to threats and harassment, from Trump supporters convinced the election was stolen.
In a statement, Danielle Alvarez, a senior advisor for the campaign and the Republican National Committee, said the party had recruited 230,000 poll watchers, poll workers and legal experts to “bring transparency and accountability” to the election.
“While Democrats will stop at nothing to weaken our elections, we are fighting for a fair and secure process where every legal vote is counted properly,” she said.
Throughout his campaign, Trump has repeated that he won in 2020 while signaling he would contest a possible loss to Harris.
On Friday, in a post on Trump’s Truth Social platform, he wrote that there was “rampant Cheating and Skulduggery” in 2020 and threatened election officials and others “involved in unscrupulous behavior” this cycle with prosecution.
Election officials say one of their biggest fears is a razor-close result where the outcome will hinge on court fights over small numbers of disputed ballots. The Republican National Committee has targeted election officials with dozens of lawsuits challenging various aspects of the voting process, a move seen by Democrats as a prelude to contesting a potential loss. Republican poll watchers, who monitor the casting and counting of ballots, have been trained to be aggressive in scrutinizing the process, and their ranks are filled with activists who still deny the 2020 results, according to training calls reviewed by Reuters.
The tensions are especially acute in Philadelphia, Atlanta and Detroit, major Democratic vote centers in crucial swing states. Trump accused them of allowing electoral fraud in 2020 and has done so again since the start of this campaign.
At an Iowa rally in December, he urged followers to go to the three cities and “guard the vote,” a phrase that alarmed Democrats who warned it could prompt his supporters to intimidate voters or disrupt the counting.
Daniel Baxter, Detroit’s chief operating officer for absentee voting and special projects, said the city is preparing for potential unrest in planning with local police and federal officials. Its election headquarters has been strengthened with armed guards and bullet-proof glass. The counting of mail-in ballots has been moved to a more secure location in the convention hall downtown. In 2020, Trump supporters sought to disrupt the process by pounding on windows and yelling “stop the count.”
“We plan for a riot,” Baxter said in an interview. “We just want to make sure that we have planned for the worst as we hope for the best.” He said he is unaffiliated with any party.
In a virtual meeting for prospective poll workers, an official with the Republican National Committee warned the volunteers that Detroit was not to be trusted. “Because that city, if I could get away with ... you know, burning it to the ground, I would try,” said Morgan Ray, the RNC’s director of election integrity for Michigan, according to a previously unreported recording of the Sept. 10 meeting obtained by Reuters. Ray and the RNC didn’t respond to requests for comment on her remarks.

Trump also singled out Detroit, America’s largest Black-majority city, saying on Oct. 10 that the rest of the country would become “like Detroit” if Harris wins. Detroit City Clerk Janice Winfrey, a Democrat, said she believes racism was at the root of Trump’s attacks on cities like hers. “He’s the type of person that thinks that he can easily intimidate Detroiters because we’re a predominantly Black city,” she said in an interview. “But we’re not intimidated by him at all.”
Philadelphia has overhauled vote-counting since delays in 2020 created an opening for Trump and his allies to spread conspiracy theories and for his supporters to target election officials with threats. In 2020, election clerks in Philadelphia and elsewhere struggled with an avalanche of mail-in ballots, thanks to more liberal vote-by-mail rules adopted by many states in response to the pandemic.