As we go to air on today’s BradCast, we’re girding for the monster Hurricane Milton‘s direct impact on Florida‘s central Gulf Coast over the next several hours, even as millions in that state and five others struggle to recover from devastation following Hurricane Helene less than two weeks ago — and as all of us prepare for November 5th and whatever may come thereafter. [Audio link to full show follows this summary.]
This week, amid Helene recovery in North Carolina, the state Board of Elections, in a unanimous, bipartisan vote, approved a list of emergency measures for voters in the state’s hardest hit counties. Naturally, Trump Republicans on social media are already lying and spreading disinformation about those measures and, of course, Fox “News” is playing along. That said, with the Trump Campaign itself calling for measures to expand access for voters in Republican areas of the state following Helene, it seems like Team Trump is also preparing to have legal (and political) complaints ready to go after the election — if they lose.
That strategy, however, is not new for them. Even before Helene, the RNC says they are involved in scores of lawsuits across dozens of states. Many of them have been filed by groups like the American First Legal Foundation, founded by far-right Trump adviser Stephen Miller. One such novel suit filed by the group seeks a ruling in Arizona that judges may toss out election results over “failures or irregularities” by local officials. America First Legal is currently seeking such a ruling, however, only in counties where Kamala Harris is believed to be narrowly ahead of Trump.
Similar efforts are also underway by Republicans in other battleground states such as Michigan, Nevada and Pennsylvania, even if they don’t think they will actually win the suits. The strategy, according to election law experts, appears to be to have these complaints in place before the election so they can be cited afterward, and used by election officials at the state and federal level to try and overturn results — only in the event that Trump loses, of course.
At the same time, the Government Accountability Project, a longtime whistleblower support organization, founded in 1977 in the wake of Daniel Ellsberg‘s release of the Pentagon Papers, has published a new guide meant to support election officials and poll workers who may have legitimate reason to blow the whistle this year, particularly in battle grounds states. The 37-page booklet [PDF], entitled “On the Front Lines of Democracy: A Guide to Speaking Up for Election Officials & Workers,” offers specific legal advice for those may have seen something and want to say something about it, but don’t know exactly how to do so while protecting themselves in the bargain.
We’re joined today by DANA GOLD, GAP’s Senior Director of Advocacy & Strategy and the Director of the group’s Democracy Protection Initiative, which was formed in advance of the 2020 election, “in anticipation of a highly partisan environment” when they were “very concerned about foreign and insider threat of illegal election interference,” she explains today.
“We didn’t have a lot of whistleblowers, though,” says Gold. “We had a fire extinguisher ready. But, as we know, the 2020 election ended up being actually quite secure, fair and free, and administered safely.” That said, as we discuss today, “the threat landscape has changed in 2024.”
Gold outlines a number of “primary threats to elections” as identified by research in “this very hyper-partisan environment.” She says foreign interference remains a concern, but also “the risk of disinformation being spread widely, which can have the result of suppression, delay, eroding confidence in the election results. And potential insider threats. People who are essentially election deniers who believe that the 2020 election was stolen despite every piece of evidence showing that the election was free and fair.”
“This is a really volatile environment and election officials and workers are on the front lines, and may be in the best position to see efforts to suppress the vote. They may see insider threats. There are opportunities for election officials and workers who may see problems, and feel very scared and not clear about how to raise that concern, especially if the threat is their supervisor, someone in a position of power.”
Given my own long history of reporting on election whistleblowers over the past two decades — usually related to voting systems and their vendors — the question of how to determine who are legitimate whistleblowers in this atmosphere, and who are not (but may even think they are) is a rich topic of discussion. Also, given that heroic whistleblowers like Reality Winner — a national security official who exposed the fact that Russian intelligence operatives had actually infiltrated voter registration systems in several states before the 2016 election — ultimately received a five-year prison sentence for having done so, Gold grapples with how to best encourage whistleblowers to come forward, while still protecting their legal and civil rights.
“That’s why this is really important for us, in terms of a strategy of trying to disseminate this guide, to make election officials and workers, and any employee, aware of their rights, and their risks and options.”
“Document everything,” she advises those who may believe they have witnessed an election-related violation of law. “Write it down contemporaneously. Make sure that’s secure. Check for allies in their co-workers. Note witnesses. Date things. There are ways to shore up the verification piece, which will be critical to both insulate them and make a difference.” She adds, of course (citing Mesa County, Colorado’s former MAGA County Clerk, Tina Peters, who just received a nine year prison sentence for tampering with voting systems, even as she uncovered nothing!), “they should not break the law to do so.”
“Whistleblowers are such an important piece of democracy itself,” Gold asserts. “The information provided by a whistleblower fuels those mechanisms of accountability that are our representative democracy. Very important tools in our collective efforts to ensure free and fair elections.” To that end, she tells me, the group provides “legal and strategic support and advocacy, so we can protect them, in this environment particularly.”
There is much more of note in our fascinating and lively conversation today. Please tune in!…
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