In the last presidential election, the only threats at the polls were from Obama supporters.
But it is true having “poll watchers” is extremely common practice. I did it myself for the Dems in my younger days. You have to stay a certain distance from the entrance. You can’t do any campaigning. you can’t confront people going into the polls. All you can do is ask people who they are. Sometimes, but not usually, people are asked how they voted.
But the more important part is their name, and most of the time we didn’t ask how they voted because some people don’t like it. You ask the name because back at your precinct headquarters, they’re checking off the known party (Dem in my case) voters. We had “runners” who would take the names down to the precinct headquarters. Toward the end of the day, they would call the people who did not vote yet and urge them to get to the polls. When it was getting late, they would offer rides to those who hadn’t voted and send somebody to go pick them up.
Later in my “career” as a Dem worker, I also ran precinct, county and district coordinating headquarters where we coordinated all of that. Some of the workers were paid, but most were not.
All Trump is doing is enlisting poll watchers, which is something I used to do too. It’s normal Americana.
It might be noted that the media also have poll watchers in all the important precincts. They really do ask how people voted because that’s how they project winners. So if anybody starts a ruckus, the media will be right there to report it, call the cops, or whatever.
This whole thing is just one more Dem myth to slander Trump and Repubs. But most Americans know all about poll watchers because they’re there at every big election. So few will buy this story.
