Threats and Harassment of Election Officials Resulting from the 2020 Election

The people who run elections in the United States are under attack. They are being attacked online, in their offices, on the streets, and at their homes. Individuals from within their communities and many from outside of their communities are spearheading these attacks. If the 2020 election taught us nothing else, we now know U.S. democracy is much more fragile than we thought. There are over 8000 election jurisdictions in the United States and the effectiveness of all of them begins with the person who is running the operation: the local election official. Our analysis examines the findings of a qualitative study conducted in early 2021 of eleven election officials and eight election experts whose experience or perspective of harassment gives them a unique ability to shed light on what happened during and after the 2020 election. The study took place as a University of California, Berkeley Master of Development capstone project and these findings were originally published by the California Voter Foundation in June 2021. Below we document harassment, death threats, and the trauma, fear, and anxiety faced by many officials; and propose key solutions to address and avoid these issues in the future.