Potential chaos from GOP 'election watchers' has experts more worried than ever

On Monday, NPR reported that experts are increasingly worried about the push by Republican officials and lawmakers around the country to recruit more "election watchers" to keep an eye on voters.

"The push for more poll watchers is a clear outgrowth of the lies and disinformation spread by former President Donald Trump and his allies that the 2020 election was stolen from him. Just a third of Republicans trust U.S. elections are fair, according to a new NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll released on Monday," reported Miles Parks. "Officials in Virginia say there's been an influx of interest in patrolling voting locations this year, especially among Republicans. A conservative group called the Virginia Project even released a series of videos on how to become an election observer, specifically focusing on how to look for fraud in this November's election."

There remains no evidence of any election in 2020 that was corrupted by fraud. Only a tiny handful of illegal voting incidents have been identified, at least some of which involved people trying to cast a second vote for Trump. But the risk is real, say experts, that the GOP's poll watcher push could create a culture of intimidation and make it harder to vote.

"Past experience with similar investigative efforts around the country has raised concerns that they can be directed at minority voters, which potentially can implicate the anti-intimidation prohibitions of the Voting Rights Act," wrote former DOJ civil rights official Pamela Karlan, the principal deputy assistant attorney general with the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division. Virginia election official Chris Piper agreed, saying, "If the intention is to disrupt, to hinder or delay, that is a concern. And unfortunately, I think with the rhetoric the way it is, it's hard to decipher anymore."

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