Election Day in the US went relatively smoothly with only a few interruptions and brief delays in voting, while there were concerns before the election about misinformation, foreign influence and threats to election officials and voting systems.
Before Tuesday, more than 82 million Americans had already voted in a largely successful early voting period with high turnout despite some technical difficulties and frustrations in the presidential battleground state of Pennsylvania.
And when the final day of that vote came around, the problems that emerged were “mostly expected routine and expected,” said Kate Conley, senior adviser to the agency’s director of cybersecurity and infrastructure security.
She said that the agency currently has no data on any general, significant incidents that affect election security.
Issues affecting voters Tuesday included the typical mishaps — from an official who forgot the key to a polling station in Arizona’s largest county to an election judge who failed to show up at the polls in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania.
Some precincts across the country experienced problems with voter registration processes and e-polls, causing some voting delays. Some precincts had errors in the printing of ballots and printed new ones and consequently extended the voting time.
Bad weather across the mid-US brought localized flooding and other problems in some places, including power outages for at least one polling place in Missouri that was using a generator to continue voting.
Still, in various rain-hit states, voters huddled under umbrellas as they waited in line to vote, not giving up on a presidential election that many American voters see as crucial to the future of US democracy.
In the western part of the key state of Pennsylvania, several counties reported problems with machines that scan and count paper ballots filled out by voters. A Pennsylvania state judge ordered polls to remain open for two additional hours in Cambria County, which voted 68 percent in 2020 for former President Donald Trump, the candidate again this election. That district asked for an extension even though district officials said the issues had been resolved.
In Georgia, another presidential state that regularly swings Republican or Democratic, less than a dozen polling places had to stay open late because of alleged bomb threats that turned out to be false, Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger said.
The FBI said Tuesday afternoon that it was aware of a series of credible bomb threats to polling places in several states and said many of them appeared to originate from Russian email domains.
The massive early voter turnout before Tuesday – slightly more than half of the total vote cast in the presidential election four years ago – was fueled in part by Republican voters who voted more early than in previous elections at the urging of the Trump campaign to counter a longstanding Democratic advantage among early voters.
The early voting period was hardly a problem, even in western North Carolina, which was hit by Hurricane Helen last month.
In addition to hurricanes in North Carolina and Florida, the worst disruptions of the election year so far have been arson attacks that damaged ballots in two ballot boxes near the Oregon-Washington border. Authorities there are still looking for the person responsible.
The absence of any significant, widespread problems has not stopped Trump, the Republican nominee, from making numerous claims of fraud or election interference during early voting, a possible prelude to post-election challenges.
Trump indicated on Tuesday that he will not challenge the election results – as long as they are fair.
“If the election is fair, I would be the first to concede the result,” Trump said, though it’s not clear what fits that definition.
He said as much later, shortly before polls were scheduled to close in Pennsylvania, posting on his social media platform that there was “talk of massive fraud in Philly” and that the police were on the way.
He did not provide details, and there was no immediate indication of what he meant.
Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner issued a statement on Trump’s announcement that the only attempt to cheat came from the Republican presidential candidate.
“There is no factual basis in law enforcement to support that wild claim,” Krasner said. “We’ve been calling all day for complaints and allegations of wrongdoing if there are any. If Donald J. Trump has any facts to support his wild allegations, we want them now.”
One of the three members of the Philadelphia Board of Elections, Seth Bluestein, a Republican, said on social media that there is “absolutely no truth to Trump’s claim. It’s another example of misinformation.” Voting in that city is safe, he said.
In Georgia, a subsequent attempt by Republicans to challenge the collection of mail-in ballots in the Atlanta area last weekend after early voting had ended was dismissed as “frivolous,” and Trump-appointed U.S. District Judge R. Stan Baker said the Republicans’ argument ” does not withstand even the most basic level of interpretation of the law and reading comprehension”.
Trump’s Democratic opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris, urged voters not to fall for Trump’s tactics to cast doubt on the election.
This is the first presidential election since Trump lost to Joseph Biden four years ago and began various attempts to circumvent the outcome and stay in power. This culminated in a violent attack on the US Capitol on January 6, 2021 to stop the vote being certified as Trump told his supporters to “fight like hell”.
Even now, a solid majority of Republicans believe Trump’s claim that Biden was not legitimately elected, despite audits and recounts in swing states, all of which confirmed Biden’s victory.
During four years of election lies and conspiracy theories about voting, local election officials faced harassment and even death threats. This has led to increased security at election offices and polling stations, including buttons to automatically call the police and bullet-proof glass.
While there have been no major reports of any malicious cyber activity affecting election offices, foreign actors have been active in using fake social media profiles and websites to fuel inter-party disputes and disinformation. In recent weeks, U.S. intelligence officials have attributed to Russia numerous fake videos alleging election fraud in swing states.
Ahead of Election Day, officials issued a joint statement with federal law enforcement agencies warning that Russia is particularly stepping up influence operations, including methods that could incite violence, and is likely to continue after the vote.
Jen Easterly, the top US election security official, urged Americans to rely on state and local election officials for election information.
“This is especially important as we find ourselves in an election cycle with an unprecedented amount of disinformation, including disinformation aggressively promoted and amplified by our foreign adversaries on a larger scale than ever before,” she said, adding: “We cannot allow foreign adversaries to vote in our democracy”.
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Source: www.vijesti.me
