Federal election monitors will be on hand in four Pennsylvania counties for Election Day next week, and while that’s not exactly new, state leaders have a message for them: You should watch yourselves as well.
Last week, the U.S. Department sent a letter to state election officials, advising them that it would sent election monitors to Allegheny, Lehigh, Luzerne, and Philadelphia counties to monitor the vote.
“Our monitors only observe and take notes,” said DOJ civil rights division attorney James Catnia in the letter. “They do not intrude or interfere in any way in the voting process” — and will be dressed not in uniforms but in “business-casual” garb without identifying pins.
There is nothing new about federal election monitors observing the voting process: Three of the Pennsylvania counties singled out by the Department of Justice next week — Allegheny, Luzerne, and Philadelphia — were also visited by monitors in 2024, under the administration of President Joe Biden. Such observations can help document compliance by local officials with civil rights and ballot-access laws.
Schmidt: Observers must follow state, federal laws
But in a brief pre-election address Tuesday, Pennsylvania’s top election official, Secretary of State Al Schmidt, said the state "expects everyone observing polling places to follow all state and federal laws" — and those laws don't give monitors authority to police voters themselves.
“DOJ monitors are not legally entitled to any greater access to polling places than any member of the public," he said. "We encourage them to coordinate with county election offices to ensure that their activities on Election Day do not disrupt the voting process in any way."
“Additionally, state and federal laws strictly limit military and law enforcement presence at polling places.”
Schmidt's remarks were notable even though he prefaced them with several minutes of discussion about the voting process, as well as requests that voters be “patient” with election workers who “are our neighbors who have offered their time so others in their community can exercise their right to vote.”
But President Donald Trump has routinely accused elections of being fraudulent, especially since losing the 2020 election. He sought to overturn those results in court, and his supporters sought to disrupt their certification in the Jan. 6, 2021 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.
In recent days, the Trump administration has filed legal action to demand court action if a Republican candidate for U.S. Senate loses in Alaska — a move Trump has said he initiated. The administration has also brought a court fight in California over its demand that election officials there assist in efforts to remove from the voter rolls people the administration says are not eligible to vote. And it is a standard part of Trump’s political speeches that not only was he cheated out of a win in the 2020 presidential race, but that if Republicans he supports lose this fall, it will be because of fraud.
State officials and election-integrity groups have generally been cautious in their remarks about how they would respond to potential election interference from the federal government, in part because of concern that raising such fears can turn them into self-fulfilling prophecies by scaring voters from the polls.
Schmidt’s remarks Tuesday have been among the more pointed statements he has made on the topic.
'Luzerne County has nothing to hide'
Luzerne County Manager Romilda Crocamo released a statement noting that the Justice Department has monitored Luzerne County elections before, including the 2022 and 2024 general elections and the 2024 primary.
"Each time, the county worked cooperatively with federal personnel, and each time the election went forward as it should," Crocamo said.
"The ground rules are clear and well understood. DOJ monitors will not be stationed inside polling places. That has been the county's consistent position: it keeps polling places orderly and prevents any appearance of intimidation of voters," she added. "Monitors are free to observe from outside polling places, and county election officials will stay in contact with the DOJ throughout Election Day."
Crocamo also sought to reassure voters heading to the polls.
"Voters should cast their ballots with confidence. Any problem at a polling place should be reported right away to the poll workers on site or to the Luzerne County Bureau of Elections," Crocamo said.
"Luzerne County has nothing to hide. Our Bureau of Elections, our Board of Elections, and hundreds of poll workers are prepared to run a fair, accurate, and lawful election. County administration has complete confidence in the work of our Bureau of Elections staff," she added. "Monitoring confirms that work.”
ACLU: Monitors 'could be poorly trained'
A week ago, civil rights groups wrote a letter to election officials in all 67 Pennsylvania counties, urging them to be on their guard against efforts to meddle with the voting process.
“DOJ’s election monitoring program has existed for many years, and monitors have long been deployed without incident. Under normal circumstances, monitors wear plainclothes, do not interfere with or disrupt voting or counting, and abide by all local, state, and federal rules and regulations,” asserts the ACLU, its Pennsylvania chapter, and the Public Interest Law Center in their letter of Oct. 20.
“However,” the letter continues, “this year, DOJ has announced that it is massively expanding its monitoring program. Monitors under this new, expanded program could be poorly trained, lack a legal background (or potentially be from outside DOJ entirely), or even be conspiracy theorists who may have been disqualified from federal employment in the past.”
“Participants in DOJ’s monitoring program … do not derive any additional powers from federal statutory or regulatory authority. Persons acting as federal election monitors … must comply with all state laws regulating other members of the public.”
The letter spells out the kind of behavior that is prohibited at polling places — such as efforts to intimidate people from voting — and underscores that local officials have power over and responsibility for the conduct of local elections.
“No matter what federal actors say on Election Day, you run your elections,” it says. “And you are responsible for ensuring that no one — including federal officials — interferes with the right to vote in your county.”
For their part, state leaders have said they have spent months preparing for a wide range of possible federal actions — up to and including efforts to deploy federal troops on Election Day.
“We have been preparing for this for more than a year,” Gov. Josh Shapiro told WESA this past weekend. And while he acknowledged that he was “deeply concerned” about potential federal action, he pledged that “we will protect people's access to the polling places."
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