Local election officials are making the safety of voters, poll workers and election infrastructure a top priority in the run-up to the 2024 elections.
Early voting in Virginia is scheduled to begin on September 20th.
Teri Smithson has served as Hanover County’s Chief Elections Officer and Registrar at Large since 2010. She also serves as the regional director for the Virginia Association of Registrars of Voters.
Smithson said Virginia’s 133 elections agencies have been working regularly since 2020 with local, state and federal law enforcement, as well as IT and cybersecurity experts, to ensure the fairness of the upcoming election.
She worried the assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump could make the 2024 election more difficult to administer.
“I couldn’t believe it,” Smithson said, “and my first thought was, ‘It’s going to get worse.'”
A 2024 Brennan Center for Justice survey of 928 election officials nationwide found that 38% of local election officials had experienced intimidation, harassment or abuse in connection with their jobs, and more than half of election officials said they were concerned about the safety of their colleagues and staff.
The majority of election officials have implemented security measures, including strengthening cybersecurity protections and increasing physical security at election offices and polling places.
The Virginia General Assembly adopted further protections for election workers this year, passing a law in some cases protecting personal information on public documents.
The Virginia Department of Elections is providing additional support to protect against digital threats. The department is working with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the Virginia Department of Information Technology on an automated security pilot project that uses artificial intelligence to perform continuous cybersecurity monitoring.
Smithson’s four full-time staff and volunteer election workers have been trained to watch for any potential threats at polling places, and they have been taught a code word they can use to signal to each other if there is a threat, she said.
“They hear it and they know something is going on,” Smithson said.
Henrico County Elections Administrator Mark Coakley said he was working with the county’s emergency management and workplace safety departments to develop plans for responding to power outages, cyberattacks, road closures, political unrest or other events that could disrupt the election.
Smithson said the words of elected officials and politicians “directly impact” how people treat election staff.
“They have to lead by example,” she said. “When there are hard words and hard feelings, and the way it has been for the past four years, people are listening.”
