Virginia has a long history of election monitoring by the Department of Justice, but some state Republicans are criticizing agency plans to do so this year.
“We welcome the opportunity to host an observer from the DOJ,” Hanover County Registrar Teresa Smithson told Radio IQ. She’s been in the gig for 14 years and it's the first time the U. S. Department of Justice has asked to come observe, but she’s not worried about it.
“We’re just looking forward to having a very uneventful election with extremely wide margins,” she said, repeating a portion of the election workers' prayer.
Hanover County is one of six Virginia localities that will be monitored by DOJ attorneys this year.
The monitoring effort covers 27 states and dozens of localities. In a statement a DOJ spokesperson said it’s part of regular review to ensure equal access to the ballot. They’d done it for decades in Virginia considering the state’s history with suppressing the Black vote during the Civil Rights era, but the influx of non-English speaking citizens in Northern Virginia led to new monitoring in the last few years.
Manassas, Manassas Park and Prince William County are all on the list this year. Susan Reed, director of elections in the City of Manassas, said it’s the second time she’s had DOJ watch her precincts.
“There was no problem,” Reed, who's been involved in local elections since 1999, told Radio IQ Monday of previous DOJ monitoring. “It's like they faded in the background.”
Reed said the agency also provides feedback after they monitor, but implementing that feedback isn’t required.
“It’s just letting us know what they see in the field, and I have no problem with that,” she said. “They’re just doing their jobs like I am.”
But in social media posts over the weekend, some state Republicans criticized the DOJ announcement. Mechanicsville Senator Ryan McDougle said, “The Biden-Harris Department of Justice should be focused on preventing non-citizens from voting in Virginia’s elections—instead of intimidating voters.”
Both Attorney General Jason Miyares and Governor Glenn Youngkin also pointedly mentioned DOJ monitoring in weekend posts as well.
“Virginia law requires any observer (except those from the political parties) to obtain written authorization to enter a polling site,” Miyares posted. “I expect DOJ to follow the law.”
In a phone call, A spokesperson for the Attorney General’s office said they wanted to make sure all election observers follow Virginia state law.
“Our expectation is that observers will indeed follow the law,” he said.
Multiple text messages sent to McDougle asking for clarification on his comments were not returned.
All six localities confirmed to Radio IQ that they had given DOJ permission to monitor. It’s something most do with local party watchers as well.
Rich Anderson, chair of the Republican Party of Virginia, said he was long familiar with DOJ monitoring.
“It’s a normal, routine oversight operation that the DOJ administers. They have authority under law to do so,” he said, pointing to his own party’s use of election monitors. “They can’t intercede, our poll watchers are trained to only communicate with election workers, and I believe the DOJ is under the same rules.”
Democratic Senator Jeremy McPike’s district includes Prince William County. He wasn’t surprised to hear DOJ was returning, but he was shocked to hear intimidation complaints from his senate colleagues.
“The only complaints I’ve received this year are actual voters who’ve been voting for years getting kicked off the rolls,” McPike told Radio IQ, referring to the Youngkin-ordered culling of potential ineligible registrations that also resulted in some legal citizens also being removed from Virginia’s voter rolls.
McPike said he spoke to a Woodbridge resident who had voted for years but was improperly removed from the rolls under Youngkin’s order. Nearly 200 Prince William County voters were purged during the 90-day quiet period according to documents obtained by Radio IQ, though it was unclear who were legal citizens and who weren't. Reporting by the Washington Post said as many 43 had cast a ballot between 2012 and 2020, and 26 of them have since legally re-registered.
Delegate Michelle Lopes Maldonado, who’s entire Manassas-area district is under DOJ monitoring for language access this year, was also surprised to hear concerns from Republican officials.
“These monitors were here this cycle, the cycle before that. And people have not felt intimidated,” she told Radio IQ. “There's a little level of comfort and confidence that they are there, just by their presence, to ensure the integrity of the election process.”
In Henrico County, a locality set to be monitored for the first time, registrar Mark Coakley, a 20-year veteran director of local elections, said he’s honored to have DOJ come watch his people work.
“I told them no firearms and they laughed,” he joked in a phone interview. “They don't have firearms, they’re lawyers.”
“We want to show how elections are run with the integrity of the process,” he added, hoping to teach the DOJ monitors a few things about how elections while they're there.
"Hopefully they eat at good restaurants and spend some sales tax money here locally, too,” he added.
If you are worried your civil rights are being violated while trying to vote you can reach the Department of Justice’s complaint line at 800-253-3931
This report, provided by Virginia Public Radio, was made possible with support from the Virginia Education Association.
