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Jared Dearing, the director of Kentucky’s Board of Elections, had little to do with Louisville, the state’s largest city, having only one polling place for the June 28 primary. It was a county decision, and it made sense. In-person turnout was expected to be low during the pandemic. The polling place, a convention center, offered multiple locations to cast ballots, and transportation by bus there was free.
Nevertheless, as luminaries from LeBron James to U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., tweeted in outrage about the supposed disenfranchisement of Louisville voters, threats poured into Dearing’s office. “You’re too scared to answer your phone,” one man said in a voicemail message from a blocked number. “Go find a gun and kill yourself. Every person that didn’t get to vote because of you should get to beat the shit out of you.” The man, who identified himself as a Washington, D.C., resident, expressed hope that Dearing, a “bigoted whore,” would be mangled in a flaming car crash.
In another voicemail, the same caller predicted that every member of Dearing’s staff, whom he called “evil fucks,” would be damned for eternity. “Y’all are going to hell. God sees you. He sees you committing voter suppression, and that is a mortal sin.”
Such abuse isn’t limited to Kentucky. Across the country, election administrators and their staffs are facing unprecedented attacks, much of it from outside their jurisdictions, from both left- and right-wing voters and activists. The ..
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