Washington – Federal poll watchers will be in 22 states today, safeguarding against fraud or discrimination in election districts marked by tight races, large numbers of minority voters and faulty ballot machines.
Justice Department monitors and observers are being assigned to Cuyahoga County, Ohio, which has been dogged by problems with computerized touch-screen voting machines. They will be in Bergen County, N.J., a must-win prize for both candidates in the state’s Senate race. And they will be watching more than a dozen counties nationwide where polls are on Indian reservations and in big cities dominated by black voters.
In all, the Justice Department is sending an estimated 850 poll watchers to 69 cities and counties – what officials Monday called an unprecedented number, and twice the number sent during the 2002 congressional midterm elections. In Colorado, poll watchers will be in Denver, Arapahoe and Adams counties.
The government has dispatched poll watchers to ensure fair elections since the 1965 Voting Rights Act was enacted.
Assistant Attorney General Wan J. Kim, who heads the Justice Department’s civil-rights programs, told reporters last week that the election districts were selected in part because of close races there.
They include Fort Bend and Galveston counties in Texas, where Republican write-in candidate Shelley Sekula-Gibbs is seeking to keep a GOP hold on the seat vacated by former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay. Texas Democrats have accused Sekula-Gibbs of twice entering early-voting locations – which is prohibited by law – to introduce herself to voters and workers.
