Suspicious packages were sent to election offices in more than 20 states this week, prompting an FBI investigation, triggering evacuations and rattling staff, according to a CNN investigation of state offices and a report by The Associated Press.
The threatening envelopes came as election officials across the country prepare for a Saturday deadline to send the first ballots to overseas and military voters and as states are weeks away from the start of widespread early in-person and mail-in voting.
According to CNN and AP reports, suspicious envelopes were received by election officials or intercepted en route to officials in Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Georgia, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, Tennessee and Wyoming.
Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger said Thursday that his office had been notified by the U.S. Postal Service that a suspicious package was “headed our way” and that the Postal Service would attempt to intercept it, as it did last November when an envelope full of fentanyl was sent to a Fulton County election office.
“We’re on the lookout, and so are they,” Raffensperger said of the package.
What other election officials are saying: Karen Brinson Bell, executive director of the North Carolina State Board of Elections, told CNN that the key state was also being targeted this week.
Bell said staff now wear gloves when handling mail and isolate certain areas of the office when they find a suspicious item that could be contaminated. An official with the Kentucky Secretary of State’s office also told CNN that after this week’s incident, they asked staff to wear gloves when handling mail, “out of an abundance of caution.”
“When we have to take these extra steps, it really adds to the workload and it really adds to the anxiety that we feel about doing our jobs, when what we really want to do is make sure that people can vote,” Bell said.
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