Minnesota Reformer: Election Deniers Are A Threat To Minnesota's Democracy

By Maia Irvin, Minnesota Reformer

Election deniers and right-wing activists are threatening democracy in Minnesota ahead of the November election, according to a new report from the Defend Democracy Project.

The report, which relies on interviews with Minnesota grassroots activists, legal analysts and academics, singles out the local spread of disinformation as a primary threat to democracy in Minnesota.

“Some of the most interesting, and frankly scary, stuff that’s happening right now is happening at that county level,” said Becky Parks, Defend Democracy Project research director.

The report details far-right activists under the moniker “Swamp Watch” mobilizing at the county level to encourage officials to change election systems by implementing measures like hand counting ballots. Election administration experts say hand counting ballots is slow, labor-intensive and allows for significant human error.

Parks pointed to extremists’ successful efforts to hand count ballots in Crow Wing county. She said similar efforts are happening in Faribault, Carver and Sherburne counties.

“[The counties] are all enmeshed together as part of the election system,” Parks said. “If one county… is mucking with the process, it’s going to have ripple effects.”

Election deniers are also serving or running for office, chief among them Republican secretary of state candidate Kim Crockett.

Crockett, the report charges, has spread disinformation about Minnesota’s election systems throughout her campaign and worked with the right-wing Election Integrity Network. EIN is a national network run by the Conservative Partnership Institute. Crockett is leading an EIN effort to use more partisan election judges — instead of county workers. EIN then trains these partisan judges to ignore local election rules, according to the report.

Carver County has already voted to use more partisan election judges in November’s election.

Crockett has also called mail-in voting fraudulent, criticized early voting and questioned whether people with disabilities and non-English speakers should be allowed to vote.

“We need to be having civil conversations about election policy, not calling each other names,” Crockett said in a statement emailed to the Reformer. “Working to restore confidence in our elections isn’t dangerous or extreme.”

Parks said voters should be aware of their rights and expect to see “aggressive” poll watchers and others staking out ballot drop boxes during this year’s election.

“We really need to be prepared in Minnesota and states across the country for some of these folks to run the same playbook that they tried to run in 2020,” Parks said.

The Minnesota Reformer is an independent, nonprofit news organization dedicated to keeping Minnesotans informed and unearthing stories other outlets can’t or won’t tell..