Justice Department Charges 20 People With Threatening Election Workers After Dramatic Increase In Acts Of Political Intimidation

The Justice Department charged 20 people with threatening election workers throughout the United States through its Elections Threats Task Force.

This task force was formed in June 2021 in response to increasing reports of intimidation and threats to election workers following the 2020 election. Former President Donald Trump and his allies argued, without evidence, there was widespread fraud during this election. 

In addition to the task force’s work leading to these charges, they opened dozens of investigations into other instances since their launch. 

During a press conference in Arizona to lay out the sentence for the Ohio resident Joshua Russell for making death threats to an official working in the Arizona secretary of state’s office, Justice Department official John Keller told reporters that 13 of the 20 people charged were convicted. 

Seven individuals were given sentences between one-and-a-half to three-and-a-half years in prison, which, Keller mentioned, shows “how seriously the federal courts are taking this conduct.”

“Our work is not done, our efforts will not wane, the department will continue to vigorously pursue anyone who criminally threatens or targets the election community,” Keller stated. “This behavior is insidious with potentially grave consequences for individual victims and for the institution of election administration as a whole.”

“The public must know any criminal threats to the election community will be prosecuted to the full extent of the law,” he continued. “Death threats are not debate. Death threats do not contribute to the marketplace of ideas. Death threats are not First Amendment-protected speech.”

In the case of Russell, officials laid out a sentence of two-and-a-half years in prison for him due to him leaving a series of voicemails around the 2022 midterm elections in which he threatened the life of then-Arizona Secretary of State Katie Hobbs, who had been elected governor of the state that year. 

“Mr. Russell made three phone calls to the office of then Secretary of State Katie Hobbs threatening to put her in the ground or in a grave,” U.S. Attorney for the District of Arizona Gary Restaino said during the Arizona press conference. 

“You’re the enemy of the United States, you’re a traitor to this country, and you better put your [expletive] – your [expletive] affairs in order, ’cause your days [inaudible] are extremely numbered,” Russell stated in his first voicemail to Hobbs, according to the DOJ. “America’s coming for you, and you will pay with your life, you communist [expletive] traitor [expletive].”

Hobbs discussed the threats she received immediately after overseeing Arizona’s 2020 election.

She labeled the threats directed toward her family and staff as “utterly abhorrent.” Still, she stated that they would not keep her from doing her job, which includes certifying Arizona’s election results.

“But there are those, including the president, members of Congress and other elected officials, who are perpetuating misinformation and are encouraging others to distrust the election results in a manner that violates the oath of the office they took,” she mentioned in a statement.

“It is well past time that they stop,” Hobbs stated. “Their words and actions have consequences.”

In 2022, Kari Lake, Hobbs’ Republican challenger for the governor’s seat, claimed that there had been fraud after she lost and unsuccessfully went to court to attempt to overturn the results. She never provided any evidence to substantiate her charges, and her case was thrown out by a judge.

Last month, Lake said she would not defend herself against a defamation lawsuit initiated by Maricopa County Recorder Stephen Richer, who she falsely claimed had rigged the election against her. The trial will now move to the damages phase, and she could be on the hook for millions of dollars.