Fewer people are willing to be poll workers

Instances of voter fraud in the United States are incredibly rare, and that’s certainly the case in Burke County.

But allegations of fraud are more prevalent now than perhaps any other time in the nation’s history.

For the people in charge of our elections, the perception that voter fraud is rampant can be a major headache, resulting in baseless accusations and belligerent attitudes on the part of some voters.

As a result, many poll workers have had enough.

“I’ve probably got like six or seven chief judges that are done,” said Burke Board of Elections Director Kenny Rhyne. “They said they’re done. No kidding. They won’t do it any more. They said it’s not worth the aggravation and the accusations or somebody being rude.

“They’ve said they’ll come in and help me here in the office, but they are not going back to the polling places on election day.”

Rhyne was careful not to lay the blame on either major party, but he did say the rudeness and groundless suspicion began to ramp up in 2020.

That was the year former President Donald Trump repeatedly claimed the election had been stolen from him, and that he was the actual winner instead of President Joe Biden.

Many of the former president’s supporters took that to heart.

According to research in 2022 by the Carnegie Endowment, “Threats of violence against election workers, formerly almost nonexistent, are now frequent — a 2022 Brennan Center poll found that one in six election officials had experienced threats. Half were threatened in person — not just online or on the phone. The DOJ has received reports of more than 850 threats against election officials since the 2020 elections, but the Brennan Center poll found that more than half the cases of threat had not been reported to law enforcement, suggesting actual intimidation is far higher.”

Burke County has so far avoided violent confrontations at the polls.

But Rhyne said voters constantly express their distrust of the electoral process and those overseeing it, even though numerous systems are in place to keep elections secure.

“Poll workers are getting hard to get, really,” Rhyne said. “People get tired. People are hateful, people are mean. They’re politicking out there. You know, people really push it to the extreme. People make comments like, ‘You threw away my vote. You changed my vote. You threw away my vote.’”

Rhyne said the most noteworthy example of unrest was a mild one that happened last November during a contentious city council election in Valdese. An argument erupted in the parking lot, and judges had to ask folks to back up so they wouldn’t violate state law by campaigning within 50 feet of a polling place.

Judges also asked for Burke County Sheriff’s Office deputies to ride through the area. Rhyne added law enforcement officers are not allowed to monitor precincts because it can be seen as voter intimidation.

It isn’t hard to see why many may think the pay for a day’s work at the polls isn’t worth the headache.

Poll workers in Burke are paid $165 per day for their first election and $185 for subsequent elections. Judges get $200 per day and chief judges are paid $250. Rhyne said many larger counties pay more.

Rhyne said there is ample staff to cover early voting, which runs from Oct. 17 to Nov. 2. He is still looking for workers for election day, Nov. 5.

“We’ve got to have more workers, because this general election is probably the biggest one (turnout) many of us have ever seen in their lives,” he said.

The animosity has taken its toll on directors as well. Rhyne said 34 of the state’s 100 counties have new directors this year, Burke included.

During his career, Rhyne — who took over the job earlier this year after the retirement of longtime director Debbie Mace — has worked every job at the polls. He feels it’s a civic duty and wishes more people would do it, if only for the experience of seeing things from a different point of view.

In fact, he wouldn’t mind seeing poll workers selected the way jurors are chosen.

“This is a community service,” Rhyne said. “You make a little bit of money, but 14 hours a day for a couple of hundred dollars, that’s no money, especially when you’re worn out and you’ve got to go back to work to your own job the next day.

“I think everybody should have to be a poll worker sometime in their life.”

NOTE: If you’d like to sign up to work the polls on election day, you can email the Burke Board of Elections at burke.boe@burkenc.org, or call 828-764-9010.