North Carolina election workers battle misinformation and conspiracies after Helene

North Carolina will be one of the closest-watched swing states on election night. On top of the challenges brought by Hurricane Helene, election officials have confronted a years-long swirl of disinformation, conspiracies and threats to workers by Donald Trump and his allies. Laura Barrón-López reports.
Geoff Bennett:
All right, let’s zoom into one of the states where election officials are working to secure the vote this year.
Amna Nawaz:
North Carolina will be one of the closest watch swing states on election night. More than 2.5 million people have already voted early in the state as officials expand options for displaced voters in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene.
Geoff Bennett:
Still, Donald Trump and his allies continue to lie about the security of voting in battlegrounds like North Carolina, laying the groundwork to contest the 2024 election results.
Laura Barron-Lopez is back with this report.
Mary Beth Tipton, Director, Yancey County, North Carolina, Board of Elections: After we get up here, it lays completely different than what it used to. It don’t even run the same way.
Laura Barron-Lopez:
In parts of Yancey County, along North Carolina’s border with Tennessee, the devastation from Hurricane Helene is catastrophic.
Mary Beth Tipton:
Part of me wants to see it. That way, I can accept it as real, but then a part of me don’t.
Laura Barron-Lopez:
Mary Beth Tipton has lived here her whole life. And for 12 years, she’s been the county’s elections director. Tipton’s staff prepared for all sorts of Election Day scenarios, but not for this.
Mary Beth Tipton:
I think we were all in shock there for a couple of days. And then, as things start to settle down just a little bit, reality kicks in, and it’s like, I have got a job to do.
Laura Barron-Lopez:
On the day we met, she was headed to the tiny town of Pensacola to check whether a precinct at the local fire station would be usable.
It became a hub for aid distribution after Helene. Earlier this month, the state passed changes to help hard-hit areas vote, including giving counties the power to adjust polling places and offering residents more options for receiving and turning in absentee ballots.
On top of the challenges brought by Helene, election officials in North Carolina have confronted a yearslong swirl of disinformation, conspiracies, and threats to workers.
Mary Beth Tipton:
The atmosphere has changed since 2020. Nobody trusts us. Everybody thinks that we’re out to get them, we’re not going to count their ballots, we don’t want them to vote. And that’s been a big one. That’s been a tough one. That’s been a hard one to swallow.
Laura Barron-Lopez:
Much of the distrust stems from former President Donald Trump’s false claims that the 2020 election was stolen and ongoing lies about widespread voter fraud in America.
Karen Brinson Bell is the executive director of North Carolina’s State Board of Elections.
Karen Brinson Bell, Executive Director, North Carolina State Board of Elections: We have to focus on how to conduct an election. And we keep our eye on that ball. We’re not going to play Whac-A-Mole with the various conspiracy theories and accusations and falsehoods that are being put out there.
Laura Barron-Lopez:
Among the most common lies this cycle, that Helene and the government’s response to it were designed to disenfranchise Republicans in the election and that noncitizens, with the help of Democrats, are trying to vote in significant numbers. It’s a felony for noncitizens to vote in federal elections.
Trump combined all those falsehoods at a recent campaign stop in Western North Carolina.
Donald Trump, Former President of the United States (R) and Current U.S. Presidential Candidate: FEMA has done a very poor job. They were not supposed to be spending the money on taking in illegal migrants, maybe so they could vote in the election.
Karen Brinson Bell:
There is no grand conspiracy. We are nonpartisan in the work that we do. We are election officials committed by oath to conduct the elections for all North Carolinians.
Laura Barron-Lopez:
Still, the prospect of challenges to the election results in North Carolina looms large.
Jim Womack leads the Republican Party in Lee County, just south of Raleigh. He’s also head of the so-called North Carolina Election Integrity Team, which is part of a Republican-led network to train poll observers in swing states.
Do you think North Carolina will have a legitimate, fair election?
Jim Womack, President, North Carolina Election Integrity Team:
I think that our election integrity organization and the thousands of trained volunteers will do everything they can to identify any form of election fraud, and that we will dutifully report that and provide the evidence to challenge those voters.
Laura Barron-Lopez:
Womack’s team created a — quote — “suspicious voters list” using the states voter rolls. He says those rolls are riddled with duplications, dead people, and felons, a claim Karen Brinson Bell rejects. She says officials regularly update the lists. She also notes:
Karen Brinson Bell:
That just because someone is ineligible potentially on our voter registration rolls does not mean that we have voter fraud. There’s checks and balances in place for all of this. People need to quit putting fear in the minds of voters.
Laura Barron-Lopez:
Even so, Jim Womack says his observers have their antennas up. Among those they’re looking for, noncitizens.
Iliana Santillan, Executive Director, El Pueblo:
The messaging that folks have been hearing about noncitizens voting has created a lot of turmoil and general confusion with our folks. We’ve had people who are citizens, they just became citizens this year, asking if they can vote.
Laura Barron-Lopez:
Iliana Santillan is the director of El Pueblo, an immigrant rights nonprofit in North Carolina. Santillan, a naturalized citizen herself, says Trump’s anti-immigration rhetoric this cycle amounts to voter intimidation.
Iliana Santillan:
One of the concerns we have is, depending on who wins this election, they might be targeting our community members and say that whoever wins might have won because undocumented people voted.
Laura Barron-Lopez:
Santillan points to yard signs in Spanish that warn noncitizens they could be deported if they vote, signs that were paid for by Jim Womack’s group.
And according to a video obtained by CBS News, Womack told trainees that newly-registered voters who have — quote — “missing information” and “Hispanic-sounding last names” may be suspicious. Womack told the “News Hour” he was answering a question that used that language. And he insists he isn’t trying to intimidate voters.
But, after 2020, Womack claims, he wants to rebuild trust, even as Trump continues to spread the lie that the only way hell lose in November is if Democrats cheat.
Doesn’t that undermine trust in the U.S. elections?
Jim Womack:
It probably does. But you must ask yourself the question, is the First Amendment limited? Can they designate when you can say when you can say what’s on your mind or what you believe versus what you cant?
Laura Barron-Lopez:
I understand the right to free speech, but the election officials are genuinely afraid sometimes for their lives. They have put panic buttons in Surry County here in North Carolina. Are you not worried for their safety when they face threats like that?
Jim Womack:
We hear these claims that people are afraid for their lives. But, again, they can say whatever they want to say. I think a lot of that is hype. They say that because they want special protections or they want to draw attention to the fact that they’re being watched.
Laura Barron-Lopez:
But Karen Brinson Bell says it’s not hype. Since 2020, they have added protections like thumbprint entry at offices and door security.
Given what happened in 2020, Donald Trump put a focus on states like Georgia, on states like Arizona, specifically on election workers. Are you, is North Carolina prepared this year to potentially become Georgia?
Karen Brinson Bell:
We know that we may be subjected to that. If we do our job that is already well-defined and outlined, then the facts will speak for themselves. The documentation will be there to counter any accusation.
In some ways, ask us. Point the finger at us, so that we can prove that these results are accurate and secure. And we are going to certify, just like we always do.
Laura Barron-Lopez:
Back in Yancey County, Mary Beth Tipton asked the state for tents to replace some of her precincts. At least two were entirely wiped out. But she found out that the precinct at Pensacola’s fire station will be ready to use on Election Day.
Mary Beth Tipton:
It’s a sigh of relief. I know a lot of people, they — who wants to think about an election at a time like this? But then we have the voters that call the office that’s in these areas that can’t get out. And they want to vote.
That’s something I can give them. And it’s a part of who I am. It’s — I want to see to it that they have — they have lost everything. This is one thing they’re not going to lose, is their voice to cast their ballot.
Laura Barron-Lopez:
For the “PBS News Hour,” I’m Laura Barron-Lopez in Western North Carolina.