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Election workers experienced a rise in threats and harassment in the fallout from the false claims about the 2020 Presidential Election being stolen from former President Donald Trump.

Two years later, election workers across the country have dealt with all forms of intimidation tactics that make them feel unsafe and unable to do their jobs.

A new California law, Senate Bill 1131, authored by state Senator Josh Newman, D-Fullerton, allows election workers and other government employees to enroll in programs to keep their addresses and other personal information confidential.

Election officials can now enroll in the Safe at Home program that’s currently used by domestic violence survivors and people who work at abortion clinics.

The brunt of the election harassment is levied at the local level in many rural California counties. Smaller election offices lack the security resources to protect its workforce from the harassment, according to Kim Alexander, the president and founder of the California Voter Federation.

“The places we are seeing activity around election conflict in California are some of the smaller, rural northern counties. Particularly Nevada County, up here just north of Sacramento, and Shasta County,” Alexander said.

Cathy Darling Allen, the Shasta County Clerk and Registrar of Voters, has seen the changes first-hand.

“This is a job that five years ago was really under the radar and very demanding, very high stress, but at the same time not a lot of attention was paid to the process and that’s very different now,” Allen said.

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“We have people who want to talk about and examine front to back the whole way that elections are conducted — and we welcome those questions but those questions turn into threats or turn into unacceptable, invasive behavior,” Allen said.

The harassment around the election process has caused many workers to quit their positions or not seek reelection.

“I feel confident that our counties are going to be able to manage the election sufficiently. But we do have to worry about whether we have a deep enough bench to continue to staff elections,” Alexander said, “It's really a lot of work, people don’t appreciate how much complicated details involved in putting on an election in California.” (Full Story)