Remember the panic accomplice media outlets created over the 2024 election, that poll workers and elections officials were under imminent threat of attack? Turns out it was another phony five alarm from leftist election integrity-denier groups parroted by their faithful allies in corporate media.

A new report on Election Day in swing state Michigan tracks the real threat to representative democracy came from aggressive leftist groups and complicit poll officials who did everything they could to stymie transparency and cast doubt on the idea of free and fair elections.

‘Fears for Her Life’

In late November 2022, the Associated Press begrudgingly reported that the “chaos” their leftist friends warned would cripple the midterm elections never materialized. Hmmm? 

Among the many hair-on-fire narratives, AP helped shape the paranoia that “poll watchers who had been steeped in conspiracy theories falsely claiming that then-President Donald Trump did not actually lose the 2020 election.” And they dutifully reported on Democrats’ worries that new election integrity laws in Republican-controlled states represented  “Jim Crow 2.0.”

How stunned AP and the rest of corporate media seemed when those election security measures didn’t suppress minority votes or imperil democracy. 

“… Election Day, and the weeks of early voting before it, went fairly smoothly,” the integrity-deprived news outlet reported post-election. 

So much for the fear porn then. But the accomplice media, as we know, is nothing without fear. So they were back in 2024, warning again of looming violence at the polls, insisting the Trump-supporting MAGA movement was prepared to make trouble. 

“Poll workers face violence, threats,” declared NewsNation. 

“Poll workers face threats ahead of the 2024 election,” read a July 5, 2024 NPR headline. The story featured a “Kansas City woman,” Chinesa Rusch, who “fears for her life.” 

“Now that there have been four years of this rhetoric, people have had time to plan,” Rusch told the leftist, taxpayer-subsidized news outlet. “Someone could come to Election Day with the intention to do harm to, in their minds, protect their vote. That possibility of violence surrounding our elections was never something that I perceived as a possibility before 2020.”

Yeah, Rusch seems to have survived the ordeal, at least based on her social media posts. In fact, it wasn’t much of an ordeal at all, according to Shawn Kieffer, Republican director of elections at the Kansas City Board of Election Commissioners.  

“I’m sure she was very safe or we would have heard about it after the election,” Kieffer said in a phone interview with The Federalist. 

There was really only one incident of threatened violence at the Kansas City polls on Election Day, he said. A  voter frustrated about the long line yelled out something about blowing up the polling site — a labor union hall. Kieffer said it turned out to be an empty threat. The man high-tailed it before police arrived. There were no further problems. 

The elections office and law enforcement did work together to secure the voting stations, but Election Day was a relatively quiet affair, the election official said.  

“We didn’t really have any incidents except that one,” Kieffer said. 

After stoking unfounded fears for months, the AP had to admit that “Election Day unfolded relatively smoothly as voters faced only scattered disruptions and delays after an election season marked by concerns over disinformation, foreign influence and threats to election workers and voting systems.”

‘Myriad Troubling Trends’

What AP didn’t have much to say about — and why would an accomplice media outlet carrying water for the left? — was their media pals violating state election law, left-leaning observers interfering with voters, and illegal campaigning inside polling sites. 

That’s what the Public Interest Legal Foundation (PILF)  witnessed and recorded in its new Serve & Observe Report. 

The election integrity organization documented Election Day 2024 operations inside Detroit-area polling places, a critical voting center in swing state Michigan. PILF officials engaged in extensive on-site monitoring, and the report reveals “myriad troubling trends that undermine the integrity, neutrality, and transparency of Michigan’s voting process,” according to to the foundation’s press release.

“The events we documented in Detroit should concern every American who values fair and lawful elections,” said PILF President J. Christian Adams. “PILF observers witnessed sophisticated interference in the process by progressive election protection organizations in Michigan.” 

Report findings include: 

› Overwhelming left-leaning observer presence that interfered with the election process and voters. Aggressive conduct by election observers. These individuals directed voters, questioned credentials, and demanded ID far beyond their legal authority.

› Media personnel outside of legal boundaries. New York Times and Washington Post journalists entered secure voting areas in violation of Michigan election law and invaded voter privacy, taking pictures of voters casting ballots at close range inside prohibited areas.

› Illegal campaigning inside polling locations. PILF operatives noted race-based appeals and distribution of campaign literature inside the 100-foot no-campaign zone.

› Sophisticated “line-warming” operations. These operations featured DJs, snacks, and cheerleading, creating a partisan atmosphere disguised as harmless voter comfort efforts.

› Democratic Party and affiliated groups outnumbered their Republican counterparts by ratios of 2:1 or 3:1 at observed locations. 

‘Aggressive’ Third-Party Poll Watchers

Some of the polling place problems occurred right “under the very nose” of Michigan’s leftist Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson, “who used the day to tour polls with a friendly media entourage in tow,” the report states. 

PILF staff were trained to watch Detroit polling sites the same way as United States Department of Justice observers do, according to the report. In fact, several staff attorneys at the foundation are Department of Justice Voting Section alumni and formerly managed election observer coverage for the federal government, the report notes. 

What they saw was startling, particularly the aggressiveness and interference of third-party poll watchers. Such observers are to be seen and not heard, under election law. Leftist third-party watchers, such as Election Protection, a project of the well-heeled Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, were very visible and very vocal, according to the report. 

“PILF observers repeatedly witnessed other organizations’ poll watchers physically and verbally insert themselves into regular administration of polling sites,” the report asserts. “We observed other poll watchers engaging voters in booths and acting in a way to lead voters into believing the third parties were election officials. The latter is a growing problem that is getting worse.”

In one incident, an Election Protection observer, in view of a Biden Department of Justice observer, blocked a voter from entering the voting area and demanded to see the individual’s “identification,” according to PILF’s report. 

‘You Should be Voting Democrat’

Beyond the observers, “print and photojournalists intruded on voter privacy and entered voting areas. Some were eventually removed by election officials while holding recording devices. Others were seemingly part of Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson’s entourage,” PILF observers documented. 

In one incident, a New York Times Magazine photographer kept snapping pictures of voters casting ballots, ignoring poll officials’ commands to leave until he was informed that he was breaking Michigan election law, the report asserts. 

And PILF observers reported frequent incidents of racial appeals to voters around the state on Election Day. 

“One incident in a Detroit polling place saw a campaigner identified with the Harris/Walz campaign handing out targeted literature to Black voters entering the poll,” the report notes. “The campaigner stood at the front door — well within the demarcated polling boundary — making the behavior illegal under Michigan election law. The distributed leaflet was a candidate slate.” 

In another incident, the foundation reports a black voter who complained about the candidate slate being passed out in the “no-campaign zone.” The voter told the poll manager that the campaigner audaciously scolded, “You’re a Black woman, aren’t you a Democrat? You should be voting Democrat. Here are the Democrats — if you care about your community, you will vote Democrat.”

“The poll manager promptly ordered the campaigner to move outside the no-campaign zone though compliance was short-lived,” the report states. 

‘Serious Questions’

Troubling incidents like those laid out in PILF’s observations shine a spotlight on the real partisan threats to representative democracy inside battleground state polling sites. The report calls on the Michigan Legislature to “strengthen enforcement mechanisms, set boundaries for observer conduct, and better train election officials on removing violators.”

“These are breakdowns legislators must fix,” Adams said. 

“PILF’s findings raise serious questions about the health of Michigan’s elections,” the report warns.