Election officials prepare for threats with panic buttons, bulletproof glass

MARIETTA, Ga. (AP) — The election director in Cobb County, an Atlanta suburb where votes will be fiercely contested in this year’s presidential race, recently organized a five-hour training session. The focus wasn’t solely on the nuts-and-bolts of running this year’s election. Instead, it brought together election staff and law enforcement to strategize on how to keep workers safe and the process of voting and ballot-counting secure.

Having a local sheriff’s deputy at early voting locations and panic buttons that connect poll managers to a local 911 dispatcher are among the added security steps the office is taking this year.

Tate Fall, Cobb County’s election director, said she was motivated to act after hearing one of her poll workers describe being confronted during the state’s presidential primary in March by an agitated voter who the worker noticed was carrying a gun. The situation ended peacefully, but the poll worker was shaken.

“That made it really real for me — that it’s so easy for something to go sideways in life, period, let alone the environment of Georgia and elections,” Fall said. “I just can’t have someone being harmed on my conscience.”

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