NC elections chief braces for the first vote since Trump stirred doubts about results

Karen Brinson Bell, head of the North Carolina State Board of Elections, says the day Republican lawmakers questioned whether she let partisan bias shape the 2020 election rules seems like 10 years ago.

Actually, the contentious state Senate hearing was one year ago, and the Republicans still haven’t apologized. They should.

As part of a settlement with groups seeking temporary changes in voting rules in light of COVID, the time period for receiving mailed ballots in 2020 was extended and witness requirements for absentee ballots were eased. Republicans had a fit over what they called a “secret settlement” – although two Republicans on the state board voted for it. They implied that Brinson Bell – a 2019 appointee of the Democrat-controlled board – was bending the rules in Democrats’ favor.

It was shabby treatment under any circumstance, but particularly so in this one. In 2020, Brinson Bell performed a feat of election supervision. Despite the fears and limitations of the pandemic, voter turnout hit a record 75 percent, no serious voting problems occurred and, by the way, Republican candidates did very well.

“That was a tough day,” Brinson Bell said last week of the Republicans questioning her integrity, “but a lot of people have called me complimentary things – Teflon, Wonder Woman and so forth.”

The compliments are in order. Brinson Bell, a Duplin County native and former director of elections in Transylvania County, is winning national attention for her ability to run trouble-free elections in a politically polarized environment. She was recently appointed to three national boards working to improve elections and election security.

Now Brinson Bell and all North Carolina election officials face another daunting task. They will oversee their first state and federal elections since former President Donald Trump declared the last presidential election was “stolen.” In addition to the logistical hurdles of running a clean election, there’s the additional challenge of overcoming conspiracy theories sparked by Trump and fanned by his supporters and right-wing media.

Election officials nationwide have been blasted by those who believe Trump’s false claims. Brinson Bell, who was reappointed by her board to another two-year term in 2021, said there were a high number of retirements this year among county elections directors. She said a recent conference for county election officials featured a talk by a psychologist about dealing with the stress brought on by attacks on the actions and motives of election officials.

The best way to counter falsehood is to be transparent about how elections work and how the results are safeguarded, Brinson Bell said.

“It has become very clear to us that you have a group (of voters) that’s informed and you want to give them the facts so they are prepared to navigate the system and inform others,” she said. “Then you have the misinformed. We may not be able to reach those folks, and that’s a hard thing to accept, but that may be the reality. So then you have to look at the uninformed and make sure that we’re getting the message out to them.”

The 2022 election will also have another complication: possible Russian cyber attacks. The state elections director is regularly briefed by federal security officials about the threat and many of the protections put in place remain classified information. Brinson Bell said vote tallies would be almost impossible to alter and all North Carolina voting machines – thanks to a transition she pushed – are now backed by paper ballots.

But the clearest concern isn’t outside interference, but skepticism among voters – and perhaps Republican lawmakers. Brinson Bell said her focus is on educating the public about the checks and audits that ensure accurate results. She wants the public to understand “that there is no smoke and mirrors, there’s no curtain to be pulled back, that our processes are transparent and thorough and that they are processes we’ve had in place for years, not just the past few years.”