Nearly one-third of Kansas election officials have left since 2020 amid harassment and criticism fueled by unsubstantiated voting fraud claims. The continued scrutiny may cause additional stress in 2024.
Making sure the poll workers do everything right is always important for conducting a safe and secure election, but next year their actions will be under a microscope. After the 2020 election, Republican President Donald Trump repeatedly pushed false claims that voter fraud cost him re-election.
That’s led to state lawmakers and the public scrutinizing the security of elections. And that’s fueling a huge turnover — 35 of the state’s 109 officials have quit since 2020. The number of election officials includes the 105 county clerks and four appointed election commissioners.
The Kansas Legislature’s Special Committee on Elections recently held hearings where advocates for election security changes argued the state’s voting systems are not safe. But it included people lining up to share dubious claims.
Republican Harvey County Clerk Rick Piepho, who serves as a legislative liaison for the Kansas County Clerks and Election Officials Association, chose not to participate in the hearings. He said the committee was only focusing on disinformation and unfounded conspiracy theories.
“I still haven’t seen any evidence,” Piepho said, “from any of these groups that anything that they’re theorizing has actually happened.”