Election analysts are worried about whether all the votes cast today will be counted, whether voters will be intimidated at the polls, and whether foreign interference might suppress votes — especially in swing states that may decide the election.
In Vermont, activists across the state are planning follow-up events, starting on Wednesday and continuing throughout the week, with an eye on the national arena.
“We have complete faith in Vermont, and the integrity of our election,” said Spencer Putnam, lead organizer of Count Every Vote Vermont. “We’re doing this partly to hold up Vermont as an example to the rest of the country.”
Putnam said Covid is one big reason organizers decided to this week’s events. In a normal year, he said, activists might have gone to Florida or Pennsylvania to help get out the vote in-person, but this year that wouldn’t be safe.
The rallies are also an attempt to counteract the tone of any violence that might follow the election, Putnam said. The plans include peaceful marches, candlelight vigils, sign-waving, information sessions, conversation and reflection.
Decentralized marches are planned in Rutland, Bristol, Middlebury, Montpelier, Brattleboro and other towns across the state.
“We’re not a big town, and yet, we hope to have 100 or 200 people come to the village green on Wednesday if we need to — and hopefully we don’t,” said Jim Mendell, one of the organizers of the march in Bristol.
Mendell said that, if the president loses the election and refuses to concede, the American people really have “no choice” other than widespread protest, regardless of their normal party affiliation.
“In Bristol we have a pretty diverse group of people,” he said. “When it comes to issues that come up, we’re a very split community.”
Mendell said that split shows in issues such as the Vermont Gas pipeline that he and other Bristol residents blocked from being built. But when it comes to the presidential election, and worries around counting ballots, people are in a little more agreement.
“We’re very much in favor, as a town, of not having (Trump) stay in office,” he said. ”But of course, we’ll abide by the election results.”
In cities such as New York and Washington, D.C., hundreds of storefronts have been boarded up in recent days in case violence breaks out on Wednesday. Putnam said he has no reason to believe anything like that will happen in Vermont, but said the calm events on this week’s schedule can offer an important contrast in stressful times.
“Once you start down this path, you begin to discover that it’s a nationwide movement,” he said. “Thousands of people are involved with these things.”
The voter-rights group also asked Vermont leaders to sign on to a pledge to ensure that every vote gets counted, “given that the right of citizens to choose their own leaders is a bedrock principle of democracy and that fairly administered elections are the mechanism to achieve this ideal.”
Putnam said the effort has won support from Republicans, Democrats, Progressives and independents, with statewide leaders like Peter Welch, Jim Condos, TJ Donovan and David Zuckerman signing on — though others, like Phil Scott, Patrick Leahy and Bernie Sanders, have not.
On Wednesday morning, the group will hold a press conference via Zoom demanding that every single ballot cast by every single American on or before Tuesday gets counted — especially if there are efforts to prevent that from happening.
“We’re of course planning an event for something that we hope doesn’t happen,” Putnam said.
He said if things go smoothly, the activists will have a celebration instead. “But we’re planning this because we don’t think it’s going to go smoothly.”
