Comment ALLENTOWN, Pa. — In the political battleground of Lehigh County, a legal group tied to Donald Trump sued to shorten the hours of the only 24-hour polling station, arguing that someone could fill it with fake votes. Vigilantes pledged online to protect it. Election officials received anonymous letters: “STOP ELECTION FRAUD.” But on this November night, there are no citizen watchdogs or sneaky fraudsters at the ballot box at the Lehigh County Government Center, just a janitor wiping the windows. Leaves strewn on the sidewalk. A husky smelling grass. “The rhetoric that’s being thrown out there doesn’t match the reality,” said Geoff Brace, chairman of the Lehigh County Board of Commissioners, a registered Democrat. National investigations have found no evidence of voter fraud that could have affected the election, and the same is true here. “It’s just a convenience for people,” said Timothy Benio, the director of local elections, a registered Republican. “It’s not a scam factory.” The polls were not always controversial. When the Republican-controlled Legislature approved widespread mail-in voting in 2019, the top Republican in the Pennsylvania Senate called it “the most significant modernization of our election code in decades.” Absentee voting has soared during the coronavirus pandemic, particularly among Democrats, as Americans sought to avoid crowded polling stations. But ahead of the 2020 election, President Donald Trump and right-wing activists have claimed without evidence that early voting is rife with fraud, and Republican lawmakers in Pennsylvania have pushed to tighten the rules. There are five drop boxes now open in Lehigh County. Signs at the 24-hour polling place at the Government Center warn that it is illegal for anyone else to cast a ballot without special permission. In the lawsuit that a county judge dismissed last month, the America First Legal Foundation, led by Trump senior adviser Stephen Miller and former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, cited a district attorney’s investigation that found 288 cases of people . casting more than one ballot before the November 2021 election. Most of the offenders slipped to two and no one carried more than six. Authorities declined to pursue any charges. “There is no dreaded ‘ballot harvesting’ with dump trucks full of extra ballots,” said Benio, the election official. “These are normal people.” For eight hours over two nights this week, The Washington Post watched people vote in this historically modest slice of Pennsylvania framed by the ridges of the Appalachian Mountains. They were Democrats, Republicans and Independents. Some had shared tickets. No one wanted to deal with the hassle of election day lines. Here are five of their stories. Deborah White arrived with her husband of four decades, Lawrence, as the sun sank above the autumn foliage. She was retired from her job at Lehigh University and didn’t have a strict schedule. She wanted to be here, on her own time, on principle. “I’m a 68-year-old African-American woman,” she said. “There was a time when we couldn’t vote. I thought, “Oh my God. I must do that.” During the last election, White, a Democrat, used the drop box because it was convenient and she didn’t want to get sick from Covid. Now he was here to exercise a right he felt was under attack. She was troubled by efforts to shrink early voting hours. Closing the slot at night, he reasoned, would just block voters who worked all day. “It’s dishonest,” he said, “and it’s controlling. They don’t want us to do what we’re supposed to do.” Carter Prokesch, a 23-year-old research and development engineer, had no plans to vote. Then his father urged him to apply for a postal ballot and make his voice heard. So after work, the self-proclaimed “moderate conservative” drove to Government Center. He held a split ticket: One vote for Mehmet Oz, the Republican candidate for Senate, and one vote for Josh Shapiro, the Democratic candidate for governor. “Because all of Shapiro’s ads weren’t about attacking people,” Prokesch said. Republican gubernatorial candidate Doug Mastriano had chartered buses to the Jan. 6, 2021, rally that erupted into riots and vowed to ban abortion without exceptions, suggesting that women who underwent the procedure should be charged with murder. He campaigned at events promoting anti-Semitic conspiracy theories. Prokesch was sick from all the fighting. He wanted to be a better Christian and stand with people who treated others with respect. He regretted voting for Trump, he said, after seeing the former president hurl so many insults. Prokesch and his father were registered Republicans. His mother and twin sister were Democrats. “We don’t talk about politics,” he said. When Lax Rode voted in the 2020 election, the 38-year-old healer had to wait in line behind 15 people. Maybe 20. It didn’t take long, but the voting process was laborious compared to walking to a drop box on a balmy evening. Practically no other people are in sight. Sliding his ballot into the slot. Done. “I was saving time,” he said with a smile, “and time is money in this capitalist country, right?” Rode, who considers himself an Independent and prefers to keep his political decisions private, moved to the United States from India in 2008. He became a naturalized citizen about four years ago and marvels at how politics has changed since then. It has liberal customers and conservative customers. The gap between them has never seemed wider. It encourages people to stick to the facts. “Back in India we didn’t have postal ballots,” Rode said. “You should go in person. That’s one of the things I like here. It makes our lives more convenient.” Mark Stein, 60, thought downtown Allentown would be quieter on a weeknight. He was right. The Muhlenberg College history professor found a parking spot and voted within minutes. Stein enjoyed the energy of the traditional polls in this county, saying he’s “never lost an election,” but the tension leading up to the midterms worries him. Stein, a Democrat, had heard of armed groups vowing to “monitor” voting sites, including drop boxes. He read that the gunman who attacked the husband of Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (Calif.) with a hammer had blamed liberals, blacks and Jews in blog posts. He thought of Republican gubernatorial candidate Mastriano blasting his opponent, Shapiro, for sending his children to a Jewish day school. (Mastriano has said he criticized the school for being “expensive” and “elite” not for any religious reason.) “As an American Jew,” Stein said, “I see a safe space being lost.” Janice Altieri, 58, is a Democrat. Her husband, Joe, 60, is a Republican. They didn’t want to have to talk to anyone about it. “Around here, a lot of people try to get you to change your vote,” said Janice, a school librarian. “They give you handouts,” said Joe, an engineer. “Which are ridiculous!” Janice said. “That way, you don’t have to deal with all that.” They could have walked five minutes to the polling station next to their home, but the couple opted for the 10-minute drive from the drop box. Campaigns in Lehigh County have been known to ambush voters on Election Day. The flyers would probably be extremely ridiculous this year, Janice said, considering all the conspiracy theories about voter fraud. The pair agreed that the 2020 election was not stolen. Early voting was safe. “I voted straight Democrat,” Janice said, turning to Joe. “I didn’t even ask you! I don’t even know if our votes match.”
