DOJ Sends Poll Monitors to Lewiston After Videos of Interpreters Walking Somali Voters to the Booths

Federal election monitors are headed to Maine's two biggest cities for the Nov. 3 election. The Justice Department will post observers at the polls in Portland and Lewiston, days after videos from Lewiston City Hall showed interpreters walking elderly Somali voters to the booths.

Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows, a Democrat, confirmed the deployment Friday. It is the first time federal observers have been sent to Maine since she took office in 2021, the Maine Morning Star reported.

What the videos showed

The spark was a series of posts from The Maine Wire, a conservative outlet in the state. Reporter Jon Fetherston filmed early voting at Lewiston City Hall and said he watched interpreters meet voters at the door, escort them into the voting room and point at choices on the ballot. The Wire said groups of elderly Somali voters were dropped off by nonprofit groups, and that interpreters work for taxpayer-funded nonprofits and Medicaid agencies, the Daily Mail reported.

Photos from Fetherston appeared to show two interpreters standing in one booth with a single elderly voter, The Beltway Report said. Who arranged the rides, and whether any voter was actually steered, has not been independently established.

A Republican candidate says she heard it firsthand. Janet Beaudoin, running for a Lewiston-area state House seat, told the City Council Tuesday that an interpreter said he would tell the voter he was helping to vote for her if she was a Democrat. "It raised a serious concern about whether the voter was being encouraged to vote for a candidate," she said. "Language assistance is a must for those who need it. I'm not disputing that. My concern is that interpreters are using their position near a voter to influence that person's choice."

Collins: 'Only Americans should be voting'

Sen. Susan Collins, locked in a tight re-election race against Democrat Troy Jackson, weighed in Wednesday. "Certainly only Americans should be voting in American elections," she told reporters. "It is troubling to me if people are being accompanied into voting booths and handling ballots in a way that is not sanctioned by law."

The rules for helpers

Help in the booth is legal. Federal law lets a voter who needs help because of blindness, a disability or an inability to read or write bring a helper of the voter's choice, as long as it isn't the voter's boss or union officer (52 U.S.C. § 10508). But the helper works for the voter, not the other way around.

Lewiston City Clerk Kathy Montejo laid out the state rules to the Sun Journal: the voter picks the aide, an aide can't step in unless asked, and an aide can't influence a voter's choice or direct the vote. Aides must read and translate the ballot out loud and can't discuss its contents. After the videos spread, the clerk's office published a guide on how to request translation help. Under state rules, only one aide is allowed in the booth, and the aide may not touch the ballot or make selections, The Beltway Report noted.

Accounts differ on what happened next. The Beltway Report said poll workers asked one woman to leave after she said she would keep helping voters fill out ballots. Montejo told the Sun Journal she has not had to ask anyone, interpreter or otherwise, to leave the building this cycle.

The pushback

Bellows says her office has not received a credible report that any interpreter engaged in illegal electioneering. Her office says it has gotten complaints about "intrusive filming, photography and harassment of voters" aimed at the Somali voters, and the city has posted signs banning photos within 15 feet of a voter. Lewiston Mayor Carl Sheline called the scrutiny of interpreters a "coordinated campaign of voter intimidation and suppression." Maine Wire editor Steve Robinson denies any wrongdoing and says his reporters need to be there to make sure interpreters follow the rules.

On the federal monitors, Bellows said, "We will monitor the monitors very carefully to ensure that they don't cross any lines."

What the monitors can do

Letters sent Wednesday to the Portland and Lewiston clerks by James Tucker of the DOJ's Civil Rights Division say the monitors will observe and take notes on compliance with federal voting rights laws. They will dress business casual with no DOJ markings, won't carry guns and won't talk to voters inside polling places, NEWS CENTER Maine reported. The DOJ letters do not say the deployment was ordered because of the Lewiston videos.

Maine is one stop on a much bigger map. The DOJ plans about 1,000 monitors nationwide this year, up from 289 in the 2022 midterms and 714 in 2024, the Maine Morning Star noted, citing CBS News. UNGA NEWS reported on the first counties put on notice earlier this week.

Early in-person voting in Maine runs through Oct. 29. Election Day is Nov. 3. This time, someone from Washington will be watching the room.