DOJ sends a record of about 1,000 election monitors to polling places in all 50 states today

The Justice Department is sending about 1,000 election monitors to polling places in all 50 states for today's midterms. It is the largest monitoring effort in the department's history, NBC News and PBS report. In the 2022 midterms the department sent 388 people to 64 jurisdictions in 24 states.

Monitors are Justice Department employees, mostly lawyers from the Civil Rights Division, who watch for compliance with federal voting laws such as the Voting Rights Act and the Help America Vote Act. "Our monitors only observe and take notes," a department lawyer wrote to Pennsylvania officials. They can enter a polling place only with local officials' permission; otherwise they watch from outside. Colorado, Indiana and Wyoming have said they will keep monitors a set distance from polling places. Kansas Secretary of State Scott Schwab, a Republican, said monitors can come in like anyone else but cannot go past the voter ID table.

Jurisdictions notified so far include four Pennsylvania counties, seven Michigan cities, seven Texas counties, Miami-Dade, King County in Washington, and Hennepin and Ramsey counties in Minnesota, Votebeat reports. The department said it would release its full list on Election Day.

Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon, who runs the Civil Rights Division, has framed this year's push around election security. On the other side, Senate Democrats are sending more than 100 staffers to watch the vote in nine states, and groups such as Common Cause and the ACLU are fielding their own monitors.

Update, Nov. 3 (morning): The Justice Department released its full list of jurisdictions on Election Day morning, covering all 50 states. In Pennsylvania, monitors are going to Philadelphia, Allegheny, Lehigh and Luzerne counties. Deputy Secretary of the Commonwealth Jonathan Marks told counties in an email that the monitors "are not authorized by any specific state or federal statute" and "may not enter restricted areas, inspect voting equipment, or demand access to any records," Spotlight PA and Votebeat report. The Pennsylvania Department of State said restricted areas start at the 10-foot buffer from a polling place entrance, which in practice keeps monitors out of polling places. In Georgia, Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger said party observers, the Carter Center and DOJ would all be watching, FOX 5 Atlanta reports.