Dad. Law enforcement braces for Election Day in the Battleground State

Public safety officials in Pittsburgh and across Pennsylvania, a key battleground state, are preparing for the threat of political violence ahead of next week’s presidential election battle between former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris.

Starting Monday, Pittsburgh police leaders can expand officers’ shifts at their discretion to ensure maximum coverage of the city and polling places, public safety spokeswoman Cara Cruz said Tuesday.

“It should be noted that the Pittsburgh Bureau of Police balances protecting the rights to freedom of expression and peaceful assembly while ensuring public safety,” she wrote in a statement. “Civil unrest and violence will not be tolerated.”

In separate statements, Pittsburgh police, Allegheny County police and Pennsylvania State Police said no reports of election-related threats had been received in the city or the commonwealth as of Tuesday.

Ms. Cruz said police are working closely with the Pittsburgh Fire Department, EMS and Homeland Security to “monitor the situation.”

State and county police are also working to ensure voters can safely cast their ballots next week.

James Madalinsky, a spokesman for the county police, told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette that the department already has officers stationed at ballot locations across the county. Officials will also be on site at the county’s election warehouse on the North Side on Election Day.

State police, which provide full- or part-time police services to more than 1,700 Pennsylvania municipalities, did not respond to “any major security incidents or coordinated efforts to disrupt the election” during the previous two election cycles, according to a statement.

Still, the nearly 5,000 military personnel statewide are proactively prepared to “organize a smooth, safe Election Day where Pennsylvanians can visit their local polling places, led by local officials from both parties,” Myles Snyder, a state police spokesman, wrote in a e-mail. .

Troopers are an integral part of Governor Josh. Shapiro’s Pennsylvania Election Task Force, created in February to “protect democracy and ensure secure elections.”

Led by Secretary of the Commonwealth Al Schmidt, the task force consists of federal, state and local law enforcement and election administration partners who are coordinating plans to mitigate threats to the electoral process, protect voters from intimidation and “provide voters with accurate, reliable election information .”

After a failed assassination attempt on Trump on the grounds of the Butler Farm Show in July left one person dead, two injured and the former president slightly injured, fears have grown about the potential for more violence in the Keystone State. Several voting rights organizations pulled their voters off the streets and suspended operations over the summer.

Across the country, Americans are becoming increasingly desensitized to acts of political violence — in some cases even normalizing the acts.

An April PBS NewsHour/NPR/Marist poll found that one-fifth of American adults believe Americans may have to resort to violence to get their country back on track.

Another poll, conducted by the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, shows that American voters are heading into the presidential election with great anxiety about what could follow, including the possibility of political violence. The survey found that about four in 10 registered voters are “extremely” or “very” concerned about violent attempts to overturn the results after the November election.

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