10月7日，亚利桑那州斯科茨代尔的一个投票中心。这是提前投票的第一天。
A voting center is seen in Scottsdale, Ariz., on Oct. 7, the first day of early voting.
奥利维尔·图龙/法新社，经盖蒂图片社提供。在亚利桑那州凤凰城的“团结变革生活”（LUCHA）办公室，正在举行彩票之夜。
Olivier Touron/AFP via Getty Images It was loteria night at the offices of Living United for Change in Arizona, or LUCHA, in Phoenix.
一小群年轻人正在玩这种类似宾果的纸牌游戏，希望赢回各种奖品：露营椅、可重复使用的水瓶和冷却箱。
A small group of young people were playing this bingo-like card game in the hopes of taking home an array of prizes: a camping chair, reusable water bottles and coolers.
顺便说一下，如果你计划在某处露营一段时间，这些奖品会很实用。而恰恰就是这些玩家上周正在接受培训要做的事情。
Conveniently, the prizes would be useful if you plan to camp out somewhere for a while. Which happens to be what these players were getting trained to do last week.
LUCHA是一个偏左的社区组织团体，一直在培训志愿者，让他们成为他们所说的“宪法观察员”，以迎接今年的中期选举。这是该组织计划在选举日临近前举办的多场线下培训中的第一场。
LUCHA, a left-of-center community organizing group, has been training volunteers to be what they call "constitutional observers" ahead of this year's midterms. This was the first of many in-person sessions the organization plans to hold as Election Day nears.
主持培训的卡里姆·罗德里格斯告诉志愿者，他们的主要工作就是观察。
Carime Rodriguez, who led the training, told volunteers that their main job will be to just observe.
“监控投票环境，”她说。“要时刻注意地面上发生的事情……只要确保你睁大眼睛保持警觉。”在许多选举周期里，各组织都会分散开来监控投票站，但紧张的中期选举环境让许多组织加大了力度。他们计划让数千人在这次选举中监视情况。
"Monitor the polling environment," she said. "Stay aware of what's happening on the ground … just make sure you are kind of keeping your eyes open." For many election cycles, groups have fanned out to monitor polling places, but the charged midterm environment has many organizations stepping up efforts. They plan to have thousands of individuals with eyes on this election.
对投票站ICE的担忧 对于LUCHA的罗德里格斯来说，移民是一个令人担忧的问题。她告诉培训中的志愿者，今年早些时候亚利桑那州的初选期间，移民执法有所增加——包括在凤凰城所在的马里科帕县的投票站周边。
Fears of ICE at the polls For LUCHA's Rodriguez, immigration is a concern. She told her training volunteers that during Arizona's primaries earlier this year, there was an uptick in immigration enforcement — including around polling sites in Maricopa County, where Phoenix is located.
而且，如果这种情况再次发生，LUCHA及其他类似组织希望有人在现场，留意他们认为可能会吓退选民的任何情况。主要是，这些组织表示，他们担心移民和海关执法局（ICE）特工会出现在投票站。
And in case this happens again, LUCHA and other similar groups want to have people on the ground, to keep an eye out for anything they think could intimidate voters. Chiefly, groups say they are worried about Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, agents at election sites.
“我觉得在这过去的两年里，每个人都像是坐立不安地抓住了座位边缘，” LUCHA执行董事亚历杭德拉·戈麦斯说。“因此，这让我们变得极具前瞻性，并确保我们正在做好准备。我们希望看到最好的结果，同时为最坏的情况做准备。” 特朗普政府派遣武装特工到投票站是非法的。政府官员表示，ICE没有针对投票地点的计划。但与特朗普关系密切的右翼政治人物，如史蒂文·班农，一直在呼吁总统派遣特工，而特朗普官员表示，ICE可能会在投票站执行逮捕令。
"I feel like these last two years, everyone has been holding on by the edge of their seats," said Alejandra Gomez, LUCHA's executive director. "And so that has made us incredibly forward thinking and making sure that we are preparing. We're hoping for the best, preparing for the worst." It would be illegal for the Trump administration to send armed agents to polling sites. And administration officials have said ICE has no plans to target polling locations. But right-wing political figures close to Trump like Steven Bannon have been calling for the president to send them anyway, and Trump officials have said ICE could serve warrants at polling places.
左倾组织“拯救美国运动”的联合创始人兼执行董事玛丽·科尔科兰表示，这足以让她认真对待这一潜在威胁。
Mary Corcoran, co-founder and executive director of the left-leaning Save America Movement, said that's enough for her to take this potential threat seriously.
“目的在于吓唬人们，利用恐惧作为威慑因素，让人们待在家里，” 她对NPR说。“因此，我们的观点是，我们能够在这次选举中产生影响的方式，是在社区中开展工作，这些社区最有可能在今年秋天因ICE可能前往投票站而受到冲击。” 科尔科兰的团队正在与阿尔·夏普顿牧师的全国行动网络以及各种工会合作，如美国教师联合会，他们将这一行动称为“安全投票”。
"The point is to scare people and use fear as an intimidation factor to keep people home," she told NPR. "So, our perspective was that the way that we could make a difference in this election was working in communities that would be most likely impacted by the threat of ICE coming to the polls this fall." Corcoran's group is partnering with the Rev. Al Sharpton's National Action Network, as well as various unions, like the American Federation of Teachers, in an effort they are calling Vote Safe.
她说，该行动的成员计划在人口众多且不断增长的黑人、拉美裔、亚洲人和移民人口的主要人口中心开展工作——特别是在参议院关键竞赛的州，如俄亥俄州、北卡罗来纳州、佐治亚州和密歇根州。
She said members of the effort plan to be in major population centers with large and growing Black, Latino, Asian and immigrant populations — particularly in states with key Senate races, like Ohio, North Carolina, Georgia and Michigan.
“志愿者们不是为了与可能出现的任何ICE人员接触而在那里的，”她说。“这实际上是通过真正见证来产生缓和影响。”她说，社区中神职人员、退伍军人、教师和护士的出现希望能产生“缓和影响和威慑影响”。司法部选举观察员 左翼团体不会是投票站里唯一的人。例如，共和党全国委员会招募观察员以保持选举安全和透明。而司法部领导人表示，他们计划加强其通常的存在，因为司法部经常监控投票站。
"The volunteers are not there to engage with any ICE folks that could show up," she said. "It's really about having a de-escalatory impact by way of really bearing witness." She said the presence of clergy, veterans, teachers and nurses from the community will hopefully have a "de-escalatory impact and a deterrent impact." DOJ election observers Left-leaning groups won't be the only folks at the polls. The Republican National Committee, for one, recruits observers to keep elections secure and transparent. And leaders of the Justice Department, which regularly monitors polling places, say they plan to step up their usual presence.
民权司助理部长哈米特·迪隆在国会山对记者讲话，时间为5月29日。
Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Harmeet Dhillon speaks to reporters on Capitol Hill on May 29.
安娜·莫尼梅克/盖蒂图片社 司法部民权司司长哈米特·迪隆在《真实美国之声》节目中表示，她计划派遣来自该机构的一千人监测投票站。
Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images Harmeet Dhillon, the head of DOJ's Civil Rights Division, said on Real America's Voice that she plans to send a thousand people from the agency to monitor polling sites.
“这将是历史上规模最大的司法部选举观察员行动，”她说。“我很兴奋能领导这一行动。”她说，司法部工作人员将与其他在投票站的观察员发挥类似作用，那就是仅仅观察。
"This is going to be the biggest DOJ election observer effort in history," she said. "And I'm so excited to be leading that effort." She said that DOJ staff will play a similar role to other observers that will be at the polls, which is just to watch.
“他们不会以任何方式干涉或管理选举，他们将进行观察并做记录，”她说。怀俄明州的共和党州长在8月批评了司法部观察员在该州的行为。“非常时期”全国选举官员协会的塔米·帕特里克表示，选举管理人员已经听到关于大型观察员团体的大规模计划有一段时间了。但帕特里克说，重要的是要指出，这是他们在几乎每个选举周期都会听到的事情。
"They're not going to be interfering in any way or running the election, they're going to be observing, making notes," she said. Wyoming's Republican governor criticized the actions of DOJ observers in the state in August. "Not normal times" Tammy Patrick with the National Association of Election Officials says election administrators have been hearing of big plans of large groups of observers for a while now. But Patrick said it's important to note that this is something they hear most election cycles.
“至少在我从事这项工作的20年左右的时间里，每两年似乎就会有一次这样的传闻，即将有大规模观察，并且成千上万的人将前往投票站进行观察，”她说。
"Every two years it seems, for at least the 20 or so years I've been doing this, we hear that there's going to be massive observation, and thousands of people are going to show up to observe at the polling place," she said.
它过去并没有以这种方式表现出来，但这些并不是正常时期。因此她说选举管理员正在向公众进行教育。例如，谁可以观察什么，或者你可以离投票站有多近的规定，因州而异。
"It hasn't manifested in that way in the past, but these are not normal times." Which is why she says election administrators are educating the public. Rules about who can observe what, or how close you can be to a polling site, for example, vary from state to state.
此外，观察员在投票站实际能做的事情也有限。如果出现问题，由选举工作人员和当地执法部门来处理。帕特里克表示，多年来许多观察员会感到无聊然后离开。
Also, there is only so much observers can actually do at the polls. If something goes wrong, it's up to election workers and local law enforcement to sort it out. Patrick said most years many observers get bored and leave.
“实际过程往往是……相当枯燥，”她说。“甚至可以说，看着人们走进来、报名、签名、领取选票是很无聊的。”但如果事情不枯燥，州民主党委员会协会的简·克利布——该协会是民主党全国委员会的一部分——表示她希望现场有人进行记录。
"The actual process tends to be ... pretty dry," she said. "And one might even say boring to watch people walk in, give their name, sign their name, get their ballot." But if things are not boring, Jane Kleeb with the Association of State Democratic Committees — which is part of the Democratic National Committee — said she wants people on the ground recording.
对于政党而言，投票站出现问题的风险很高——尤其是在竞争激烈的选举中，诉讼很常见。
For political parties, the stakes of problems at the polls are high — particularly in close elections, where lawsuits are common.
“我们将记录任何不良行为，”她说。“这可能会是音频。可能是静态图片，也会是视频，然后这些视频会被发送到各州党。这样，他们就能将这些信息上报给民主党全国委员会。因此，我们有一个非常清晰的流程，以确保我们记录下所有这些内容，以防需要提起诉讼。”投票故事 2026 中期选举
"We're going to record any bad behavior," she said. "So that might be on audio. It may be still pictures, and it will be video that will then be sent to each state party. So, then they can get that information up to the DNC. So, we have a very clear process to make sure that we're documenting all of this in case lawsuits have to be filed." voting stories 2026 midterms