Senate Democrats Plan to Deploy Their Own Poll Observers for the Midterms

Senate Democrats are planning to launch an “Election Observer Program” that will deploy trained staff to observe elections across the country, as Democrats fret about possible meddling in the midterms.

It’s a sign of how worried they are as President Donald Trump continues to emphasize his desire for more control over elections. This week the situation further escalated when he refused to sign a bipartisan housing bill until the Senate passed the SAVE America Act, which would implement restrictions on voting.

“Threats to the 2026 election are not hypothetical, they’re happening in real time,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said at a press conference Thursday announcing the program. “We’re not waiting for the chaos to arrive. We’re preparing now.”

The program, led by Sen. Alex Padilla (D-California) and Schumer, would be the first of its kind in the Senate. It’s aimed at training Senate staff to go to polling places and inform Senate Democrats of any threats, interference or misinformation. Schumer emphasized that these observers would not count votes, run elections or advocate for any candidates.

“We haven’t finalized or decided on the specific locations, but I’m sure one of the biggest considerations will be where we anticipate close contests,” Padilla said. “Because that’s where even a little bit of interference, intimidation, harassment can have a disproportionate effect on election results and the election outcomes.”

Senate staff told NOTUS that the task force plans to recruit volunteer Senate staff to be trained over the next couple of months. Observers will be focused on Senate races in the general election.

The program is an outgrowth of Senate Democrats’ Election Protection Task Force, which they created in April in response to the SAVE Act, another version of the voter-identification bill, and to concerns that the president would deploy federal agents to the polls.

The observers program is modeled after a program the House of Representatives has run for decades, Padilla said.

In his second presidential administration, Trump has taken steps to control how states administer elections and verify voter citizenship, including threats to withhold Department of Homeland Security funding from states that refuse to make changes he’s demanded. The administration has seized ballot boxes in Fulton County, Georgia, spread misinformation about the scale of noncitizen voting and attempted to eliminate mail-in voting for states that do not comply with Trump’s executive order to change how elections are administered.

Many of these efforts have been blocked by the courts. But the threats — from withholding federal funding to halting legislation — are putting additional pressure on states and lawmakers.

“The president of the United States is clearly laying the groundwork to try to interfere with the midterms and undermine confidence in any election results that he is not happy about,” Padilla said. “If the federal government’s going to have a say in the time, place and manner in which elections are being held that lies with Congress, not the executive branch.”