A mostly smooth Election Day nationwide was marred in multiple battleground states Tuesday by a series of bomb threats and baseless claims of wrongdoing by former President Donald Trump.
The bomb threats in parts of Arizona, Georgia and Pennsylvania turned out to be hoaxes but forced evacuations and some polling places to extend hours.
The threats were reported throughout the day at polling locations in three metro Atlanta counties, all with large numbers of Democratic voters, and into the evening at voting locations in Pennsylvania, forcing evacuations. Bomb threats also were reported at three voting locations in Navajo County, Arizona, according to the secretary of state’s office.
In an evening news conference, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro acknowledged there had been multiple bomb threats called in to voting locations across the state, but said thus far there is “no credible threat” to the public.
“Every legal, eligible vote will be counted and counted accurately, and the will of the people in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania will be respected," said Shapiro, a Democrat.
In a statement, the Pennsylvania State Police said they were working with local partners to respond if needed. Neither Shapiro nor the police gave more details about who might be behind the bomb threats or why Shapiro believed there was no threat to the public.
In Georgia's Fulton County, which includes Atlanta, 32 of 177 polling places received bomb threats and five were briefly evacuated. The FBI on Tuesday afternoon said it was aware of multiple hoax bomb threats to voting locations in several states and said many of them appeared to originate from Russian email domains.
“Georgia’s not gonna be intimidated,” Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger said Tuesday. (AP)
