Julia Shumway of The Capitol Chronicle covered today’s release of the 2023 Oregon Election Officials Staffing Study.
Key quote from Dr. Paul Manson:
“The cloud over all of this is the political environment to some degree or the perceptions,” said Paul Manson, a Portland State University political science professor and the center’s research director. “(In) one out of five of our interviews, we had to pause because it was just too emotional.”
One of the clerks interviewed no longer feels comfortable telling strangers what their job is because they’re scared of the reaction, Manson said. Concerns about threats and harassment also make it harder to recruit employees.
Job postings, description and compensation don’t match the current job requirements for county election workers, Manson said. They’re usually classified as clerical jobs, but election workers now have to do more outreach and public engagement, spending time debunking misinformation and talking to adversarial voters. One Oregon official interviewed for the study noted they would make more working at the In-N-Out Burger across the street than in the elections office.
