500 Justice Department staffers to monitor the polls, down from 2012

A man exits a voting booth in New Hampshire.
(Image credit: Jewel Samad/AFP/Getty Images)

On Election Day, more than 500 Justice Department staffers will monitor voting in 28 states, down from almost 800 assigned to the same job in 2012.

This has been an especially cantankerous campaign season, with Republican nominee Donald Trump saying the system is "rigged," and could cost him the election. The monitors will be looking for voting rights violations at the polls, including discrimination based on race, disability, and language. "The bedrock of our democracy is the right to vote," Attorney General Loretta Lynch said Monday. "The department is deeply committed to the fair and unbiased application of our voting rights laws."

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Catherine Garcia, The Week US

Catherine Garcia is night editor for TheWeek.com. Her writing and reporting has appeared in Entertainment Weekly and EW.com, The New York Times, The Book of Jezebel, and other publications. A Southern California native, Catherine is a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.