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Republican poll observers who say they're trying to root out fraud have aggressively approached voters and elections officials inside early voting sites, questioned established voting law and drawn at least two dozen complaints from voters, Wake elections officials said.

Election officials and campaign watchdog groups said the observers' actions could intimidate voters and suppress turnout. State Board of Elections Executive Director Gary Bartlett said he had been informed about the problems in Wake. It is against the law for observers to talk to voters and argue with poll workers.

Wake County Board of Elections officials say they've had to deal with multiple complaints from voters and polling place staff about observers who hover near as voters go through the process, taking down names and addresses.

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Across the nation - from Texas, Florida, New York, Vermont and now North Carolina - complaints are rolling about poll observers who are stepping out of line. Some are talking to voters, arguing with poll workers, challenging voters over identification - all of which is illegal.

One New York county got so many complaints about poll watcher intimidation that for the first time, it issued written rules - 11 in all - that watchers must follow.

Poll watchers work for candidates and political parties looking for fraud. Many complaints this year have been about Republican and tea party observers.

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For years, conservatives nationwide have complained that vote fraud is rampant. The latest, local example can be found in a video posted on the Web by True the Vote, an offshoot of a conservative Houston group called King Street Patriots. In the video, it’s alleged that observers sent to cover voting in the 2009 Houston mayoral race, “saw corruption everywhere.” “Our elections are being manipulated by the RADICAL LEFT,” read one full-screen graphic.

In Tomball, where the predominant race is white, voters were lined up 20 deep at an early voting location in the Tomball Public Works building. But there was not one poll watcher to be found.

The 11 News I-Team then went to Jersey Village and saw a racially-diverse stream of voters at the voting location inside the Jersey Village City Hall. But like in Tomball, there were no poll watchers.

I-Team went to the mostly black, low-income neighborhoods of south central Houston. Inside the Sunnyside Multi-Purpose Center, there were no lines but a near constant arrival of one or two early voters, most all of them black.

Unlike the other two locations, here there were two poll watchers seated within several feet of the line of voting booths. Both poll watchers were Anglo and both were Republicans, according to Teresa Saldierna, the presiding judge. Saldierna said, earlier in the week, there had been as many as 10 Republican poll watchers there.

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Florida: David Woodward reported that he went to Delray Beach City Hall yesterday afternoon to cast his ballot.

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I arrived to early vote at the Delray Beach City Hall at 12:40 this afternoon. There were about 30 people in line in front of me. As it turned out those 30 people translated into an hour and a half wait. I was standing in line with this Haitian guy in front of me and we were joking and stuff at all of the confusion. We finally got to the front of the line and he went into the voting room first. That's where things started really going downhill fast.

observed a gentleman standing behind all the voting officials with an "I Voted" sticker on and his cell phone open. He was recording data into his cell phone. Then, cell phone open he would walk over to the open computer screens with all the voter data displayed and record more data, then walk around the table to look at the info the Haitian man in front of me had written down on his registration form then back to his open cell phone. This happened to ALL of the people sitting at all four computers gathering info.

When I got in and sat down I immediately said "WHO IS THAT GUY AND WHY IS HE STANDING THERE LOGGING DATA INTO AN OPEN CELLPHONE." He was a Republican Poll Watcher. He walked around the table and was doing the same thing to me I saw him doing to the Haitian guy. I grabbed up my forms and insisted he step away. A couple people in charge gave me a yellow form to submit a complaint. I was shaking but I recorded his name and what he was doing and said it really upset me.

I asked for them to show me where it says in the rules for poll watchers they handed me that they can stand behind the poll workers and take personal information about the voter directly from the voter logs. They said that wasn't allowed. LOL. DUH! The guy had been in there god only knows how long doing that. On the way out one of the supervisors stopped me in the hallway leaving in front of everyone waiting in line. I repeated what I put on my complaint and people's mouths dropped open. What in the world is going on? These Republicans have no shame and abide by no rules. They seem to push everything as far as they can and they appear to be getting away with it.

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Andrew Katz, another early voter, said that he never met Woodward but backed up his story. He said the poll watcher's actions "didn't quite pass the smell test" and that there was a "certain amount of voter intimidation" involved in the poll watcher's actions. He was holding the cell phone chest high, "essentially a position where he could enter information or take a photograph," Katz said. There were signs that said there were no cell phones allowed in the area.

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