With three weeks until the start of early voting, the death of a long-time county sheriff adds to the duties of Nicole Mickley, director of elections in the small town of Carrollton, Ohio. She and her small staff of four now have to remake the ballots for the second time in a week.

Mickley and local election officials like her have been overwhelmed with harassment and faced conspiracy theories of election falsehoods since President Donald Trump falsely claimed that the 2020 presidential election was stolen. The stress from this vitriol has driven many workers away, creating even smaller staffs with even more stress.