The Kentucky Board of Elections received a suspicious envelope Friday that is being examined by the FBI, amid dozens of elections officials around the country receiving threatening letters with a powdery substance.
Taylor Brown, the general counsel for the election board, said the envelope bore the same return address, postmark, stamp and handwriting as an envelope received by the Louisiana secretary of state’s office earlier that week, which also contained a threatening letter and a white powdery substance.
Brown says staff was on the lookout for such a letter, not opening it and calling the FBI to examine it. While it contained a powdery substance, they determined it was not harmful and did not have to evacuate the building.
Kentucky is now at least the 33rd state where election officials have received such a letter, as WIRED reported Monday that election officials in 32 other states had received one. Kentucky Secretary of State Michael Adams’ office said Monday they have not yet received such a letter.
Brown has not been told by the FBI what the enclosed letter said, but the one sent to Louisiana officials with identical features “was a message to election officials warning of civil war coming on Election Day, and that election officials that participated would be left to suffer the penalty for treason.”
He added that the Louisiana letter makes references to immigrants and communists, complaining about states that did not turn over private voter information to the Trump administration. Kentucky is one of four states with a Republican chief election official to not turn over the data, leading to an ongoing lawsuit against Adams by the Department of Justice as they seek to remove alleged non-citizens from the voter rolls.
Brown added that the U.S. Postal Inspection Service indicated they believe more than 700 of these threatening letters have been mailed out across the county, including to the congressional office of both Democratic and Republican members.
The letters sent to many — including Kentucky and Louisiana — had a New York City return address for DSA, with the Democratic Socialists of America denying any involvement. They also had a postmark for Dallas, Texas.
The FBI and US Postal Inspection Service are continuing to investigate who sent the letters.
