Official who removed Trump from ballot target of swatting
A fake emergency call to police resulted in officers responding Friday night to the home of Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows just a day after she removed former President Donald Trump from the state’s presidential primary ballot under the Constitution’s insurrection clause.
She becomes the latest elected politician to become a target of swatting, which involves making a phone call to emergency services with the intent that a large first responder presence, including SWAT teams, will show up at a residence.
Bellows was not home when the swatting call was made, and responding officers found nothing suspicious.
Suspects in swatting cases are being arrested and charged as states contemplate stronger penalties.
Republican U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene was the target of a swatting attempt at her Georgia residence Christmas morning, the representative and local police said.
A man in New York called the Georgia suicide hotline claiming he had shot his girlfriend at Greene’s home and was going to kill himself. Police said investigators were working to identify the caller and build a criminal case.
Another New York man was sentenced in August to three months in prison for making threatening phone calls to Greene’s office in Washington, D.C.
While the Maine Department of Public Safety did not share a suspected motive for the swatting attempt against Bellows, she had no doubts it stemmed from her decision to remove Trump from the ballot. The swatting attempt came after a conservative activist posted her home address on social media.
“And it was posted in anger and with violent intent by those who have been extending threatening communications toward me, my family and my office,” Bellows told The Associated Press in a phone call Saturday.
A call was made to emergency services from an unknown man saying he had broken into a house in Manchester, according to the Maine public safety department.
The address the man gave was Bellows’ home. Bellows and her husband were away for the holiday weekend. Maine State Police responded to what the public safety department said ultimately turned out to be a swatting call.
Police conducted an exterior sweep of the house and then checked inside at Bellows’ request. Nothing suspicious was found, and police continue to investigate.