Wyoming Republican Governor Mark Gordon expressed concerns on Wednesday, August 27, 2026, about the conduct of U.S. Justice Department election observers during the state's primaries held last week. Speaking at a state canvassing board meeting, Gordon described the observers' behavior as "a bit aggressive" and "irregular."

He noted that state and local officials were not informed in advance about the Department of Justice’s plans to deploy monitors. Gordon stated, "I have asked the attorney general to start looking into, you know, kind of the nature of the visits and all that sort of stuff."

Despite his concerns, Gordon emphasized confidence in the election itself, saying, "I’m not saying anything went wrong or anything else, and I certainly think the conduct of this election was phenomenal."

Laramie County Clerk Debra Lee, a Republican, also criticized the DOJ monitors, stating their questions were "outside the scope of federal voting rights laws." She added that the monitors requested training guides, inquired about how new election equipment was acquired, and sought to examine tabulators.

Lee told NBC News that shortly after learning of the monitors' presence, she spoke with a DOJ official in Washington who explained that the decision to send monitors to Wyoming was made on short notice and that an email had been sent to her but may have gone to the wrong address.

The Justice Department has deployed over 80 election monitors across seven states during this year’s primaries, including for upcoming runoffs in South Carolina. Dispatching federal election monitors is not unusual; the DOJ noted it sent monitors to nine states during the 2022 midterms.

Sources

  • NBC Politics, "Wyoming’s Republican governor raises concerns over ‘aggressive’ DOJ election monitors," August 27, 2026, link