The FBI and the U.S. Postal Inspection Service are investigating letters sent to state officials and election offices across the country containing an “unknown substance.”
Just weeks before November’s midterm elections, election officers in Louisiana and Oklahoma received envelopes containing a powdery substance, leading to evacuations. A similar package containing white powder was also sent to the Ohio secretary of state, but the U.S. Postal Service intercepted it.
The U.S. Senate sergeant at arms informed members of the upper chamber on Thursday of the investigation in a message obtained by the Associated Press. The notice said law enforcement officials were working to intercept additional mail, but some could reach their destination. Federal authorities have urged recipients to treat the mail as “potentially hazardous.”
Brendan Donahue, a senior official with the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, confirmed the investigation during a press conference on Thursday. “We are committed to protecting our nation’s election officials from threatening and dangerous mail. Any threat or attack on an election official is unacceptable,” Donahue said.
In a statement, the FBI said it was “investigating a series of suspicious mailings sent to various addresses nationwide, including Secretary of State offices and their related election officers,” alongside the U.S. Postal Inspection Service. “Some of the letters contained an unknown substance and we are working closely with our law enforcement partners to respond to each incident,” the FBI said. The bureau declined to comment on what the purported substance may have been.
In Oklahoma, state troopers determined the substance mailed to the Oklahoma State Capitol complex was non‑hazardous. In Cook County, Illinois, an envelope containing only white powder was sent to treasurer Maria Pappas on Thursday morning; it turned out to be baking powder. “Unfortunately, one‑tenth of 1% of the population causes 100% of the problems: crimes, threats, murders, beatings and abusiveness, etc. Too bad that normal folk have to have their guard up when a minority of folk lash out with their craziness,” Pappas said in a statement.
Two organizations representing secretaries of state and state election directors released a joint statement expressing alarm. The National Association of Secretaries of State and the National Association of State Election Directors said they are “deeply concerned by these incidents” and reiterated that “threats against election officials and workers have no place in our democracy.”