Ballot boxes, also known as drop boxes have been used across the United States for years allowing citizens to submit their vote when they get their ballot by mail. According to VINnews, a ballot box was set on fire by an incendiary device in Vancouver, Washington on October 28, 2024. The fire damaged 475 ballots despite having a suppression system inside the box.

 Vancouver is the biggest city in Washington’s 3rd Congressional District, the site of what is expected to be one of the closest U.S. House races in the country, between first-term Democratic Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez and Republican challenger Joe Kent. Earlier in the month on October 8, 2024 a different incendiary device was placed in another ballot box. Luckily, no ballots were damaged. However, authorities have discovered that the remainder of the incendiary devices left behind on both incidents link together. 

Around the same time as the second Vancouver incident, another incendiary device damaged three ballots at a box in Portland, Oregon, in what federal, state and local officials have decried as an attack on democracy before a heated Election Day. Surveillance images captured a Volvo pulling up to the drop box in Portland just before security personnel nearby discovered a fire inside the box, Portland Police Bureau spokesperson Mike Benner has said The incendiary devices were attached to the outside of the boxes. Luckily, the fire was put out quickly, due to the suppression system inside the box and a nearby security guard.  

Investigations are taking place, even by the FBI. In fact, U.S. Attorney Tessa M. Gorman and Greg Austin, acting special agent in charge of the FBI Seattle field office, said in a joint statement Tuesday that they wanted to assure citizens that they are working together to investigate the fires and will work to hold the person or people responsible “fully accountable.”