FBI Raids Office Of Democrat Ballot Harvesting NGO In Ohio

The FBI has been cracking down in recent months on organizations linked to potential election fraud.

On Thursday, the FBI conducted a raid on the Ohio Organizing Collaborative’s main office.

The Ohio Organizing Collaborative is a progressive-linked group that has reportedly led numerous ballot-harvesting initiatives across Ohio.

The FBI also conducted raids at the homes of several of the Ohio Organizing Collaborative’s leaders.

MS NOW broke the story and provided the following details:

FBI agents on Thursday raided the Cleveland offices of the Ohio Organizing Collaborative, a pro-democracy organization that helps register voters in that state, three people briefed on the search told MS NOW.

Agents also fanned out across the state, showing up at the homes of the group’s leaders and staff members, carrying some subpoenas and seeking information and electronic devices, according to the three people briefed, two of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive ongoing investigation. Members of the group contacted lawyers on Thursday to determine their legal options, the people said.

Prentiss Haney, a board member of the Ohio Organizing Collaborative, told MS NOW Thursday night that agents approached people with connections to the group, including some who had performed basic canvassing and volunteer work, and pressed them for information.

Agents were “basically trying to fish for information,” Haney said.

“They had agents all across the state going to civil rights leaders’ and community leaders’ doors intimidating them, coming and demanding that they talk about literally anything they would ask,” Haney said, adding that agents “asked them if they’re committing voter fraud, just on their doors, in front of their houses with their children, and just following them to work and school.”

Some of the people said the agents approached without warrants, according to Haney.

“Just straight-up intimidation tactics,” he said.

Spokespeople for the FBI and the Justice Department did not immediately respond to requests for comment late Thursday night.

The sources briefed on the search said they are concerned this new effort in Ohio is part of the Trump administration’s efforts to sow doubt and distrust in voting integrity in key swing states ahead of the midterm elections.

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Here’s how Democrat Rep. Shontel Brown reacted to the raid:

I am alarmed and outraged by reports that Trump and Kash Patel’s FBI has raided the Ohio Organizing Collective in Cleveland.

This appears to be a blatant effort to suppress and deny the vote of people in Northeast Ohio. These raids must end immediately. pic.twitter.com/Io6oC74Ayc

— Rep. Shontel Brown (@RepShontelBrown) June 12, 2026

Salem News reported the organization has had a troubled past:

An East Liverpool woman was sentenced to six months in the Columbiana County Jail for engaging in voter registration fraud.

Rebecca A. Hammonds, 34, of Fourth Street, was originally charged with 35 counts of falsely registering people to vote and forging signatures on voter registration forms. She pleaded guilty in January to 14 of the 35 counts as part of a plea deal.

Hammonds was a paid canvasser for the Ohio Organizing Collaborative (OOC), a liberal activist group that was active in registering voters in the southern part of the county during September and October 2015, when the voter registration fraud occurred. In October of that year, the county elections board director contacted the sheriff’s office after his staff began finding discrepancies in voter registration applications filed by OOC, including five submitted in the name of dead people.

The sheriff’s office conducted the initial probe before turning the investigation over to the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation, a division of the Ohio Attorney General’s Office, which handled the prosecution. The felony charges carried a maximum possible one-year prison sentence on each count. Brian Deckert, an associate assistant attorney general, had recommended a one-year prison sentence for Hammonds but he did not oppose her request for probation.

At Monday’s sentencing hearing, Deckert said Hammonds was paid an hourly rate and not per voter registration, so it was not “a situation where she had a quota system … I think it just may have come down to human laziness,” he said of Hammonds’ actions.

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Hats off to FBI Director Kash Patel for taking voter fraud seriously.