Federal agents with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) entered a polling place in Onondaga County during New York’s primary elections on Tuesday.
Paigelynne Gonyea, a poll worker, says the agents were there to give her a warning that she may have violated federal law.
In January, Gonyea posted the name of the federal agent who shot and killed Renee Good in Minnesota on her Instagram.
Gonyea says she doesn’t feel she did anything wrong.
“It was his name that was already out there from the Minnesota newspaper,” Gonyea said. “Like, I released something that was already released to the public.”
Dustin Czarny, the Democratic elections commissioner at the Onondaga County Board of Elections, said ICE’s presence was inappropriate.
“There was no emergency inside this polling place. There was no urgency to this matter that this had to be done during the hours of 6 p.m. and 9 p.m. on June 23,” Czarny said.
Czarny’s counterpart, Republican Commissioner Kevin Ryan, agreed.
“Obviously, we don’t want non-citizens voting,” Ryan said. “But at the same time, it sends a bad signal when you have ICE agents showing up to polling places.”
A voicemail shared on Gonyea’s social media shows that the agents tried her apartment first.
“This message is for Paige, my name is Dave Brody, special agent with Homeland Security, we were just by your apartment…,” the voicemail said. “…We were just calling you in reference to a post that we believe you made on Instagram where you doxed an ICE agent back in January, we just wanted to talk to you about it, you’re not in any type of trouble.”
When the agents couldn’t get a hold of her, they went to the polling place instead, where Gonyea says she invited the agents in out of fear.
“I wanted the whole interaction recorded in a place where I knew that nothing would happen,” Gonyea explained.
Czarny says no voters were present when the agents entered the polling location and that voting wasn’t interrupted. Still, he says that does not excuse the agents’ actions.
“There is a sanctity of our ballot, of our democratic process, and there is no reason to have a presence like this.”
And Gonyea stands by her actions.
“I’m shaken up, but I don’t want to live in fear,” she said, “And the post is still up.”
The New York attorney general’s office and state Board of Elections are aware of the situation and are looking into the matter.
Spectrum News 1 did reach out to ICE and the Department of Homeland Security but they did not comment on the matter.