Federal election monitors arrived in Miami-Dade County on Tuesday, Nov. 3, as part of the largest polling-place monitoring operation in Department of Justice history.

The DOJ deployed approximately 1,000 monitors and observers to all 50 states for the first time, according to a department press release. In Florida, monitors were assigned to five counties: Miami-Dade, Broward, Palm Beach, Hillsborough and Leon.

The effort is coordinated by the DOJ's Civil Rights Division. Monitors include personnel from the division, other DOJ components, U.S. Attorney's Offices and federal observers from the Office of Personnel Management, the department said.

Assistant Attorney General Harmeet K. Dhillon of the Civil Rights Division said in the department's statement that election integrity has been a top priority for the administration and the division.

The scale marks a sharp increase. Newsweek reported that 289 monitors were deployed for the 2022 midterms and 714 for the 2024 presidential election. During the 2022 cycle, the DOJ monitored 64 jurisdictions across 24 states, according to The Pavlovic Today.

Miami-Dade Supervisor of Elections Alina Garcia told WSVN ahead of Election Day that the DOJ had already notified her office it would send monitors to the county. Garcia described what the observers would be checking.

"What they come to ensure is that we are using Spanish and English, because that's part of federal law, and that there is no discrimination, that kind of thing, but they watch from afar," Garcia said. "They already informed us that this is one of the counties they're coming to but, probably, people will not even see that they're there."

Legitimate DOJ monitors carry official identification and do not enter polling places, according to a DOJ email to local election officials reported by Local 10. In an Oct. 28 court filing, the department said FBI and Immigration and Customs Enforcement personnel would not serve as monitors, Newsweek reported. Personnel would not carry firearms or exercise law enforcement authority while monitoring, according to court filings cited by Newsweek.

The deployment drew criticism. Some voting rights groups, including the NAACP, say they believe the monitors could suppress turnout and disenfranchise voters, particularly minority voters, USA Today reported. The NAACP sued in October seeking records and warning that the expanded federal presence could intimidate voters, according to Newsweek. The government has said its personnel must follow legal and ethical restrictions.

USA Today reported that in states with closely contested Senate races, monitors were assigned to cities and counties with disproportionately high levels of Black and Hispanic residents, according to U.S. Census data.

Election authorities in at least five states have restricted or challenged the federal operation, Newsweek reported. Officials in Indiana, Kentucky, Washington County in Arkansas, and Hennepin and Ramsey counties in Minnesota said DOJ monitors cannot enter polling places without legal authorization or local permission.

Garcia also warned voters before Election Day about reports of people posing as DOJ monitors at early voting sites. "We did receive a report that, in other places, people had been pretending to be DOJ and they would never do that," she said. No impostor incidents were reported in Miami-Dade as of late October, according to WSVN.

Voters with questions or complaints about federal voting rights can call the DOJ's election issues hotline at 1-800-253-3931. Polls closed at 7 p.m. Tuesday across South Florida.