Concrete fences, barbed wire, police inside: the polling place in Phoenix, Arizona, looks like a fortress.

Security is particularly heightened in this key state, which has spawned many conspiracy theories about the 2020 presidential election.

“The stake is very important and very serious, it is about the basis of this democracy, which is our elections,” warned Bill Gates, one of the election officials of Maricopa County, the most populous in Arizona.

In 2020, Donald Trump lost to Joe Biden by just 10,500 votes in Arizona. At the time, armed protesters protested for several nights in front of the county election center in downtown Phoenix as mail-in ballots were counted.

The Republican has never conceded defeat, and for four years the state of Arizona has been reduced to a stronghold of conspiracy theories about the election.

Trump’s theories about the 2020 election being “rigged” have spread widely in Arizona, often fueled by local officials who are supporters of the billionaire.

To address this mistrust, the Maricopa County Election Center has now installed cameras in the ballot storage areas, which continuously stream live video to the Internet.

“We’ve tried to be as transparent as possible,” said Gates, a Republican nominee who resisted Trump’s pressure four years ago and has since been the target of threats and hate speech.

“But we ask for something in return,” he added: the losing candidates “to accept the results.”

With polls showing Kamala Harris and Donald Trump in a neck-and-neck battle and the Republican nominee insisting on the possibility of “rigging,” the tension is palpable in Arizona.

Last week charges of “terrorism” were brought against a man who for many nights he was shooting at the office of the Democratic party in Tempe, a suburb of Phoenix.

Police seized 120 handguns from his home, as well as 250,000 rounds of ammunition and a grenade launcher. His arsenal shows that this retired former engineer was planning a massacre, the prosecution said.

The 60-year-old had been following websites promoting conspiracy theories online, according to local media. In 2020, he reproduced on his social media account the slogan of Trump supporters “stop the steal” (stop the steal) after the defeat of the Republican.

“We are on red alert,” said Maricopa County Sheriff Russ Skinner.

Up to 200 members of his service are ready to intervene today and in the days after the election, he added.

“We’re going to have a lot of resources out there, a lot of personnel, a lot of equipment,” he added, explaining that police officers would use drones to monitor activity around polling stations, while snipers and other reinforcements would be ready to deploy if it became clear possibility of violence breaking out.

Election officials were also trained to learn how to barricade themselves inside a room or use a fire hose to repel would-be intruders.

However, this tense atmosphere did not prevent thousands of volunteers from participating in the process of preparing and conducting the elections.

Like 43-year-old Jenny Bryan who yesterday helped with about ten of her colleagues in the preparation of a polling station so that she could welcome the voters today.

The 2020 election was “a scary time,” admitted the university student who has been involved in organizing Arizona’s elections for 15 years. But this only reinforces his sense of duty.

This year Brian received special training in de-escalating tense situations. “Fears of political violence and voter intimidation show how critical these elections are,” he said. “So it’s very important that we don’t look scared, in order to help them vote and contribute to the smooth running of this process,” he stressed.