Chuck Darwin<p>Incendiary devices were set off Monday at two ballot drop boxes <br>— one in Portland and another in nearby Vancouver, Washington <br>— destroying hundreds of ballots in what one official called a “direct attack on democracy” <br>about a week before a heated Election Day.</p><p>The early morning fire at the drop box in Portland was extinguished quickly <br>thanks to a suppression system inside the box as well as a nearby security guard, police said, <br>and just three ballots were damaged there.</p><p>But within a few hours, another fire was discovered at a transit center drop box across the Columbia River in Vancouver. <br>Vancouver is the biggest city in Washington’s 3rd Congressional District,<br>the site of what is expected to be one of the closest U.S. House races in the country, <br>between first-term Democratic Rep. <a href="https://c.im/tags/Marie" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Marie</span></a> <a href="https://c.im/tags/Gluesenkamp" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Gluesenkamp</span></a> <a href="https://c.im/tags/Perez" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Perez</span></a> and Republican challenger Joe Kent.</p><p>The ballot box in Vancouver also had a fire suppression system inside, <br>but that failed to prevent hundreds of ballots from burning, said Greg Kimsey, <br>the longtime elected auditor in Clark County, Washington, which includes Vancouver.<br> He urged voters who dropped their ballots in the transit center box after 11 a.m. Saturday to contact his office for a replacement ballot<br><a href="https://apnews.com/article/vote-ballot-drop-box-democracy-fire-f66c52f774955106fb9e7c8172825cff" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" translate="no" target="_blank"><span class="invisible">https://</span><span class="ellipsis">apnews.com/article/vote-ballot</span><span class="invisible">-drop-box-democracy-fire-f66c52f774955106fb9e7c8172825cff</span></a></p>