ST. PETERSBURG -- The company whose guard or guards were seen outside an early voting site Wednesday afternoon says it's not engaged in any poll watching. It also says the guard was off duty.
Syotos, a security guard firm based in Crestview, Florida, says one of its guards was in the neighborhood to pick someone up, recognized someone at the polling station, and struck up a conversation.
Here's the company statement:
We do not have any employees engaging in poll watching. We had an off duty employee who was picking up a family member who happened to be in the vicinity of a polling location. The employee saw someone they knew near the polling location and had a short conversation. Again, this employee was off duty and was in no way engaging in poll watching. The employee was stoped by a local deputy that had every right to ask what was happening .The employee made it clear that they were not affiliated with the polling both. A change of information from the officer to the deputy happened and all information came back valid and true. The officer just had on their gear from leaving work and that was taken out of context.
The guard's presence caused some speculation that the Trump campaign or Republicans had hired them to be there... something both the campaign and Florida GOP denied.
In response to the incident, Pinellas Sheriff Bob Gualtieri says he'll post deputies at all of the county's five early voting sites. He says none of the activity broke any laws.
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