Content warning: This article contains examples with explicit language.
On December 29, police descended on the home of Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows after receiving a hoax emergency call. The apparent “swatting” — a practice that uses phony emergency calls as a harassment tool — came just a day after social media users, including a local right-wing activist, shared Bellows’ home address and claimed that she “needs to be dealt with” and threatened to “keep her up all night.”
The threats followed Bellows’ December 28 decision to bar former President Donald Trump from Maine’s presidential primary ballot because of his role in the January 6, 2021, insurrection. (Trump has since appealed the decision.)
Within hours of the announcement, users on various social media platforms — including Facebook and X (formerly Twitter) — began sharing Bellows’ home address. The next night, police showed up at Bellows’ home after receiving a phony emergency call — a harassment tool that has led to at least one fatal police shooting.
One of the first social media users to share Bellows’ address was a local right-wing activist named Shawn McBreairty. On X, McBreairty accused Bellows of “attempting to devolve our Constitutional Republic into a banana republic” by barring Trump from the state’s primary ballot before posting Bellows’ home address.
In 2021, McBreairty became a right-wing media darling and appeared on Fox News multiple times to discuss his fight against what he called “indoctrination” in local schools and his ban from school board meetings of a Maine school district for reading explicit material at a meeting. (McBreairty has been involved in lawsuits with at least two different Maine school districts.)
Several other X users also posted Bellows’ address on the platform.
Users on Facebook and Instagram, both owned by Meta, also shared Bellows’ address. One Facebook user repeatedly posted Bellows’ address, along with photos allegedly showing the home, to a pro-Trump Facebook group with nearly 150,000 members. The user, who said the address had been “data mined,” called on other users to “Go PROTEST and keep her up all night” and argued that Bellows “needs to be dealt with.”
Far-right message board users also shared Bellows’ address and made violent threats against her. One 4chan user called for Bellows “to be shot.” (Some posts alleged that Bellows had shared her own address on Instagram.)
Bellows’ apparent “swatting” is another instance of social media activity and threats leading to real-world harms.