Iowa state auditor Rob Sand was among those answering phone calls in the boiler room.

“It just became very clear that members of the public in general had started calling,” he said.

“One call would be someone screaming at me that CNN was screaming about the results,” said a different volunteer. “And then the next call would be somebody actually calling in the results. Or journalists were phone banking the phone bank. So we couldn’t talk to precinct captains because CNN was having their entire staff f—ing phone bank us.”

Some were friendly Iowans seeking to give the call center volunteers a boost.

“We had, every so often, the sweet calls from someone asking, ‘How’s it going? I’m thinking of you guys,’” said one volunteer. “But it was like, ‘Get off the phone!’”