Assembly Speaker Robin Vos has sent to committee a resolution to impeach the state’s top election official, six weeks after five lawmakers introduced the proposal and on the heels of a new TV campaign pressuring him to move on it.
A Vos spokesperson said there was no connection between the ad campaign and Thursday’s move, saying the resolution was “referred like any other bill.”
Meanwhile, Vos, R-Rochester, signaled the effort won’t go anywhere after a Dane County judge issued a temporary injunction last week barring lawmakers from removing Meagan Wolfe as Elections Commission administrator.
“I think she should be replaced, but we now have to wait for the court process to work,” Vos said.
AR 18, which was first circulated for co-sponsorship on Sept. 22, includes 15 grounds for impeaching Wolfe. The move would require a majority vote in the Assembly and the support from two-thirds of the Senate to remove her.
The resolution was proposed by state Rep. Janel Brandtjen, R-Menomonee Falls, and four others. Brandtjen clashed with Vos last session as she endorsed his primary opponent in 2022 and he removed her as chair of the Campaign and Elections Committee after she used the post to push a series of falsehoods about the 2020 election. On Tuesday, she called on Vos to move the resolution to committee, saying Assembly rules give the speaker 10 business days to assign a bill number and committee after a resolution has been submitted.
“This delay raises concerns that the process is not being managed in a timely manner or that there may be an intent to delay,” Brandtjen said in Tuesday’s statement. “The people of Wisconsin expect their elected officials to adhere to the established rules and ensure a fair and efficient legislative process.”
Brandtjen’s office didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on the resolution being assigned to the Government Accountability and Oversight Committee. It’s chaired by Rep. David Steffen, R-Green Bay, and his office didn’t immediately return a call seeking comment on his plans for the resolution.
Last Friday, Dane County Judge Ann Peacock issued a temporary injunction barring GOP lawmakers from removing Wolfe as she weighs the merits of a lawsuit seeking to keep her in the job. That order bars lawmakers from appointing an interim while she decides the merits of Dem AG Josh Kaul’s suit that seeks to keep her in the post unless she leaves voluntarily.
The order didn’t directly address impeaching Wolfe, but included the directive that further “official actions” by GOP lawmakers to “remove or attempt to remove” Wolfe “do not have legal effect, subject to a final decision of this Court.”
Assembly Minority Leader Greta Neubauer, D-Racine, called Vos’ decision to legitimize the articles of impeachment “deeply troubling.”
“It seems that it doesn’t matter what the rules are or what courts say, the GOP playbook is to consolidate power at all costs, including threatening impeachment at every turn,” she said.
Earlier this week, a group that bills itself as the Wisconsin Elections Committee began running a new TV ad in the Milwaukee market that threatens to oust Vos unless he allows the impeachment process against Wolfe to proceed.
In Thursday’s statement, Vos knocked the ads saying the people behind them are “obviously from out-of-state since anyone living in Wisconsin would know of recent events.”
“The money could be better spent attacking the real obstacle to election reforms and that’s Tony Evers,” Vos said.
Records filed with the FCC show the Wisconsin Elections Committee’s officers include Adam Steen, a Donald Trump-endorsed candidate who challenged Vos in the 2022 GOP primary, and Harry Wait, a conservative activist who now faces charges for illegally requesting an absentee ballot in Vos’ name.
Wait told WisPolitics Vos’ decision to assign the measure a bill number “is in part a victory,” though he added it’s not enough to satisfy the group’s demands to oust Wolfe.
“We wouldn’t do this unless we thought it could work, and we’re putting so much pressure on Vos he’d be a fool not to remove her now,” Wait said. “Because we have statewide support and Vos’ ratings are as low as they’ve ever been.”
A group spokesperson told WisPolitics Wednesday it planned to spend $100,000 a week on TV, radio and newspaper ads until either Vos relents or is replaced, through a recall or a primary challenge. A filing with the FCC shows the group has put down $80,000 on broadcast TV on four Milwaukee stations between Oct. 30 and Nov. 7.
Asked if the group has any major donors funding his operation, Wait said, “we really don’t even want that kind of money or influence because we’re self-guided and pretty much self-funded.”
“We don’t beg,” he said. “If people think we’re doing good work, they contribute to our cause. And because we are a public interest group, we are able to tap into large sums of the citizens in the state.”
See Vos’ statement here.
See the FCC file here.
