Wisconsin Attorney General Josh Kaul says he expects challenges to Wisconsin’s elections and is prepared to “defend the results” if need be.
“There have been suggestions again about the integrity of our elections,” Kaul said on WISN’s “UpFront,” which is produced in partnership with WisPolitics. “So I think two things are important: One is we need to make clear, and when I say we, I mean bipartisan groups of people, need to make clear that we have safe and secure elections in Wisconsin. They’ve been tested over and over again. We know that the system works. And then secondly, we’re certainly prepared, if we need to, to defend the results of the election.
“This is not new ground in Wisconsin,” Kaul said. “Since I’ve taken office as attorney general, we’ve had a lot of challenges to our voting system. There was an effort to remove tens of thousands of voters from the rolls. We defended against that effort, and we won. There were efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election. Several lawsuits were filed. We won every one of those cases, and the results were upheld.”
Kaul has charged three former allies of Donald Trump — Kenneth Chesebro, Jim Troupis and Mike Roman — in connection to the 2020 fake electors scheme.
Kaul said the investigation is still ongoing and wouldn’t rule out new charges, including any targeting Trump himself.
“We don’t approach investigations thinking about is this particular individual potentially going to be charged or not in the abstract,” Kaul said. “We do that based on the facts as they are developed and as we are gathering facts and learning more information. That’s what shapes the direction we take with the investigation and should also shape the direction a prosecutor takes in making a charging decision.
“In any case where we’re investigating, we are committed to following the facts where they lead,” Kaul added. “We have a basic principle in our system of justice, which is that we have equal justice under the law. Nobody is above the law, and so we apply the law equally. Now, we’re not going to speculate who may or may not have evidence that’s gathered against them. What I can tell you is that the decisions that we make with respect to our investigation and any charging decisions we’re in a position to make, will be based not on the identity of the individuals involved but on the facts and the law.”
Montana Sen. Steve Daines, the chair of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, says Wisconsin’s U.S. Senate race is “razor-thin” as the GOP pours more money and resources into Wisconsin in the final three weeks.
“These polls have tightened up, but we’re seeing Wisconsin right now (in) a tied race,” Daines told “UpFront.” “We’re seeing just a razor-thin race, but the momentum we’ve seen shifting now towards Eric Hovde.”
Daines, tasked with ensuring Republicans regain control of the Senate, is looking to the Midwest to shore up potential Republican wins alongside his home state of Montana.
“Certainly, states like Montana are very important,” Daines said. “West Virginia is over. We’re going to win West Virginia. Both sides have really conceded that. So that’s plus one. Montana, Ohio, and I’ll tell you Wisconsin, these states they call the ‘blue wall’ states, Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, these are all now tied toss-up races. And so we look at Wisconsin now as a very, very probable state.”
Daines confirmed reporting by POLITICO that the NRSC is canceling its remaining independent expenditure ad buys and redirecting the money toward hybrid ads, but dismissed money concerns three weeks from Election Day.
“You know, we’ve set records actually in the support we’re seeing at the NRSC, which we’re very thankful for,” Daines said. “But these ads you talked about, that we can invest in races and supporting these great candidates, they pay a lower rate by law. The candidate has a lower rate, and we’re able to take advantage of those more favorable rates.”
Arvind Gopalratnam, the Milwaukee Bucks vice president of social responsibility, says civic engagement is a “huge focus” for the organization and the NBA ahead of Election Day.
“Social responsibility is a huge focus area for the NBA and its platform,” Gopalratnam told “UpFront”. “And one of those big focus theme areas is voting and civic engagement. So this year in particular, every NBA team is off on Election Day. Some teams play the night before, and we’ll be theming their games to talk about voting, but it’s part of the league’s commitment to making sure that we can continue to celebrate voting in our world, too.”
The Bucks hosted a voter registration drive during its preseason game alongside a mock election where fans could vote for their favorite team and food to better learn how the process works.
“We believe that voting should be fun,” Gopalratnam said. “It’s a civic part of our responsibility in life. If you’re eligible to vote, we want to make sure you’re educated and make sure that you have the resources available to you, to understand how to vote. In our communities, every state, every community is a little bit different. So we want to demystify some of that process and making sure that our fans understand voting should be fun, not just in a presidential year but every year.”
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