The News: In a new letter to the United States Department of Justice, WILL outlines potential concerns with the Wisconsin Election Commission’s (WEC) maintenance of the statewide voter registration list and suggests follow-up questions to be posed to WEC.
WILL’s letter provides important insight into Wisconsin’s unique election system and points out potential failures in that system. USDOJ is the agency designed to address any such failures because it is authorized to sue Wisconsin for failure to comply with the maintenance requirements imposed by federal law.
What Happened: USDOJ recently sent a letter to WEC to determine if WEC’s maintenance of the statewide voter registration complies with federal law. WEC responded. WILL has now sent a follow up letter to USDOJ suggesting additional questions that WEC should be required to answer.
The Quote: WILL Deputy Counsel, Lucas Vebber, stated, “Even before WILL’s comprehensive review of the 2020 election, WILL has monitored WEC’s administration of our elections and taken action to correct problems. Whether it’s WEC’s failure to properly maintain the statewide voter registration list, the use of drop boxes, the use of an unlawful voter registration form, the use of a mobile voting vans, we have seen a troubling pattern with how WEC administers elections – sometimes outside the scope of state and federal law. We hope our message to the USDOJ will help bring much-needed attention to this important issue.”
Issues Highlighted in our Letter:
Comparing Wisconsin Voter Registration Information to DMV Databases: Both state and federal law require WEC to match voter registration information to DMV databases. The purpose of this exercise is to determine if the information supplied by a new registrant matches the information for that same person on file with DMV. If it does not, then WEC must determine whether the registration is genuine or a fraud. WEC acknowledges that it uses different processes to do this matching if the registration is done online, by mail, or in-person. WILL’s letter raises questions about potential failures in the process for doing the matching for registrations done by mail or in person.
Why does Wisconsin keep ineligible voters in its database? It appears that when registered voters are deemed to be ineligible, they are not removed from WEC’s database but instead are changed from “active” status to “inactive” status in that database. That raises concerns about when and how those ineligible voters can be moved back to active status and by whom. WILL is calling on USDOJ to issue a follow-up inquiry to WEC to get to the bottom of that issue.
Whether Wisconsin’s complies with federal law regarding the maintenance of our statewide computerized voter registration list? Federal law requires each state to maintain a statewide computerized voter registration list and that such list must be administered in a uniform and nondiscriminatory manner. WEC’s response to USDOJ reveals that Wisconsin appears to be in violation of that requirement. WILL asks USDOJ to ensure that WEC is not, in fact, violating federal requirements for uniform and nondiscriminatory list maintenance.
Non-Citizen-Voting Concerns: Wisconsin voters recently approved a constitutional amendment prohibiting non-citizens from voting. USDOJ asked WEC what WEC was doing to determine if any non-citizens were on the statewide voter registration list. It appears that WEC does virtually nothing. WILL’s letter raises follow-up questions on this issue to determine if WEC takes any real action to audit the list to answer this question.
WILL’s Nationally Recognized Work on Election Integrity: WILL has received national recognition for our work on election integrity, and our comprehensive report assessing the 2020 Presidential Election has been cited by media outlets as well as by election experts from across the country. The WSJ called WILL’s work the best—and most comprehensive—look at the 2020 Presidential Election.
