Watertown, Wis. — Dane County Circuit Court Judge He once said A ruling that says people who steal from big-box stores shouldn’t be prosecuted and Wisconsin voters with disabilities can now request and download electronic ballots, changes that could create election administration problems in battleground states in November.
Judge Everett Mitchell said, Pastor The Madison resident, who ran for state Supreme Court justice last year but lost in a five-way primary, issued a temporary injunction last week covering the Nov. 5 election, effectively changing some of the election administration system in a state that struggled to count absentee ballots in the last presidential election.
Voters printing People with disabilities Self-certify The injunction allowed voters who were unable to read or complete their ballot without assistance to request an electronic vote from an elections clerk and then use assistive technology to complete and return their ballot.
The ruling leaves office staff in about 2,000 local governments with little time to make adjustments.
Deputy attorneys for Democratic Attorney General Josh Kaul said the change in law was Creates confusion and security risks.
Election administration in Wisconsin is somewhat decentralized, with 72 county clerks and more than 1,800 city and town clerks responsible.
Current state law allows military members and voters living overseas to request an absentee ballot and return a paper ballot by mail.
Before the injunction, voters with disabilities followed the same process as other absentee voters: Request an absentee ballot from their local elections clerk, receive the ballot in the mail, fill it out, and either drop it off at the clerk’s office or return it by mail.
Republican state lawmakers appealed the ruling in conservative Waukesha County, especially Judge Mitchell. Disrupt the status quo A few months before the big election.
Unless or until the appeal is granted, clerks will be struggling to adapt to Wisconsin’s new absentee voting law, along with the threat of the 2020 presidential election and Donald Trump’s Wisconsin campaign. Litigation Hanging in the background.
The Wisconsin Elections Commission declined to comment on ongoing litigation, and the Republican National Committee’s director of election integrity did not respond to a request for comment.
