Wisconsin: Legislature cannot fix voter ID law before November election, leader says | Wisconsin State Journal

The leader of the state Senate said Wednesday that the Legislature will not go back into session to fix Wisconsin’s voter ID law, which was struck down Tuesday by U.S. District Judge Lynn Adelman. Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald, R-Juneau, said in an interview that although he supports the planned appeal of Adelman’s decision, Tuesday’s rejection of the law left little room for lawmakers to act. “I don’t see it (Legislature) coming back,” Fitzgerald said. “It’s not going to be resolved for the November election.” Senate President Mike Ellis, R-Neenah, echoed that sentiment, saying that calling lawmakers back to Madison would be “an exercise in futility.” Any new law would have to be approved by Adelman, who not only struck down the voter ID law but also blocked the state from enacting any similar requirement, said John Ulin, an attorney who represented civil-rights groups and individuals challenging the law. “This pretty much ends the idea that we could come in and do something through a legislative effort that would make sense at this point,” Fitzgerald said.

Wisconsin: Federal judge strikes down voter ID; Van Hollen to appeal | Associated Press

A federal judge in Milwaukee struck down Wisconsin’s voter identification law Tuesday, declaring that a requirement that voters show a state-issued photo ID at the polls imposes an unfair burden on poor and minority voters. U.S. District Judge Lynn Adelman sided with opponents of the law, who argued that low-income and minority voters aren’t as likely to have photo IDs or the documents needed to get them. Adelman said the law violated the U.S. Constitution’s guarantee of equal protection. The decision invalidates Wisconsin’s law and means voter ID likely won’t be in place for the fall elections, when Republican Gov. Scott Walker faces re-election. Walker said last month that he would call lawmakers into special session if the courts ruled against the law; Walker’s spokeswoman did not immediately return an email seeking reaction Tuesday. Nor did Republican legislative leaders, who have agreed a special session would be warranted to pass a revised version of the law. Tuesday’s decision could set a precedent for similar legal challenges in Texas, North Carolina and elsewhere. There are 31 states with laws in effect requiring voters to show some form of identification, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Seven states have strict photo ID requirements similar to the one a state judge struck down in Arkansas last week; that decision has been appealed to the Arkansas Supreme Court. Pennsylvania’s voter ID law has been put on hold because of court challenges.

Wisconsin: Federal Judge Strikes Down Wisconsin Law Requiring Photo ID at Polls | New York Times

A federal judge on Tuesday struck down Wisconsin’s law requiring voters to produce state-approved photo identification cards at polling places, advancing a new legal basis — the Voting Rights Act — for similar challenges playing out around the nation. Judge Lynn Adelman, of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin, found that the state’s 2011 law violated the 14th Amendment of the Constitution as well as the Voting Rights Act, which bars states from imposing rules that abridge a citizen’s right to vote based on race or color. “I find that the plaintiffs have shown that the disproportionate impact of the photo ID requirement results from the interaction of the requirement with the effects of past or present discrimination,” Judge Adelman wrote in the decision. “Blacks and Latinos in Wisconsin are disproportionately likely to live in poverty. Individuals who live in poverty are less likely to drive or participate in other activities for which a photo ID may be required (such as banking, air travel, and international travel) and so they obtain fewer benefits from possession of a photo ID than do individuals who can afford to participate in these activities.”

Wisconsin: Write-in rules changed under new state law – Isthmus | The Daily Page

For poll worker Larry Nelson, Election Day’s most irritating hour — or hours — arrives after the polls close, when the write-in votes are counted. “Here you are, on your feet after working 14 hours, and now you have to sort through the ballots looking for Mickey Mouse,” he explains. “It’s quite a bit of work for something that doesn’t mean a whole lot. Hopefully we can get the law changed before the next election.” Consider it done. On April 2, the day after this year’s spring election, Gov. Scott Walker quietly signed a bill lifting the requirement that all write-in votes must be counted.

National: GOP Steps Up Attack on Early Voting in Key Swing States | The Nation

On Election Night 2012, referring to the long lines in states like Florida and Ohio, Barack Obama declared, “We have to fix that.” The waits in Florida and Ohio were no accident, but rather the direct consequence of GOP efforts to curtail the number of days and hours that people had to vote. On January 22, 2014, the president’s bipartisan election commission released a comprehensive report detailing how voting could be smoother, faster and more convenient. It urged states to reduce long lines by adopting “measures to improve access to the polls through expansion of the period for voting before the traditional Election Day.” That would seem like an uncontroversial and common sense suggestion, but too many GOP-controlled states continue to move in the opposite direction, reducing access to the ballot instead of expanding it. The most prominent recent examples are the swing states of Wisconsin and Ohio. Yesterday Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker signed legislation eliminating early voting hours on weekends and nights, when it’s most convenient for many voters to go to the polls. When they took over state government in 2011, Wisconsin Republicans reduced the early voting period from three weeks to two weeks and only one weekend. Now they’ve eliminated weekend voting altogether.

Wisconsin: Scott Walker signs early-voting bill; partial veto extends voting hours | Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Acting out of the public eye on controversial measures, Gov. Scott Walker signed asbestos liability legislation Thursday opposed by a number of veterans groups and used a partial veto to loosen new restrictions on early voting opposed by Democrats. Wielding his pen privately on a stack of 31 bills, Walker approved a number of elections bills Thursday, including the absentee voting measure and another one to give lobbyists more time to give campaign donations to state officials. In the early-voting measure, Walker used his partial veto powers — the most powerful in the nation — to nix language restricting early voting hours in Milwaukee and other cities to 45 hours a week while leaving in place a provision to prohibit early voting on weekends.

Wisconsin: Senate approves bill to limit absentee voting | Daily Cardinal

The state Senate passed a bill Friday limiting voting times to submit absentee ballots. Under current law, one can apply to a municipal clerk in person to vote using an absentee ballot. The ballot can be submitted between the third Monday before the election and the last Friday before the election by 5 p.m. In-person applications for absentee ballots would only be received Monday through Friday between 7:30 a.m. and 6 p.m. under Senate Bill 324, introduced by Sen. Glenn Grothman, R-West Bend. Both Democrats and Republicans criticized the bill and urged Gov. Scott Walker to veto it.

Wisconsin: Wisconsin Senate Republicans not likely to act on voter ID this session | Capitol Times

The Wisconsin state Senate’s Republican leadership favors a special session to address voter ID as opposed to taking up legislation passed by the Assembly in November in the remaining weeks of the 2013-14 legislative session. Myranda Tanck, an aide to Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald, Senate Republicans would prefer to see how the state Supreme Court rules on the voter ID bill that Gov. Scott Walker signed three years ago. That law has since been struck down by two Dane County Circuit Court judges.

Wisconsin: The politics of Voter ID in Wisconsin | Capitol Times

Gov. Scott Walker is putting the entire weight of the governorship behind Voter ID. Walker told reporters Tuesday that he was willing to call a special session of the Legislature this summer in order to pass a new bill requiring voters to show photo identification at the polls. Although Walker signed such a bill into law in 2011, it was quickly ruled unconstitutional by two Dane County judges and is now being considered by the state Supreme Court, which is expected to deliver a ruling in the coming months. If the high court upholds the lower court rulings, finding that the bill cannot be implemented as written, Walker suggested that the Legislature could pass a new bill that would address any objections from the judiciary while still preserving an ID requirement.

Wisconsin: Walker open to bill limiting early voting hours | Associated Press

Gov. Scott Walker signaled Tuesday that he was open to signing a bill that would limit early voting, including disallowing it on weekends in the two weeks leading up to an election. The state Senate was expected to pass the bill Tuesday, despite objections from those who say it’s an unconstitutional attempt to make it more difficult for minorities in Wisconsin’s largest cities to vote. Senators were preparing to work into the night voting on more than 50 bills, including more than a dozen that would make substantive and technical changes to election law, as part of an effort to end this year’s session within the next couple weeks.

Wisconsin: Walker to call special session if courts rule against voter ID | Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Gov. Scott Walker said Tuesday he would call a special legislative session if courts this spring do not uphold the state’s voter ID law, which has been blocked since soon after it was enacted. Shortly after taking over all of state government in 2011, Republicans passed a law requiring voters to show photo ID at the polls. In 2012, two Dane County judges blocked the measure. Those cases are now before the state Supreme Court, which is expected to rule by June. Separately, U.S. District Judge Lynn Adelman is considering two other cases that argue the voter ID law violates the U.S. Constitution and federal Voting Rights Act. Adelman and the state Supreme Court may not rule until after the legislative session ends in early April. Any one ruling against the voter ID law would keep the measure from going into place. Walker told reporters he would closely monitor what the courts decided on voter ID to see if lawmakers needed to make any modifications. He said he would want a special session if the courts didn’t allow the requirement to take effect for the November elections.

Wisconsin: Court filings seek to stop Doe probe into recall elections | Journal Sentinel

Three unnamed people have asked the Wisconsin Court of Appeals to temporarily halt a secret investigation of campaign fundraising and spending during Wisconsin’s recent recall elections. Madison attorney Dean Strang filed the five motions Thursday, according to online court records. The filings name special prosecutor Francis Schmitz and initially named retired Kenosha County Circuit Judge Barbara Kluka, who was originally in charge of the investigation. The filings were amended this week to reflect that the investigation is now being overseen by retired Appeals Court Judge Gregory Peterson. Kluka has not said why she recused herself. Copies of the court records were not available because Strang has filed motions to seal the petitions and related records. The filings, called petitions for supervisory writs, are requests that higher courts review how the investigation is being conducted.

Wisconsin: Assembly approves changes to voting hours, ID law | Journal Sentinel

In a late-night session Thursday, Republicans in the state Assembly approved measures to reinstate Wisconsin’s voter ID law, tighten early voting hours, limit the ability to recall elected officials and restrict access to the site of a proposed iron mine in the North Woods. They also took a first step toward amending the state constitution to require members of the state Supreme Court to choose the chief justice, rather than having that post automatically go to the most senior justice. Legislators from the two parties had been working together to move through a jam-packed agenda by midnight, but bitter disputes developed late Thursday that threatened to send the session into the early morning hours. Tensions flared after Democrats attempted to take up a bill honoring the children killed last year at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut. Republicans rejected taking that up and then advanced a bill creating an anti-abortion license plate.

Wisconsin: Assembly Republicans push through recall, photo ID, absentee voting measures | Associated Press

Assembly Republicans used the final regular session day of the year Thursday to push their proposals that would make it more difficult to remove public officials from office, require photo identification at the polls and limit hours of in-person absentee voting. Democrats, who opposed all the measures but didn’t have the votes to stop them, argued against the changes as an infringement on voter rights and attempt to quash Democratic supporters. Republican leaders defended the proposals, saying they would protect the integrity of the election process by allowing recalls only when those targeted have committed a serious crime, combat fraud by requiring photo identification and install a more uniform system for in-person absentee voting hours statewide. The Assembly isn’t the last stop for any of the hot-button elections issues. All would also have to pass the Republican-controlled Senate, and the change to the recall law for statewide officials would be put to a statewide vote. The soonest that could happen is 2015. The recall measure passed 53-39 with all Democrats opposed.

Wisconsin: Walker withdraws elections board nomination | Associated Press

Gov. Scott Walker wants to replace, without explanation, the former judge who led the nonpartisan elections board during Walker’s recall in 2012, raising questions about his motives for the unusual move. Walker’s office today provided The Associated Press with a copy of the governor’s Oct. 24 letter withdrawing the nomination for Senate confirmation of Judge David Deininger. Walker spokesman Tom Evenson had no comment on why the governor made the move. A Senate committee was to vote on the nomination Tuesday. “I feel like I’ve been fired and I don’t know why,” said Deininger, a former Republican lawmaker who was first appointed to the Government Accountability Board in 2008 by then-Gov. Jim Doyle, a Democrat. The board was established to be a nonpartisan arbiter of the state’s election and ethics laws, but some of its decisions have so angered Republicans they have called for it to be abolished and reconstituted.

Wisconsin: Republican state Senate leader says he won’t take up new photo ID bill | Star Tribune

The latest proposal to require Wisconsin voters to show photo identification at the polls appears to be dead on arrival. The Republican Legislature passed a photo ID requirement in 2011, but courts blocked it soon after, and it is not in effect. A pair of Republican state Assembly members circulated a new bill Thursday, with the hope of holding a hearing next week and taking a vote later in November. But Republican Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald told The Associated Press he does not plan to take the bill up in the Senate. Fitzgerald said it makes more sense to see what happens with lawsuits currently pending in both state appeals and federal court, including one that’s headed to trial starting Monday. “We should sit tight right now,” Fitzgerald said. The bill would have to pass the Senate and Assembly in identical form, and be signed by Gov. Scott Walker, before taking effect. Fitzgerald said even if that were to happen, a new law would just trigger another round of lawsuits. Enacting a photo ID requirement has been a top priority of Republicans for years. They were stymied by Democratic Gov. Jim Doyle, who vetoed such a requirement three times between 2002 and 2005. Republicans took full control of the Legislature in 2011 and quickly passed the bill.

Colorado: Allegations of voter suppression efforts ignore the reality of recall elections | The Recall Elections Blog

We now have the usual flip side of the “gypsy voter fraud” allegations that we heard yesterday — an equally specious complaint of voter suppression. Part of the complaint is that the mail-in ballot law was tossed out for the recall. Nothing can be said about that — that’s the rules, and you got to play’em. The other, more important claim, is that the turnout is exceptionally low, even for a recall. However, this may not be borne out by facts. With a few, very noteworthy exceptions, recalls usually see lower turnout. Let’s look at another high profile state legislative recall. Arizona state Senate President Russell Pearce faced a recall which took place on an election day (albeit a true off year election). Election Day recalls should have higher turnout than a regular special election like in Colorado, and since Pearce was such a lightening rod, you might expect great turnout. Instead, 23,296 people voted, down from 31,023 who voted in the 2010 general election (when it was a safe seat).

Editorials: Wisconsin high court should see voter ID violates constitution | The Cap Times

The May 30 ruling of the Wisconsin Court of Appeals, District 4, which found Wisconsin’s voter ID law to be constitutional, was ill thought out and inconsistent in its arguments. Yet there are many Wisconsinites who suggest that the state Supreme Court will uphold the ruling because the court is so politicized that it will simply take the side of Gov. Scott Walker and his legislative allies. The governor and irresponsible legislators have advanced a number of voter suppression initiatives and the theory is that the court is so biased in favor of Walker’s political project that the justices will simply rubber-stamp the restrictive voter ID scheme. But we refuse to accept that the majority of justices on the high court have rejected the rule of law.

Wisconsin: Fewer elections for top court would restore civility, public trust, special task force says | Wisconsin State Journal

Limiting Wisconsin Supreme Court justices to a single 16-year term would help restore public confidence in a court whose image has been battered by increasingly savage political campaigns fueled by a rising tide of money, a special task force of attorneys says. The state Bar of Wisconsin panel wants to see a constitutional amendment introduced this fall to change the system that allows justices to run for unlimited 10-year terms, said Joe Troy, a former circuit judge who led an 18-month study that resulted in the proposal. “The campaigns have become so brutal,” Troy said. “The sitting justice is attacked and demeaned, and the challenger is attacked and demeaned. The public sees that and thinks we must not have very good justices.” The proposed term limits aren’t a cure-all, but they would help restore public trust in the system, Troy said. “No justice, once elected, would ever be elected again,” Troy said. “The perception that they are there serving the people (with money) who put them there, or they are worried about the next election, that’s just not going to happen.”

Wisconsin: Assembly Speaker Robin Vos wants quick action on elections bill – State elections board wants go-slow approach | Journal Sentinel

Assembly Speaker Robin Vos plans to proceed quickly with a wide-ranging election reform bill despite objections from the state elections board. “Our main message to the committee today is please slow down,” said Michael Haas, elections director for the Government Accountability Board. “The legislation addresses some significant policy areas of election and campaign finance…that would benefit from more vetting.” But Vos, a Rochester Republican, said quick passage is necessary to enact election safeguards and properly train poll workers before the next election in spring 2014. “We adjourn on June 30, so it is my intention to get a bill passed by June 30,” Vos said, referring to the end of the Assembly’s floor period. He said he is happy to discuss components of the bill in a bipartisan fashion but stressed the need for additional safeguards in election law.

Wisconsin: Elections bill would make it harder to recall municipal and school officials | Journal Sentinel

Municipal and school officials could be recalled from office only if they have been charged with a crime or ethics violation, under a sweeping elections bill quickly moving through the state Assembly. Under other provisions of the bill by Rep. Jeff Stone (R-Greendale), new limits would be enacted on when people can vote in clerks’ offices before an election, ballots could more easily be thrown out and restrictions would be eased on when lobbyists can give campaign donations to legislators and the governor. The bill wouldn’t affect state and county elected officials, who can be recalled for any reason under the Wisconsin constitution. As a result, the proposal would not have prevented the recall election of Gov. Scott Walker last year or the attempted recall of Milwaukee County Executive Tom Ament after the pension scandal in 2002.

National: Why the GOP’s electoral vote gambit won’t work | Washington Post

A Republican-backed plan to change the way certain states allocate electoral votes has fizzled as quickly as it sprung onto the national consciousness. The slate of upcoming 2014 governor’s races is a major reason why that happened. Last month, Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus voiced some support for the effort to award electoral votes in a handful of battleground states by congressional district. Since many of those congressional districts lean Republican, the plan, if passed in several swing states, would give future GOP presidential nominees a leg up. But for the Republican governors in these states, endorsing the idea — which Democrats can easily cast as a partisan power grab — would carry immense political risk on the eve of reelection campaigns that already promise to be challenging. So, the governors have mostly distanced themselves from such proposals.

National: GOP electoral vote changes going nowhere | Politico.com

Republican proposals in swing states to change how electoral votes are allocated have set off alarms that the party is trying to rig future presidential elections. But the plans are going nowhere fast. In the majority of states where such measures are being considered – Virginia, Florida, Ohio and Michigan, all states that voted for President Obama in 2012 but have Republican-controlled legislatures – proposals to split Electoral College votes proportionally have either been defeated or are strongly opposed by officials in those states. The only remaining states are Pennsylvania, where an electoral vote change was unsuccessful in 2011, and Wisconsin, where Gov. Scott Walker has expressed hesitance about any changes to the system. “I just said I hadn’t ruled it out. I’m not embracing it because it’s a double-edged sword,” Walker said in a recent interview with POLITICO. “What may look appealing right now depending on who your candidate was might, four or eight years from now, look like just the reverse. And the most important thing to me long term as a governor is what makes your voters be in play. One of our advantages as a swing state is that candidates come here … that’s good for voters. If we change that that would take that away and would largely make us irrelevant.”

Wisconsin: Gov. Walker voices concerns about GOP Electoral College plan | Journal Sentinel

Gov. Scott Walker says he has a ”real concern” about a Republican idea to change the way the state awards its electoral votes, conceding the move could make Wisconsin irrelevant in presidential campaigns. A proposal now percolating in the GOP is to allocate most electoral votes by congressional district, instead of giving them all to the statewide winner. “One of our advantages is, as a swing state, candidates come here. We get to hear from the candidates,” said Walker in an interview Saturday at a conservative conference in Washington, D.C. “That’s good for voters. If we change that, that would take that away, it would largely make us irrelevant.” Walker says he has not yet taken a position on the issue. Republicans have suggested making the change in a handful of states such as Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Michigan, which have been voting Democratic for president but are now controlled by the GOP at the state level.

Wisconsin: Justices again decline to take up voter ID case | Journal Sentinel

The state Supreme Court for a third time on Monday rejected a request by Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen to take up a case that voided Wisconsin’s voter ID law. The terse opinion was unsigned, and no one dissented from it. The defeat for the Republican attorney general came just 2 1/2 months before Justice Patience Roggensack faces re-election. The decision means the case will remain before the Court of Appeals in Waukesha. A second case is before the Court of Appeals in Madison. One or both cases are expected to eventually be decided by the state Supreme Court.

Editorials: Election-day registration works here | Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Don’t look now, but an ongoing battle over how Wisconsinites vote opened on a new front. After signing into law a series of changes to how state elections are run, Gov. Scott Walker said he was considering doing away with election-day registration – or EDR, as its known – the practice of letting voters register on the same day they vote. Walker has since backed away from that idea, pointing to a Government Accountability Board report that showed doing away with EDR would be costly. But it would be a mistake for other reasons as well, one that runs contrary to our state’s fine traditions and will add an unnecessary barrier to voting. The concerns the governor raised about EDR actually would become much worse if it were eliminated.

Wisconsin: Walker open to changing state’s Electoral College allocations | Journal Sentinel

Gov. Scott Walker is open to having Wisconsin allocate its Electoral College votes based on results from each congressional district – a move that would offer Republicans a chance to score at least a partial victory in a state that has gone Democratic in the last seven presidential elections. The idea is being considered in other battleground states that have tipped toward Democrats as Republicans try to develop a national plan to capture the presidency in future years. The GOP governor said he found the notion intriguing but neither embraced it nor rejected it. “To me, it’s an interesting concept, it’s a plausible concept, but it’s not one where I’m convinced either of its merits or lack thereof,” he said in a recent interview at the governor’s mansion in Maple Bluff. Democrats promised to fight such a change, saying they viewed it as a way for Republicans to try to rig elections to their advantage.

Editorials: Wisconsin Governor Walker wise to avoid voting distraction | Sheboygan Press

Gov. Scott Walker has made it pretty clear what his priorities are: creating jobs and improving worker skills so that they match job openings. Eliminating same-day voter registration is not a priority. Walker last week told Bill Lueders of the Wisconsin Center for Investigation that he will veto any bill that calls for ending same-day registration “if it has a price tag.” That should settle the issue for now. Distractions abound for public officials, especially for such highly placed ones as governors and presidents. Thanks to technology and the ubiquity of recording devices, no comment goes unchallenged, or unheard.

Wisconsin: Walker vows veto of same-day voter registration ban | Sheboygan Press

Gov. Scott Walker on Wednesday apparently drove the final nail into the coffin of calls to end same-day voter registration in Wisconsin, vowing to veto any such bill that imposed additional costs. “If it has a price tag, absolutely,” Walker told the Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism in an interview at the Executive Residence, when asked if he would use his veto pen. “There’s no way we’re spending money on something like that.” The idea of ending same-day voter registration gained currency after Walker made a speech in California last month in which he suggested ending the state’s practice of letting voters register on Election Day, citing the burden it placed on poll workers. Two Republican lawmakers began seeking sponsors on a bill to accomplish this in the GOP-controlled state Legislature. But the idea drew heavy opposition from critics, including some local election officials, and the state Government Accountability Board estimated it would cost the state $5.2 million to develop alternative registration systems required by federal law.

Wisconsin: Both sides saw big same-day voter registration numbers | Journal Sentinel

State election records show that voters in Wisconsin’s Democratic-leaning counties have been more likely to register to vote at the polls, but voters in Republican-leaning areas also made heavy use of the state’s same-day registration law. The Wisconsin State Journal reported that in three recent statewide elections, one in eight ballots came from voters who registered that same day, according to data from the Government Accountability Board. The data was for the November 2008 and November 2010 elections, and the June 2012 gubernatorial recall election.