The Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty (WILL) has “successfully persuaded the City of Neenah Clerk to end illegal electioneering practices” after election workers placed an article on the Aug. 13 Constitutional Amendment referendum questions within each voting booth, signaling which side Republicans and Democrats should support, WILL announced.
In a press release, WILL announced that the Neenah clerk now says “that they have removed all materials from the voting booths, in compliance with state law” after WILL sent an Aug. 13 letter demanding an end to the practice.
The two state referendum questions on the Aug. 13 ballot would give the state Legislature oversight on the spending of billions of dollars in federal money. Right now, the governor – no matter which political party – has sole authority to spend the federal money, including massive pots of COVID relief money. While it’s true that Republicans are generally urging people to vote “yes” on both referendums because they believe Gov. Tony Evers has engaged in wasteful spending with no public input and liberal interests have spent millions of dollars urging people to vote “no,” we’ve also spoken to Democrat and Independent voters who support the referendums because they don’t think any single partisan politician should have that much spending authority – no matter which party they adhere to.
At any rate, WILL noted, it’s not the role of the Neenah city clerk to imply how voters should vote, and it’s, in fact, against state law for them to do so.
“Neenah’s City Clerk had no right to try to put a thumb on the scale to manipulate the opinions of voters. This should serve as a warning to other election clerks to abide by the rules in Wisconsin law,” WILL Deputy Counsel, Dan Lennington, said.
On August 7, WILL wrote Neenah Clerk Char Nagel, “Multiple voters in the City of Neenah are reporting that election workers have placed a Yahoo.com news article within each voting booth at the Neenah City Hall early voting site. The news article describes two referendum questions on the August 13 ballot, and characterizes the question as partisan, pitting Republicans and ‘conservative groups’ against the Governor, Democrats, ‘and liberal groups.’ We received the first reports of this practice last night. Some election workers even admonished voters to ‘read it carefully.’”
“Voters are casting ballots ahead of the August 13th Partisan Primary and considering two ballot questions that would change the Wisconsin Constitution. The City of Neenah placed a Yahoo.com news article in voting booths, which pained the ballot questions as partisan in nature,” WILL said.
“The article signaled which side Republicans should support, and which side Democrats should support. The Clerk previously stated that ‘voters don’t understand’ the questions and she must ‘explain’ what the election means to voters. This conduct is called ‘electioneering’ and is forbidden by Wisconsin state law,” the WILL news release says.
“While WILL supports the passage of the amendments, any attempt to influence the outcome at the polls or in the voting booth, especially by election officials, is illegal. The referendum questions are non-partisan,” WILL noted.
David Rashid, a lawyer with the city attorney’s office, wrote WILL, “While we respectfully disagree with your appraisal of both the facts and the applicable law as may relate thereto, in the interest of maintaining election integrity and avoiding even the appearance of impropriety, the subject material was immediately removed at the request of the citizen and will not be permitted to be re-posted. Moreover, nothing other than ballots and marking instruments will be present in our voting booths.”
