COVID-19

“I don’t think many people who are aware of what’s going on, and are tuned into politics and government in this state, would say that it’s anything even resembling a democracy,” said Jay Heck, the executive director of the Wisconsin chapter of Common Cause, a government watchdog group. ... “They view this as an opportunity to be able to extend one-party rule in this state for another 10 years,” Heck said. “If they can do that, they can do it in a great many other states as well.”

If state legislatures do not expand mail-in voting soon, legal challenges like the ones that resulted in Wisconsin’s chaotic primary will be waged right up until the presidential election, said Sylvia Albert, director of voting and elections for Common Cause, a nonpartisan watchdog group. “What you saw in Wisconsin would be happening in November,” Albert said.

Today, Common Cause called on Congress to hold emergency hearings to examine why Wisconsin voters were forced to risk their lives by standing in lines at polling places on April 7th during the COVID-19 pandemic when public gatherings were prohibited in the state. The letter to the Senate Rules and Administration Committee and the Committee on House Administration also urged the committees to explore how other states are adjusting their elections to ensure that all voters can be counted during the current pandemic in both the primaries and the general election. The letter also emphasizes the need for Congress to provide additional election funding to states in its next stimulus bill to help ensure every American is able to cast their ballot in a safe and secure manner.

Jay Heck, the Wisconsin director of Common Cause, a voting-rights advocacy group, said voters face a difficult choice between wanting to vote and protecting their health. “Wisconsin’s absentee ballot rules are no doubt disenfranchising voters,” Heck said. Heck said the governor and Legislature have seven months to correct the problem to “avoid this kind of chaos” for the November general election.

"Wisconsin is the only state in the nation that has failed to step up and respond responsibly and safely to the current national health pandemic emergency," Jay Heck, director of voting rights group Common Cause in Wisconsin, said in a statement. 

We deserve a government accountable and transparent to the people, but President Trump is once again acting as if he is above the law. Trump’s decision to remove Glenn Fine, the leader of an independent panel of inspectors general providing oversight of the coronavirus relief stimulus, is a corrupt power grab. Without strong oversight,  the public will not have the confidence that their hard-earned money actually serves the public over special interests.