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MADISON, Wisconsin – A divided Wisconsin Supreme Court banned the use of a majority of ballot boxes on Friday and ruled that voters could not give their completed absentee ballots to others to return on their behalf. a practice that some conservatives despise as a “ballot harvest.”
It is a sentence feared by voting rights advocates, who said earlier that this decision would make it difficult for voters, especially those with disabilities, to return their ballots in absentia. Many Republicans were waiting for a ruling that they said would help prevent someone from casting a ballot on behalf of another person.
The 4-3 ruling came a month before the state primaries on Aug. 9, when voters will restrict the fields for the U.S. governor and senator. Both contests in this battlefield state are being closely watched nationally.
For years, ballot boxes were used without controversy throughout Wisconsin. Election secretaries greatly expanded their use in 2020 during the coronavirus pandemic, as absenteeism reached unprecedented levels.
At the time of the presidential election, there were more than 500 ballot boxes throughout Wisconsin. Some Republicans opposed its use, pointing to a state law that says an absentee ballot must “be emailed by the voter, or delivered in person, to the city secretary who issues the ballot or ballots.” .
The state high court ruled Friday that it means voters themselves must return ballots in absentia and cannot use mailboxes.
“The key phrase is‘ in person ’and it should be assigned its natural meaning,” Judge Rebecca Bradley wrote for the majority.
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In a dissent, Judge Ann Walsh Bradley called the majority “dangerous to democracy.”
“He seems to have taken the opportunity to make voting difficult or to inject confusion into the process whenever the opportunity has been presented to him,” he wrote.
The two Bradleys on the track are unrelated.
The majority opinion stated emphatically that “ballot boxes are illegal under the Wisconsin statutes” without distinguishing between those with staff and those without staff. Dissidents said they felt the matter had not been resolved because the lower court held that mailboxes with staff and in the clerk’s offices could be used.
The case began last year when the Conservative Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty filed a lawsuit for the use of distribution boxes on behalf of two men in the Milwaukee suburbs. State law does not mention ballot boxes and the lawsuit argued their use “it casts doubt on the fairness of the elections and erodes voters’ confidence in the electoral process,” and that the two men “have the right to have the elections in which they participate administered properly in accordance with the law.”
State election officials and disability rights advocates who intervened in the case defended the use of mailboxes, saying they offered a way for voters to return ballots in person. In addition, they did not claim that anything in state law prohibits voters from having their spouse, friend, or someone hand over their full ballot to a secretary so that it can be counted.
In January, Waukesha County Circuit Judge Michael Bohren ruled in favor of those who filed the lawsuit. He concluded that state law did not allow unattended ballot boxes and required absent voters to return their ballots in person or put them in mailboxes.
The state Supreme Court blocked Bohren’s order for the judicial and school board primaries in February because they were fast approaching. But judges banned the use of mailboxes for the general election of those positions in April.
On Friday, the court sided with the lower court and issued a more permanent ruling that will affect the next election, starting with next month’s primaries. Secretaries began sending absentee ballots last month.
Thirty states and the District of Columbia allow ballot boxes, according to the U.S. Vote Foundation. Thirty-one states have laws that allow voters to have someone else return their ballot, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Some of these states allow voters to designate whoever they want for this role, while others limit it to relatives or caregivers.
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Wisconsin law says no person can “receive a ballot or give a ballot to a person other than the responsible election official.” Those who filed the lawsuit argued that the policy should be followed strictly, meaning it would be illegal for someone to leave the ballots of their elderly parents or for church members to collect ballots after a service. and then take them to a secretary’s office.
Most agreed with this assessment.
Republicans have been more concerned about large-scale efforts to collect ballots from partisan actors. While some have been involved in the practice in other states, neither side deployed extensive ballot collection operations in Wisconsin in 2020, when Joe Biden narrowly defeated President Donald Trump in the state.
The lower court ruled that ballots returned by mail could only be placed in mailboxes by the voters themselves, a finding that alarmed disability advocates because some voters are physically unable to go to the polls or put their ballots in the mail. .
The Supreme Court did not go that far, saying it would not address it at the moment if a voter can ask someone else to mail a ballot.
Rick Esenberg, the chairman of the group behind the lawsuit, said in a statement that the ruling “provides substantial clarity on the legal status of absentee ballot boxes and the collection of ballots.”
The decision fell on an ideological line, with judges elected with the support of Republicans in the majority and judges elected with the support of Democrats in dissent.
Both sides were closely watching Judge Brian Hagedorn, who won a race in 2019 with the help of Republicans, but in a number of high-profile cases he has sided with the court’s three Liberals.
Hagedorn signed much of Bradley’s decision, giving the Conservatives the four votes they needed to get the majority.
In a concurring opinion, Hagedorn urged lawmakers to clarify the state’s electoral laws, some of which were first enacted more than a century ago.
“Some citizens will applaud this result; others will lament, “he wrote of the majority’s decision.” But the people of Wisconsin must remember that judicial and political decision-making are different according to our constitutional order. Our obligation is to comply with the law, which can mean that the outcome of the policy is undesirable or unpopular. Still, we have to follow the law anyway. “