Robin Vos
Speaker Robin Vos and Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald today rejected Governor Evers' call for a special session to stop in-person voting and to move the postpone the April 7 election into May as an all-mail election.
Speaker Robin Vos (R-Rochester) and Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald (R-Juneau) released the following statement.
“In a crisis, people look for certainty. In elections during uncertain times, it’s important that no one questions the process. That’s why it’s so disappointing that Governor Evers has flip-flopped on the very question that we have been discussing over the past month.
“If the governor had legitimate concerns, we could have come to a bipartisan solution weeks ago. This discussion would have happened long before today. The only bipartisan discussion we’ve had was to ensure the election would continue safely and to maximize the opportunity to vote absentee.
“Unfortunately, it’s this type of feckless leadership Wisconsin has come to expect of the governor in the face of this crisis. Instead of remaining strong to ensure our representative democracy continues, he caves under political pressures from national liberal special interest groups.
“Hundreds of thousands of workers are going to their jobs every day, serving in essential roles in our society. There’s no question that an election is just as important as getting take-out food.
“Our Republic must continue to function, and the many local government positions on the ballot must be filled so that municipalities can swiftly respond to the crisis at hand. We continue to support what Governor Evers has supported for weeks: the election should continue as planned on Tuesday.”
Earlier today Governor Evers suggested that if there was not a good response from the state legislature that he would explore options that could be done without their support.
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Request for data base tries to cause more chaos in recall process
Republican lawmakers have an unlimited capacity for mischief, especially when it comes to trying to delay the inevitable recall elections coming sooner or later this year.
State Rep. Robin Vos has asked the Government Accountability Board to create an online, searchable data base of everyone who signs a recall petition.
Why? So citizens can search the hundreds of thousands of names looking for mistakes, he says:
"I can't imagine why you wouldn't appreciate the help of people all over Wisconsin who better know the names and streets in their own communities than a staff person at GAB."
Can you imagine the chaos that would create, with everyone and his brother checking for possible errors? It would be quite convenient, though, for the right-wing vigilantes who seem interested in punishing people who exercise their rights to recall an elected official.
The thing is, that's not the way the system works. The law says the person being recalled can challenge signatures, just like Vos can challenge the signatures of someone running against him. It is not even the GAB's responsibility, although the GOP managed to find a Waukesha County judge, a former GOP state senator himself, to order the GAB to look for duplicates. The GAB is already going beyond the legal requirements as a result.
Vos says the petitions are public documents, just like contracts and expense reports that are online. But the petitions Vos or other candidates circulated to get on the ballot are not in a searchable data base, so that people can look for errors or see which of their neighbors signed them. Why not? Because the law doesn't require it, and it is time consuming and costly.
Vos's request is not about transparency. It is about wanting to cause as much delay, uncertainty and outright chaos as possible during the recall process. The GOP hopes people will just get sick of the whole process, and will blame it on the Dems.
But people are smarter than that. It is very clear who is gaming the system, and Vos, Scott Walker,the Fitzgerald boys and others who keep trying to throw up smokescreens and roadblocks may well end up paying a political price for their cynical games.
UPDATE: Democurmudgeon blog has more.
Steve is a member of LION Publishers , the Wisconsin Newspaper Association, the Menomonie Area Chamber of Commerce, the Online News Association, and the Local Media Consortium, and is active in Health Dunn Right.
He has been a computer guy most of his life but has published a political blog, a discussion website, and now Eye On Dunn County.
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