Democrats Running for Governor Need to Fully Support Public Education

Removing the Walker regime is within the grasp of Wisconsin voters. Walker’s policies, if allowed to continue, will make pain and suffering the order of the day for many people, while corporations and the wealthy will flourish.

As an advocate of public education, working for over 80,000 Milwaukee students, my goal is to steer education policy and funding away from privatization, and toward teaching all students with equity in funding and resources.

The past two years have seen education used as a political football to advance schemes that have nothing to do with improving the lives of all Wisconsin’s children. There was an attempt to take over Milwaukee Public Schools. With the new legislature coming to office in 2011, private school vouchers have been expanded, along with a move toward universal vouchers. The charter movement is working to flood the Milwaukee education market with so-called “miracle” schools.

Democrats should support public education at all levels because –

1. An educated population is the cornerstone of democracy. This nation’s well-being depends on the decisions of its educated, informed citizens.
2. Education reduces costs to taxpayers. For every dollar spent to keep a child in school, the future costs of welfare, prison, and intervention services are reduced. It can cost less to educate a child now than to support a teenage parent or a repeat offender in the future. Education monies help to secure the future of all citizens.
3. Public schools are the only schools that must meet the needs of all students. They do not turn children or families away. Public schools serve children with physical, emotional, and mental disabilities, those who are extremely gifted and those who are learning challenged, right along with children without special needs.
4.  Public schools foster interactions and understanding among people of different ethnic, religious, and socioeconomic backgrounds.
5. “Education is the best provision for old age”– Aristotle. The future support of our aging population depends on strong public schools.
6. More than 95 percent of our future jobs will require at least a high school education. There is no question about the need for an educated work force.
7. The nation pays a high price for poorly educated workers. When retraining and remediation are needed to prepare a worker to do even simple tasks, the cost is paid by both employers and consumers.
8. The cost of dropouts affects us all. This nation loses more than $240 billion per year in earnings and taxes that dropouts would have generated over their lifetimes. Well-supported public schools can engage all students in learning and graduate productive and competent citizens.
9. Children are our nation’s future. Their development affects all of us. Good education is not cheap, but ignorance costs far more.
10. Public education is a worthy investment for public funds. We can invest now, or we can pay later.

Montana Supreme Court Rejects Citizens United

Montana State Supreme Court: Citizens United Not Welcome Here

Wednesday 4 January 2012

by: Sam Ferguson, Truthout

In a rebuke to the United States Supreme Court, the Supreme Court of Montana has held that Citizens United does not apply to Montana campaign finance law.

Last Friday, the Montana Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of a 1912 voter initiative – the Corrupt Practices Act – that prohibits corporations from making contributions to or expenditures on behalf of state political candidates and political parties. In 2010, the Supreme Court ruled that a similar federal prohibition was unconstitutional, prompting a wave of bills and court rulings that erased prohibitions on corporate and union political expenditures around the country.

“For over 100 years, Montana has had an electoral system that preserves the integrity of the political process, encourages full participation and safeguards against corruption,” state Attorney General Steve Bullock said in a statement after the ruling, adding, “the [Montana] Supreme Court’s decision upholds that system and is truly a victory for all Montanans.”

ALSO SEE: David Cobb – ‘Citizens United’ Doesn’t Fly in Big Sky State (Video)

The Montana Court cited the state’s “unique” history, culture and economy in justifying the decision not to follow Citizens United.

“With the infusion of unlimited corporate money in support of or opposition to a targeted candidate,” wrote Chief Justice Mike McGrath, in a 5-2 decision, “the average citizen candidate would be unable to compete against the corporate-sponsored candidate, and Montana citizens, who for over 100 years have made their modest election contributions meaningfully count would be effectively shut out of the process.”

Under the First Amendment, limits on speech are justified only if the government can demonstrate a “compelling” interest for the limitation. The Montana high court ruled that the state had several compelling interests: preventing the corrupting influence of large political expenditures; guarding against Montana’s susceptibility to corruption because of its low-cost, grass roots political culture; and stemming the threat posed by out-of-state economic interests that have a financial stake in Montana’s agriculture and resource-extraction based economy.

But in Citizens United, Justice Anthony Kennedy held that the government may “not deprive the public of the right and privilege to determine for itself what speech and speakers are worthy of consideration.” In other words, the government may not quiet the voice of some speakers in an effort to boost the voice of others. The Supreme Court also held that there is no compelling interest in limiting so-called “independent expenditures,” because such limitations do not prevent corruption.

UCLA law Professor Eugene Volokh wrote on his influential legal blog, The Volokh Conspiracy, that “the disagreement with Citizens United is so striking that it is likely that the Supreme Court will agree to hear the case and will reverse the Montana Supreme Court’s decision.”

Previously, a lower court in Montana ruled the state’s law limiting campaign spending unconstitutional, saying, “Citizens United is unequivocal: the government may not prohibit independent and indirect corporate expenditures on political speech.”

Montana’s Corrupt Practices Act

Montana’s 1912 initiative was adopted in response to considerable corruption in the state government, according to the opinion. Around the turn of the century, the so-called “Copper Kings,” powerful mining barons, ruled Montana through campaign spending and bribery. One such baron, William A. Clark, was elected to the United States Senate in 1899 after buying votes in the Montana Legislature. He was unseated and the scandal helped lead to the passage of the 17th Amendment, which requires the direct election of senators.

Before the adoption of the Corrupt Practices Act, “the State of Montana and its government were operating under a mere shell of legal authority,” said the court in Friday’s majority opinion, “and the real social and political power was wielded by powerful corporate managers to further their own business interests.”

The court reasoned that the interest in protecting against the corrupting influence of money on the political system remains meaningful 100 years after Montana voters adopted the Corrupt Practices Act. “Does a State have to repeal or invalidate its murder prohibition if the homicide rate declines? We think not. Issues of corporate influence, sparse population, dependence upon agriculture and extractive resource development, location as a transportation corridor and low campaign costs make Montana especially vulnerable to continued efforts of corporate control to the detriment of democracy and the republican form of government.”

Justice James Nelson wrote in dissent that “[t]he language of Citizens United … is remarkably sweeping and leaves virtually no conceivable basis for muzzling or otherwise restricting corporate political speech in the form of independent expenditures…. As much as I would like to rule in favor of the State, I cannot in good faith do so.”

Montana First Court to Challenge Supreme Court on Citizens United Ruling

The Montana Supreme Court is the only state court so far to uphold a ban on corporate political expenditures in the wake of Citizens United. The Colorado Supreme Court held its own corporate expenditure ban unconstitutional in March 2010. According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, 11 states have also repealed bans on corporate expenditures, and administrative agencies in five states have declared corporate political expenditure bans unconstitutional.

States may still ban direct corporate contributions to candidates or expenditures coordinated with candidates.

The three plaintiffs who sued to roll back Montana’s election law limiting campaign contributions are a sole-proprietor painting business, an influential Montana gun-rights organization and an out-of-state advocacy group. The advocacy group, Western Tradition Partnership, has renamed itself American Tradition Partnership (ATP). According to its web site, ATP is “dedicated to fighting environmental extremism and promoting responsible development and management of land, water and natural resources.”

“The Montana Supreme Court, through this decision, has shown contempt for the overriding law of the land and has thumbed its nose at the United States Supreme Court, which has specifically held that the State of Montana has no interest in prohibiting people who associate together from speaking,” said ATP Executive Director Donald Ferguson.

John Bonifaz, director of Free Speech for People, a group dedicated to overturning Citizens United, said in a statement that the ruling sets up “the first test case for the US Supreme Court to revisit its Citizens United Decision, a decision which poses a direct and serious threat to our democracy.”

The plaintiffs have until March 29 to seek review by the United States Supreme Court.

96-Year-Old Black Woman Denied Right to Vote in Tennessee

Thursday, October 6 2011, 2:06 PM EST Tags: 2012 campaign, Voter ID, Voting 96 Year Old Black Woman Denied Vote in Tennessee http://timesfreepress.com/news/2011/oct/05/marriage-certificate-required-bureaucrat-tells/ Dorothy Cooper is a 96-year-old black woman who lives in Chattanooga,Tennessee. She was recently denied a voter identification card because she didn’t have her marriage certificate available — the same card that’s required by the state to vote. This coming election may be the first one she misses in 50 years. In February, all 20 Republicans and one Democrat in the state senate passed a measure requiring Tennessee voters show a driver’s licenses or other government-issued photo identification before casting a ballot. Democrats countered that the bill’s provisions would make it tougher to many of the 500,000 adult Tennesseans — many of them poor, elderly or handicapped — who have no state driver’s license. And this is exactly what’s happening to Cooper, Times Free Press reports: Cooper slipped a rent receipt, a copy of her lease, her voter registration card and her birth certificate into a Manila envelope. Typewritten on the birth certificate was her maiden name, Dorothy Alexander. “But I didn’t have my marriage certificate,” Cooper said Tuesday afternoon, and that was the reason the clerk said she was denied a free voter ID at the Cherokee Boulevard Driver Service Center. “I don’t know what difference it makes,” Cooper said. “In this case, since Ms. Cooper’s birth certificate (her primary proof of identity) and voter registration card were two different names, the examiner was unable to provide the free ID,” Tennessee Department of Safety spokeswoman Dalya Qualls told the Free Press. She went on to add the examiner should have provided additional forms to Cooper. State Rep. Tommie Brown, D-Chattanooga, says Cooper’s case is an example of how the law “‘erects barriers’ for the elderly and poor people — a disproportionate number of whom are minorities,” she told the Times Free Press. Tennessee is just one of an array of state governments across the country that have enacted new laws that make it harder for voters of traditionally Democratic demographics to register to vote. A report released earlier this week found these new laws could make it significantly harder for more than five million eligible voters to cast ballots in 2012. The states that have already cut back on voting rights will provide 171 electoral votes in 2012 . That’s 63 percent of the 270 needed to win the presidency.

Dorothy Cooper is 96 but she can remember only one election when she’s been eligible to vote but hasn’t.

The retired domestic worker was born in a small North Georgia town before women had the right to vote. She began casting ballots in her 20s after moving to Chattanooga for work. She missed voting for John F. Kennedy in 1960 because a move to Nashville prevented her from registering in time.

So when she learned last month at a community meeting that under a new state law she’d need a photo ID to vote next year, she talked with a volunteer about how to get to a state Driver Service Center to get her free ID. But when she got there Monday with an envelope full of documents, a clerk denied her request.

That morning, Cooper slipped a rent receipt, a copy of her lease, her voter registration card and her birth certificate into a Manila envelope. Typewritten on the birth certificate was her maiden name, Dorothy Alexander.

“But I didn’t have my marriage certificate,” Cooper said Tuesday afternoon, and that was the reason the clerk said she was denied a free voter ID at the Cherokee Boulevard Driver Service Center.

“I don’t know what difference it makes,” Cooper said.

Cooper visited the state driver service center with Charline Kilpatrick, who has been working with residents to get free photo IDs. After the clerk denied Cooper’s request, Kilpatrick called a state worker, explained what happened and asked if Cooper needed to return with a copy of the marriage certificate.

“The lady laughed,” Kilpatrick said. “She said she’s never heard of all that.”

Tennessee Department of Safety spokeswoman Dalya Qualls said in a Tuesday email that Cooper’s situation, though unique, could have been handled differently.

“It is department policy that in order to get a photo ID, a citizen must provide documentation that links their name to the documentation that links their name to the document they are using as primary proof of identity,” Qualls said. “In this case, since Ms. Cooper’s birth certificate (her primary proof of identity) and voter registration card were two different names, the examiner was unable to provide the free ID.”

Despite that, Qualls said, “the examiner should have taken extra steps to determine alternative forms of documentation for Ms. Cooper.”Kilpatrick has had to call the state at least twice after taking someone to get a photo ID or have a photo added to the driver’s license. State law allows anyone 60 or older to have their picture removed from their license.

The state has been working diligently to make the process easy for residents, Qualls said.

POLL-ITICS?

State Rep. Tommie Brown, D-Chattanooga, said Tuesday that Cooper’s case is an example of how the law “erects barriers” for the elderly and poor people — a disproportionate number of whom are minorities.”What you do, you suppress the vote,” Brown said. “You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to figure that out.”

The General Assembly passed the photo ID law earlier this year, with lawmakers saying it was needed to prevent voter fraud. The legislature allocated $438,000 to provide free photo IDs for registered voters who don’t have a qualified ID.

“It makes no sense in these economic times that we are shifting our time and resources to this,” Brown said.

In Nashville on Tuesday afternoon, a coalition of organizations announced an effort to repeal the law. Groups such as the ACLU of Tennessee, various chapters of the NAACP, the AFL-CIO and Tennessee Citizen Action announced a petition drive and get-out-the-vote effort.

“This is a nonpartisan issue. It’s a fair voting issue,” said Mary Mancini, executive director of Citizen Action, in a phone interview. “It’s all about the legislators seeing that the people of Tennessee don’t want this law.”

VOTING ALL THESE YEARS

Cooper isn’t worried about the politics of the law.

“I hadn’t thought about it,” she said when asked about why legislators passed the bill.

She just wants to be able to vote.

In her decades of going to the polls, “I never had any problems,” she said, not even before the Voting Rights Act passed in the 1960s.

In her 50-plus years working for the same family, she never learned to drive so she never needed a license. She retired in 1993 and returned to Chattanooga from Nashville.Now, on occasion, one of her bank’s tellers or a grocery store clerk will ask for photo ID when she writes or cashes a check, Cooper said.

“I’ve been banking at SunTrust for a long time,” she said. “Sometimes they’ll say, well, do you have a Social Security card?”

And she shows it to them. She also has a photo ID issued by the Chattanooga Police Department to all seniors who live in the Boynton Terrace public housing complex, but that won’t qualify for voting.

Cooper’s younger sister, now 91, lives in a nursing home across town. Nursing home residents and assisted living residents are exempt from the new photo ID requirement.But Cooper, who barely needs a walker, is not.

Though she’s still able to walk around her apartment without assistance and “takes daily exercise” at a community center next door, Cooper never had any children — although she has outlived two husbands — and relies on others for transportation.

The law “is a problem if you don’t have a way of getting around,” she said. “I’ve been voting all these years.”

After Cooper was denied a photo ID Monday, Kilpatrick contacted Hamilton County’s Administrator of Elections Charlotte Mullis-Morgan, who recommended that Cooper vote with an absentee ballot rather than having to stand in line with her walker again at the state center.

Absentee ballots don’t require photo ID, and the new state law was crafted to allow that exception. A U.S. Supreme Court decision upholding a similar Indiana statute cited the absentee ballot exception as one of the reasons the Indiana law didn’t infringe on constitutional voting rights.

Still, Cooper said she will miss the practice of going to the voting precinct located in the building next door to hers.

“We always come here to vote,” she said, nodding toward a door where voting machines are set up on election day. “The people who run the polls know everybody here.”

Republicans Attempting to Steal Future State Elections

GOP leaders have redrawn maps

But only some lawmakers have seen them; vote may come before recalls

By Patrick Marley of the Journal Sentinel June 23, 2011

Madison - Legislative leaders have redrawn maps for the Assembly and Senate and could be ready to vote on them in the coming weeks, but they are closely guarding their plans for their districts and many lawmakers have yet to see them.

Having the maps completed means lawmakers have the option of approving them before recall elections are held this summer that could shift control of the Senate from Republicans to Democrats. Senate leaders declined Thursday to say whether they would do that.

But Assembly Speaker Jeff Fitzgerald (R-Horicon) said he is now sharing maps with Republicans in his house and deciding whether to pass the redistricting plan in July.

“We’ve got them all,” he said of the maps. “We’re meeting with members now, showing them maps.”

Once a decade, every state must draw new lines for congressional and legislative districts based on new U.S. census data. The new lines are needed to ensure the districts are of equal population.

Redistricting invariably attracts legal challenges, and already a group of Wisconsin citizens – including a former Democratic lawmaker – has asked a federal court to intervene in the process. Courts have drawn Wisconsin’s maps for at least the past three redistricting cycles.

Redrawing the lines can give one party an edge over the other by packing its supporters into as many districts as possible. Republicans this year have a rare chance to control the process because they hold both houses of the Legislature and the governor’s office.

But they also run the risk of losing the Senate this summer because of unprecedented recall elections against six Republicans and three Democrats. Republicans have a 19-14 majority, and Democrats would need to net three seats to gain control of the chamber.

Normally, redistricting is done months from now, after local communities have drawn their ward lines.

Andrew Welhouse, a spokesman for Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald (R-Juneau), declined to say whether maps had been shown to senators or when the Senate might take up redistricting.

A Republican source familiar with the matter confirmed GOP senators are being brought in to see maps of their redrawn districts. But three senators told the Journal Sentinel they had not seen new maps.

“They’ve kept us pretty well in the dark,” Sen. Luther Olsen (R-Ripon) said.

Olsen, Sen. Rob Cowles (R-Allouez) and Senate President Mike Ellis (R-Neenah) said they have not seen maps of their districts.

Olsen said he did not know when the Senate would vote on the new maps, but he expected it would happen before he and five other Republicans face the first wave of recall elections on Aug. 9.

“Common sense would tell me they would want to get it out of our house before that date,” Olsen said.

Ellis said that he also expected the Senate to pass the redistricting plan before the recall elections are held, but that it would be up to Fitzgerald to decide whether to do so.

The Legislature is not scheduled to be on the floor in July, but lawmakers could easily meet that month in special or extraordinary session.

Nine senators are facing recalls for the stances they took on a plan to sharply limit collective bargaining for most public workers.

The recall elections will be Aug. 9 for the six incumbent Republicans and Aug. 16 for the three incumbent Democrats. Primaries will be July 12 and July 19.

Rep. Fred Kessler (D-Milwaukee) said he is concerned Republicans will pass their redistricting plan quickly after making it publicly available, giving the public little chance to digest it.

Under the federal Voting Rights Act, districts must be drawn in ways that ensure minorities have an opportunity to elect candidates of their choice, said Kessler, who has helped Democrats in Wisconsin and Nevada with redistricting in the past.

This month, former Senate Democratic leader Judy Robson of Beloit and 14 other citizens asked for a three-judge panel to develop a redistricting plan if lawmakers do not put a constitutional plan in place in a timely fashion. The filing in federal court in Milwaukee says the maps in place since 2002 are unconstitutional because of population shifts revealed in the 2010 census.

Legislative leaders have retained Michael Best & Friedrich and the Troupis Law Office to draw the maps for them. So far they have spent $300,000 in taxpayer money for those maps, but lawmakers have not said how much they expect the legal work to cost in total. Any lawsuits could make those costs climb significantly.

Jim Troupis, one of the attorneys working on the maps, could not be reached Thursday.

A copy of the map for members of Congress has already been made public, but the maps for state lawmakers have not.

Journal Sentinel reporters Jason Stein in Madison and Tom Tolan in Milwaukee contributed to this report.

Wauwatosa: Fundraiser for Sandy Pasch June 21

Join with  Wauwatosans
__________________

Tuesday, June 21, 2011

5:30 to 7:30 pm in the evening

To view the full invitation go to:

Pasch for Senate7 Tosa

Madison’s Congressional Rep. Tammy Baldwin Calls on U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder for Federal Investigation of Waukesha County Vote in State Supreme Court Election

Baldwin calls for investigation of Waukesha County vote reporting

By Bill Glauber of the Journal Sentinel

April 9, 2011 U.S. Rep. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.) sent a letter to U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder asking for a federal investigation into the handling of vote records in Waukesha County in the wake of Tuesday’s election for the state Supreme Court.

Baldwin’s office said she sent the letter Friday night.

Baldwin wrote Holder: ”Following this week’s election for the Wisconsin Supreme Court, numerous constituents have contacted me expressing serious doubt that this election was a free and fair one. They fear, as I do, that political interests are manipulating the results.”

Kathy Nickolaus Worked for Prosser for 13 years. Suspicion and Questions Mount.

Too many questions, too few answers, far too much suspicious behavior

Solidarity Wisconsin, April 8, 2011

The current and historical conduct of Waukesha County Clerk Kathy Nickolaus is too highly suspicious not to warrant a complete, non-partisan investigation into her conduct as well as her political allies and personal funding sources. To rely on such an unreliable and overtly compromised, partisan player in highly controversial election would be unethical, to say the least.

WI Assembly Minority Leader Peter Barca explains the situation this way:

The way Waukesha County Clerk Kathy Nickolaus revealed her discovery of 14,300 previously uncounted votes raises disturbing questions, particularly in light of her past partisan history. She has been the subject of multiple complaints from other Waukesha officials on how she handles elections and keeps public information to herself outside the official county system where others can verify it.The new Supreme Court race vote totals she “discovered” during canvassing not only swung the election but also put the race just barely past the amount needed to trigger a state-financed recount.

It is especially troubling that she waited more than 24 hours to report the startling discovery and then did so at a press conference and only after she verified the results. This makes it all the harder to challenge and audit the integrity of the vote.

The partisan, political history of Ms. Nickolaus and the serious concerns about the quality of her performance found in an audit raises the question of whether an investigation is warranted. The public deserves to know that the votes were counted properly.

County Clerk Nickolaus, who worked in the Assembly Republican Caucus under then Minority Leader and Speaker David Prosser, has a history of clashing with county officials over her election responsibilities. She has drawn criticism from the County Board Chairman and other County Supervisors as recently as January for her unwillingness to adhere to audit recommendations. Internal Audit Manager Lori Schubert indicated that after last fall’s elections that Nickolaus needed to improve security and back-up procedures. Director of Administration Norman Cummings late last year indicated that they have not been able to verify that her system is secure.

Her approach raises questions about the integrity of the election to the highest court in our state.

Some questions and concerns include:

* Were there no other races that were being reported to Nicklolaus? Id so, why is it that only the Supreme Court race was not reported?

* Prosser is Kathy Nickolaus’s ex-employer

* Approximately 7400 vote difference is the 0.5% difference cut off for a recount. Conveniently, the found votes will force Kloppenburg to have to pay for a recount at $5 per ward

* Nickolaus was using Access, and she claims that she forgot to save the file. Doesn’t it autosave? Doesn’t it prompt you to save before closing, in which you have to click “no” if you are to “lose” the file?

* Numerous previous election system problems and suspicions in Waukesha County and with Kathy Nickolaus over the past several years – Jan 2011, Aug 2010, 2006(?)

* Kathy Nickolaus involved in Republican caucus scandal in 2001. (Nickolaus was granted immunity to testify about her role as a computer analyst for the Assembly Republican Caucus, investigated for using state resources to secretly run campaigns.)

* Reports that voter turnout during the day and final turnout were very off in her county alone, whereas turnout estimates in many other counties were quite accurate

Info on Kathy Nickolaus: Waukesha County Clerk (Republican)

WI’s Waukesha County Clerk  Keeps Elections Results on Her Personal Computer

Posted by DemocraticUnderground 4/7/11

Waukesha – Waukesha County Clerk Kathy Nickolaus’ decision to go it alone in how she collects and maintains election results has some county officials raising a red flag about the integrity of the system.

Nickolaus said she decided to take the election data collection and storage system off the county’s computer network – and keep it on stand-alone personal computers accessible only in her office – for security reasons. “What it gave me was good security of the elections from start to finish, without the ability of someone unauthorized to be involved,” she said.

Nonetheless, Director of Administration Norman A. Cummings said because Nickolaus has kept them out of the loop, the county’s information technology specialists have not been able to verify Nickolaus’ claim that the system is secure from failure.

“How does anybody else in the county know, except for her verbal word, that there are backups, and that the software she has out there is performing as it should?” he said. “There’s no way I can assure that the election system is going to be fine for the next presidential election.”

http://www.bradblog.com/?p=7988

HERES MORE:

An audit of Nickolaus’ handling of the 2010 election found that she needed to take steps to improve security and backup procedures, like stop sharing passwords. The audit was requested after the county’s director of administration said Nickolaus had been uncooperative with attempts to have county experts review her systems and confirm backups were in place.

Nickolaus was given immunity from prosecution in a 2002 criminal investigation into illegal activity by members of the assembly Republican Caucus. She worked for 13 years as a data analyst and computer specialist for the caucus.

She resigned from her state job in 2002 just before launching her county clerk campaign.

The corruption probe took down then-Assembly Speaker Scott Jensen, a Republican; Senate Majority Leader Chuck Chvala, D-Madison; Sen. Brian Burke, D-Milwaukee, co-chairman of the powerful Joint Finance Committee; Assembly Majority Leader Steve Foti, R-Oconomowoc; and Rep. Bonnie Ladwig, R-Racine. They all reached plea deals.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/42483089/ns/us_news

The Attempt to Steal the Election Begins

Kathy Nickolaus, Republican operative elected as Waukesha County Clerk, says she didn’t hit “save” for 7500 votes for Prosser.

Prosser gains 7,500 votes in Waukesha County after inputting error

Associated Press, State Journal staff madison.com Posted: Thursday, April 7

WAUKESHA — Incumbent Justice David Prosser gained a 7,500-vote lead in the hotly contested state Supreme Court race Thursday after the clerk in conservative-leaning Waukesha County announced she had undercounted votes due to an inputting error.

If the new results stand, they would swing the election to Prosser after unofficial results Wednesday showed challenger JoAnne Kloppenburg was the winner with a 204-vote lead out of nearly 1.5 million votes cast.

The new totals showed Prosser with 92,263 votes in Waukesha County, while Kloppenburg had 32,758.

Waukesha County Clerk Kathy Nickolaus said the votes weren’t reported to The Associated Press on Tuesday due to “human error.”

“This is not a case of extra votes or extra ballots being found,” she said. “This is human error, which I apologize for.”

The missing numbers were all from the city of Brookfield, Nickolaus said. Nickolaus said she discovered the error Wednesday. Apparently, she said, she entered the numbers into the system but failed to hit “save.”

“I came in to upload the information into the file for the statewide canvas,” she said. “When I opened it up it had all the city of Brookfield fields and columns and I saw there were zeroes.”

She said the mistake occurred on the “day-to-day system” she uses in her office and has “nothing to do with the election software or system at all.”

Before the announcement, it was assumed the race between Prosser, a 68-year-old conservative justice, and Kloppenburg, a liberal assistant state attorney general, was headed for a recount. But Prosser’s lead is likely to stand if the new numbers hold up through canvassing in all of Wisconsin’s 72 counties.

Opponents of the union rights law had hoped a Kloppenburg victory would set the stage for the high court to strike it down.

Messages left with both Kloppenburg and Prosser’s campaigns were not immediately returned.

The count was corrected on the first day that counties were in the process of verifying unofficial vote totals reported Tuesday. The race was so close, despite 1.5 million votes being cast, that the lead flipped back and forth repeatedly on election day and in the days after as those preliminary totals were checked and updated.

Gov. Scott Walker told The Associated Press before details of the new votes were announced that voters will demand transparency.

“The overriding principle has got to be that every vote that was legally cast in Wisconsin needs to be counted,” Walker said.

The surprise discovery of votes that could give Prosser the win and quash any recount before it starts already had liberal groups crying foul.

“There is a history of secrecy and partisanship surrounding the Waukesha County Clerk and there remain unanswered questions,” said Scot Ross, director of the liberal group One Wisconsin Now.

Nickolaus has come under scrutiny before.

Last year, county officials raised objections to her practice of storing election data off the county’s computer network, instead keeping it on computers in her office, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported.

The practice prevented the county’s information technology specialists from verifying that the system was secure from failing, the county’s director of administration said at the time. Auditors later recommended that Nickolaus improve security and backup procedures.

In 2001, Nickolaus was granted immunity to testify about her role as a computer analyst for the Assembly Republican Caucus, then under investigation — along with the Senate Republican Caucus and the Democratic caucuses for both houses — for using state resources to secretly run campaigns.

Nickolaus, a seven-year employee of the ARC, headed up an effort to develop a computer program that averaged the performance of Republicans in statewide races by ward.

Supreme Court Vote by County