A Dane County judge heard arguments in early June in a case that could expand absentee voting options for thousands of Wisconsin voters with print disabilities.
At the heart of the dispute is whether voters who cannot independently read or mark a paper ballot must reveal their choices to another person to vote absentee.
Disability Rights Wisconsin, the League of Women Voters of Wisconsin, and four Wisconsin voters brought the case against the Wisconsin Elections Commission.
The case, assigned
Memorial Day weekend in Wisconsin usually involves grilling, yard projects that immediately become more complicated than expected, and at least one person insisting they can totally finish rebuilding the deck before Monday night.
Underneath all of that though, Memorial Day is serious. It is a day set aside to remember people who died serving this country and the idea behind it: self-government. Messy, imperfect, occasionally exhausting self-government, but self-government nonetheless.
That system only works if people believe their participation
Continue Reading Happy Memorial Day
On February 18, 2025, in a 4-3 vote, the Wisconsin Supreme Court ruled that Kenneth Brown, a voter who raised a number of claims challenging the Racine City Clerk’s use of 22 alternate absentee ballot sites to facilitate in-person absentee voting for the August 2022 primary election, lacked standing to seek judicial review of the Wisconsin Elections Commission’s decision dismissing his complaint. In Brown v. Wisconsin Elections Commission, 2025 WI 5, the Court squarely addressed what it means to
Continue Reading Wisconsin Supreme Court Limits Standing to Appeal Decisions from the Wisconsin Elections Commission
That’s it. That’s our entire blog post. Please go vote.
Vote for all the things on the ballot.
This is the #1 right as citizens we have. Please exercise it.
I mean, we are a law firm after all. So go.
Vote.
Continue Reading Vote.
As the 2024 presidential election nears, it is critical that legal professionals in Wisconsin understand that certifying election results is a mandatory, ministerial duty at all levels of government.
Certification – the statutory process by which officials sign off on the completion of election results – serves as an important but usually uneventful post-election formality.
For as long as our country has held elections, there have been instances of local officials attempting to interfere with election certification to benefit
Continue Reading Election Certification Law in Wisconsin
Statewide ballot referenda are not new to voters in the Badger State. There are four scenarios in which a question may be directly asked of voters: whether to amend the state’s constitution; ratification of a law extending the right of suffrage; nonbinding advisory question to measure public sentiment; and, ratifying a law that was passed by the legislature, contingent on voter approval. Wisconsin does not have a direct ballot initiative process. In November 1914, 64 percent of voters rejected
Continue Reading August Constitutional Referenda to Decide Who Spends Federal Funds
Municipal clerks are once again able to use drop boxes to collect returned absentee voting ballots. As many municipal clerks will tell you, “drop boxes” for the return of government documents, including ballots, have been used throughout the state for decades, often in the form of slots or boxes at municipal buildings. They became more popular during the Covid-19 pandemic for ballot return. Then, in 2022, the Wisconsin Supreme Court, in Teigen v. Wisconsin Election Commission, ruled that ballot
Continue Reading Supreme Court Ruling Prompts New Guidance for Municipal Clerks on Drop Boxes for Absentee Voting Ballots
Hon. Jeh Charles Johnson, former U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security and ABA Task Force for American Democracy co-chair, speaks on “The Threat to Democracy.”
July 11, 2024 – A dozen speakers recently gave sobering presentations on the threat to democracy during a nonpartisan event from the American Bar Association’s Task Force for American Democracy, in partnership with the State Bar of Wisconsin.
The program, called
Wisconsin: Elections in the 21st Century (watch now) was held in-person July
Continue Reading American Bar Association Brings Democracy Listening Tour to Wisconsin
The ever-changing landscape of state government requires businesses across all industries to stay informed on the happenings in Madison. Welcome to the June 2024 Recap issue of the Capitol Connection.
Inside this issue
Vos Recall Denied by Elections Commission
A months-long back-and-forth between Assembly Speaker Robin Vos and a group seeking to recall the Republican leader ended on June 27th when in a 4-2 decision, the Wisconsin Elections Commission decided that organizers of the effort failed to collect enough
Continue Reading Capitol Connection, June 2024 Recap
As the capabilities of generative artificial intelligence have increased, so have concerns that generative AI might be used to manipulate voters and the administration of elections in the 2024 presidential election and primaries. The first warning shot came in New Hampshire on January 21, 2024, two days before the New Hampshire Presidential Primary Election, when numerous New Hampshire residents received robocalls that played a message with what appeared to be an AI-generated voice clone of President Joe Biden’s voice,
Continue Reading Wisconsin’s New Regulation of AI and Deepfakes in Political Communications
Continue Reading Vote! And Remember That Your Employees are Entitled to Time Off to Vote!
This Legal Update will help you navigate through those rough waters involving absentee ballots.
Absentee Voting
No election issue seems to be more of a lightning rod over the past year than absentee voting. While voting absentee has always occurred, this alternative voting option has been thrust into the spotlight due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the public scrutiny onslaught since the 2020 Presidential Election.
Wisconsin has been at the forefront of a variety of conflicts over absentee voting.
Continue Reading The Rocky Waters of Absentee Ballots
It seems like not a day goes by without a breaking news story about an election issue. Elections can seem as tiring as COVID – and sometimes just as confusing regarding the proper guidance or legal authority to conduct and carry out the election. Election officials and staff must weave through disputes that will seemingly only increase in the current political climate. This Legal Update will help you navigate issues involving poll workers.
Poll Workers
First, let’s examine the
Continue Reading All Hands On Deck: Poll Workers
Earlier this month, the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals decided a case involving allegations that a candidate for public office orchestrated a plan to put two other candidates on the ballot to split voters and ensure a victory. The case, Gonzales v. Madigan, No. 20-1874, 2021 WL 857476 (7th Cir. Mar. 8, 2021), could have many implications for challenges to tactics used during an election.
The litigation involved a 2016 primary election in which Michael Madigan, a state representative
Continue Reading Seventh Circuit Calls into Question “Stalking-Horse” Election Claims
On the latest episode of the WI Law in Action podcast from the UW Law Library, election law expert Dean Dan Tokaji joins us to discuss free speech, the 2020 election, and the effect of misinformation on democracy. Tokaji discusses two recent pieces: Truth, Democracy, and the Limits of Law, a 2020 Saint Louis University Law Journal article and #2DaysOut: Ten Things to Watch for on (and after) Election Day, a contribution to the Election Law Blog published right
Continue Reading Dean Dan Tokaji on Election Law, Free Speech, & the Effect of Misinformation on Democracy
Dec. 14, 2020 – The Wisconsin Supreme Court has clarified that a “stay-at-home” order amid a pandemic is not a basis, on its own, for voters to declare “indefinitely confined” status and vote by absentee ballot without showing photo identification.
The Republican Party of Wisconsin filed an original action to the state supreme court in March, seeking a preliminary injunction and a declaration of rights against Dane County.
Prior to the April primary election, the Dane County city clerk
Continue Reading Wisconsin Supreme Court Clarifies Election Law on Absentee Ballots