Lessons Learned in April Will Lead to Smoother Voting This Fall, Election Administrators Say

There were upsides to the tumultuous Wisconsin election in April. At that time, there was an unprecedented flood of absentee voting, with some significant missteps related to mail service. Many of the usual polling places were closed, leading to long lines at those that were available, amid extensive precautions due to the COVID-19 pandemic. A photo from one Milwaukee polling place of a voter holding a sign proclaiming the situation “ridiculous” circulated around the world.

So what was that upside? A lot was learned about what to do and what not to do, the challenges of running an election in today’s circumstances were clear to the public, and there is a good forecast for an election this fall that will be well run, with good options for voting and good reason to be confident the results will be reliable.

That was the picture painted Wednesday by three people involved in overseeing how the election, featuring a presidential choice, is shaping up. Wisconsin Elections Commission Administrator Meagan Wolfe, Milwaukee Election Commission Executive Director Claire Woodall-Vogg, and Brookfield City Clerk Kelly Michaels spoke with Mike Gousha, Marquette Law School’s distinguished fellow in law and public policy, during a virtual “On the Issues with Mike Gousha” program.

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What method will Wisconsinites use to vote in November?

Voters in Wisconsin can choose from three widely accessible means of voting. In addition to voting in person on election day, they can vote by mail or vote in-person at an early voting location. (Technically, this kind of early voting is called “in-person absentee” voting in Wisconsin.)

Historically, voting in-person on election day has been the most popular means of casting a ballot in Wisconsin. That changed abruptly when the spring 2020 election was controversially held at the height of the initial COVID-19 shutdown. Ninety percent of voters voted at their polling place on election day in the 2016 spring contest. Just 29 percent did so in 2020. Instead, 59 percent voted by mail and 12 percent voted early in person.

It’s a safe bet that absentee and mail voting will also increase in the general election this fall. President Trump has speculated on numerous occasions that mail voting will be used fraudulently—a view uniformly contradicted by Republican, Democratic, and nonpartisan election administrators alike. Nonetheless, the growing controversy over mail-in ballots may have changed some people’s minds.

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Tony Evers’ Pandemic Popularity Boost is Over

Early in the COVID-19 shutdown the Marquette Law School Poll documented an exceptional degree of unity among Wisconsin voters, as the pandemic broke through Wisconsin’s thick partisan divide. In late March, more than 8-in-10 Republicans and Independents, along with 95 percent of Democrats, supported the state’s mandatory social distancing measures. First-term governor Tony Evers benefited from this groundswell of public support. His overall approval rating jumped from 51 percent at the end of February to 65 percent a month later. Most remarkably, Evers’ approval rating grew 19 points with Republicans.

Those days are over.

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