Letter to the Editor: Legislature Restricting Voting Access

Today in Wisconsin, by law, a registered voter seeking an absentee ballot can go to myvote.wi.gov to request a ballot for all elections for the current year. 

During the past year, the Wisconsin legislature has been quietly, but not so secretly, crafting legislation that would hamper, block and/or complicate your right to vote. Here are some examples:

• Completed absentee ballots could not be delivered to the clerk by anyone other than the voter or the voter’s immediate family or legal guardian. It’s a Class I felony if delivered by anyone else.

• In order to vote absentee, you would first have to complete an application for the ballot, certify certain facts before your application would be accepted, then be issued the ballot.

• The required distance that an election observer may be from where poll workers are checking voters in would change from three to eight feet, to not more than three feet.

• This bill also eliminates the automatic receipt of an absentee ballot for all except military personnel. People who are “indefinitely confined, overseas, or have received an absentee ballot in the past” must complete the above application for every election.

Fortunately, Gov. Evers vetoed the above legislation.

Make no mistake: Our current legislature is working to make it harder for you to vote. There is additional legislation in the works that would restrict your access to voting in other ways. All of the legislation above passed through our legislature and was squashed only by the governor’s veto. This attempt to influence election outcomes is active.

JoAnne Morris

Sister Bay, Wisconsin