GOP-led Wisconsin Senate votes to fire election official targeted by lies over 2020 vote
MADISON, Wis. — The Republicans controlling Wisconsin’s Senate have voted to fire the battleground state’s top elections official from the nonpartisan post, prompting a legal challenge from Democrats who say the vote was illegitimate.
State Atty. Gen. Josh Kaul, a Democrat, said in a lawsuit that Senate Republicans didn’t have the authority to oust Wisconsin Elections Commission Administrator Meagan Wolfe, and accused them of attacking the state’s elections.
It’s the latest in a whirlwind of deep partisan divisions in Wisconsin, where Republicans who control the Legislature are also threatening to impeach a newly elected state Supreme Court justice before she’s even heard a case. They’re also floating plans to overhaul the state’s electoral maps before the court can toss out current boundaries that favor the GOP.
The fight over who will lead the elections agency stems from persistent lies about the 2020 election and creates instability ahead of the 2024 presidential race for the state’s more than 1,800 local clerks who run elections.
Wolfe has been the subject of conspiracy theories and the target of threats from supporters of former President Trump who falsely claim she was part of a supposed plan to rig the 2020 vote in Wisconsin in favor of Democrat Joe Biden. GOP leaders cited concerns from those conspiracy theorists in justifying Thursday’s 22-11 vote along party lines to fire her.
She said Thursday she would not “bend to political pressure” and would continue to serve as administrator at least through the end of the 2024 election, unless a court rules otherwise or the state Elections Commission votes to remove her.
“The Senate’s vote today to remove me is not a referendum on the job I do but rather a reaction to not achieving the political outcome they desire,” Wolfe said. “The political outcome they desired is to have someone in this position of their own choosing that would bend to those political pressures.”
“Wisconsinites have expressed concerns with the administration of elections both here in Wisconsin and nationally,” said state Senate Majority Leader Devin LeMahieu. “We need to rebuild faith in Wisconsin’s elections.”
An audio recording shows how the Trump campaign in Wisconsin knew he had lost but quickly began promoting the lie of a stolen election.
But numerous reviews have found that the 2020 election in Wisconsin was fair and the results were accurate. Biden defeated Trump by nearly 21,000 votes in Wisconsin, an outcome that has withstood two partial recounts, a nonpartisan audit, a conservative law firm’s review, and multiple state and federal lawsuits.
Election observers have voiced concerns that replacing Wolfe with a less experienced administrator or continuing to dispute her position ahead of the 2024 contest could create greater instability in a presidential race in which election workers expect to face more pressure, harassment and threats.
“Wisconsin Republicans’ attempt to illegally fire Wisconsin’s elections administrator without cause today shows they are continuing to escalate efforts to sow distrust and disinformation about our elections, denigrate our clerks, poll workers, and election administrators, and undermine basic tenets of our democracy, including the peaceful transfer of power,” Democratic Gov. Tony Evers said in a statement.
At Evers’ request, Kaul sued GOP legislative leaders and asked a judge to rule that the Senate’s vote has no legal effect and that Wolfe will remain in charge of the elections commission.
Meanwhile, Republicans introduced a resolution calling on the Elections Commission to appoint an interim administrator to replace her.
“The state Senate has blatantly ignored Wisconsin law in order to put its stamp of approval on baseless attacks against elections,” Kaul said, adding that Wolfe “remains the administrator.”
“The court, I’m very confident, will confirm that,” he said.
The state’s bipartisan Elections Commission deadlocked in June in a vote to nominate Wolfe for a second four-year term. Three Republicans voted to nominate her and three Democrats abstained in the hopes of preventing a nomination that would require Senate confirmation.
Her rejection by the state Senate would normally carry the effect of firing Wolfe, but a recent state Supreme Court ruling appears to allow her to stay in office indefinitely as a holdover if she hasn’t been nominated by a majority of the commission, or four members.
Senate Republicans pushed ahead in June to force a vote on her despite the commission’s failure to nominate her. LeMahieu said he interpreted the commission’s 3-0 vote as a unanimous nomination. The Legislature’s nonpartisan attorneys and Kaul have contested that interpretation, saying the law is clear that an elections administrator must be nominated by at least four commissioners.
Wolfe did not attend a Senate committee hearing on her reappointment last month, citing a letter from Kaul saying “there is no question” that she remains head of the elections agency. That hearing instead became a platform for some of the most prominent members of Wisconsin’s election denialism movement to repeat widely debunked claims about the 2020 election.
“It’s hard to believe we’re still at a place where those now very well analyzed and debunked claims about our system seem to still be driving decisions,” Wolfe said Thursday.
The indictment alleges that Trump pursued discounting legitimate votes and subverting the 2020 presidential election results through three criminal conspiracies.
Many of the same skeptics were present in the Senate gallery on Thursday, and cheered when the vote passed.
Many Republican grievances against Wolfe are over decisions made by the Elections Commission that she carried out, as she is bound by law to do. In addition to carrying out the commission’s decisions, Wolfe helps guide Wisconsin’s local election clerks.
Wolfe became head of the elections commission in 2018, after Senate Republicans rejected her predecessor, Michael Haas, because he had worked for the Government Accountability Board. GOP lawmakers disbanded that agency, which was the Elections Commission’s predecessor, in 2015 after it investigated whether former Republican Gov. Scott Walker’s campaign had illegally worked with outside groups.
Since the 2020 election, some Republicans have floated the idea of abolishing or overhauling the Elections Commission.
Wolfe has worked at the commission and for the accountability board for more than 10 years. She has also served as president of the National Assn. of State Election Directors and chair of the bipartisan Electronic Registration Information Center, or ERIC, which helps states maintain accurate voter rolls.
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