Wisconsin Provides Solutions to Running Elections
This primary season has brought scrutiny to swing states like Pennsylvania and Arizona because of the problems that these states faced when running their elections. But another swing state, Wisconsin, made less news because it conducted its elections in a smooth and efficient manner. One likely reason why Wisconsin’s elections proved so successful: its secretary of state does not run the state’s elections. Instead, the bipartisan Wisconsin Elections Commission is in charge.
For nearly 50 years, Wisconsin’s commission has administered elections. In 1973, the state established the Wisconsin election board, but a series of political scandals led the state legislature to replace the board with a government accountability board. Republican frustration with the government accountability board led them to create, in turn, the Wisconsin Election Commission, which has three Republican and three Democratic commissioners.
Though Republicans designed the commission, many feel that it acted inappropriately in the 2020 election. During the 2020 election cycle, the Wisconsin Election Commission faced a series of matters to adjudicate, ranging from whether Kanye West and the Green Party presidential nominee should have ballot access to whether the state should purge hundreds of thousands of inactive voters; from whether to hold rogue Democratic stronghold counties accountable for disobeying state law to what rules should govern mail-in voting.
In these cases, the commission reviewed the decision of another government actor, and it ended up deadlocked at 3-3. As a result, the liberal position won out, because the commission did not overturn the rogue actions of the liberal government entity that it reviewed. In response to these issues, the Republican nominee for secretary of state, State Representative Amy Loudenback, seemingly wants the secretary of state’s office to take over the administration of elections, reasoning that it is accountable to voters every four years.
Vesting such power in a secretary of state comes with its own risks. The current secretary of state for Wisconsin is Democrat Doug La Follette, a far-left Democrat who has served in the office for over 40 years. Republicans have taken La Follette to court and have removed his power to publish bills. If La Follette had the kind of power Loudenback desires, he could create even worse voting policies than the ones that conservatives criticized in the 2020 election.
Even if a Republican does win election as secretary of state, that is no guarantee that conservatives will be happy with how the office does things. In Georgia, Republican Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger made many decisions that angered conservatives, which resulted in the state’s Republican-controlled state legislature removing him from his position as chairperson of the state election board.
If a plan to vest most of the power in a secretary of state is not the answer, then what is a better solution? Georgia offers an answer. Georgia has a system similar to Wisconsin’s, but instead of Wisconsin’s six members, its election commission has seven. The legislature selects the seventh member – an arrangement preferable to having the secretary of state serve as the seventh vote, since that would wind up vesting the tiebreaking power in that office. When the legislature selects the seventh member, voters can hold those legislators accountable.
State legislatures should codify as many rules on voting as possible and limit the ability of election commissions to make policy. This is the best course of action because state legislators face voters, unlike commission members. Additionally, passing such policies would allow election commissions to focus solely on overseeing voting registration and vote counts.
The debate over election administration will heat up as 2024 approaches. Fantasy nonpartisan systems or winner-take-all partisan ones will create major problems. Establishing bipartisan commissions with reasonable checks on their powers can give all sides a voice, while also ensuring a smooth election process.
Todd Carney is a lawyer and frequent contributor to RealClearPolitics. He earned his juris doctorate from Harvard Law School. The views in this piece are his alone and do not reflect the views of his employer.
