{"id":3695,"date":"2023-06-21T05:06:19","date_gmt":"2023-06-21T05:06:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/?p=3695"},"modified":"2023-06-21T05:57:27","modified_gmt":"2023-06-21T05:57:27","slug":"wisconsin-elections-commission-mails-postcards-to-116000-inactive-voters-rep-brandtjen-criticizes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/?p=3695","title":{"rendered":"Wisconsin Elections Commission Mails Postcards to 116,000 Inactive Voters, Rep. Brandtjen Criticizes"},"content":{"rendered":"

This post originally appeared at https:\/\/wisconsindailystar.com\/news\/wisconsin-elections-commission-mails-postcards-to-116000-inactive-voters-rep-brandtjen-criticizes\/tcsquare\/2023\/06\/21\/<\/a><\/p>\n

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by Benjamin Yount<\/h5>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

One of the most outspoken critics of elections in Wisconsin says the latest from the state\u2019s Election Commission isn\u2019t doing much to instill confidence among voters.<\/p>\n

The Wisconsin Elections Commission on Friday announced it has mailed postcards to 116,051 voters who have not cast a ballot in the past four years.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese voters have 30 days to respond and tell their clerk whether they want to remain an active registered voter,\u201d the Elections Commission said in a statement. \u201cIf their clerk does not hear from them or if their mailing is undeliverable, their voter registration will be deactivated and they will need to reregister.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rep. Janel Brandtjen, R-Menomonee Falls, who has been a constant critic of WEC and its administrator, Megan Wofle, told The Center Square that the postcards don\u2019t do much.<\/p>\n

\u201cWEC\u2019s willingness to identify voters who haven\u2019t voted in four years, over providing the clerks with a legally required list of Active Military voters, is exactly the type of work that reduces the confidence in voters,\u201d Brandtjen (pictured above) said.<\/p>\n

Brandtjen\u00a0was mailed three military ballots last year<\/a>, an attempt by a former Milwaukee County elections official to show a loophole in the state\u2019s election laws that allow people to claim a military ballot without having to prove they are active duty military personnel.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe live in a state with same day voter registration, show your ID, and you can vote,\u201d Brandtjen added. \u201cWolfe [still] refuses to verify active military registrations even after fraud was committed.\u201d<\/p>\n

WEC\u2019s postcard mailing is largely perfunctory. It happens every two years.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn addition to sending out postcards every two years, the WEC is continually helping Wisconsin\u2019s roughly 1,850 municipal clerks keep the voter list current,\u201d the Commission added in its statement. \u201cWorking together with Wisconsin\u2019s clerks, the Commission is making the statewide voter database more accurate.\u201d<\/p>\n

Even if someone is mailed a postcard and doesn\u2019t respond, they are kept on the voter rolls. The Elections Commission simply lists them as \u201cinactive.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Elections Commission says there are just under 3.4 million active register voters in Wisconsin, but there are hundreds of thousands of inactive voters who remain on the voter rolls.<\/p>\n

Anyone getting a postcard from the Elections Commission this month has until mid-July to respond, or they will be labeled inactive.<\/p>\n

\u2013 \u2013 \u2013<\/p>\n

Benjamin Yount is a contributor to The Center Square.\u00a0<\/a>
\nPhoto \u201cJanel Brandtjen\u201d by Representative Janel Brandtjen<\/a>. Background Photo \u201cWisconsin State Capitol\u201d by Basharat Alam Shah<\/a>. CC BY 2.0.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

The post Wisconsin Elections Commission Mails Postcards to 116,000 Inactive Voters, Rep. Brandtjen Criticizes<\/a> appeared first on The Wisconsin Daily Star<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This post originally appeared at https:\/\/wisconsindailystar.com\/news\/wisconsin-elections-commission-mails-postcards-to-116000-inactive-voters-rep-brandtjen-criticizes\/tcsquare\/2023\/06\/21\/ by Benjamin Yount \u00a0 One of the most outspoken…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":3495,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3695","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-wi-daily-star"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3695","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3695"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3695\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3696,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3695\/revisions\/3696"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3495"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3695"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3695"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3695"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}