- A "first look" this week at illegal voting in Wisconsin.
The Wisconsin Election Commission report released this
week shows that there were more than 60 cases of 17-year-olds
illegally voting in the spring presidential primary.
The confusion centered around
whether 17-year-olds could vote in the primary
if they turned 18 by the November General Election.
In 21 states and the District of Columbia they can,
but not in Wisconsin.
More than 29 counties reported 17-year-olds casting ballots,
a huge surge compared to previous elections.
Those cases have been turned over to county prosecutors.
Some have decided not to file charges.
Some sent letters of reprimand and some counties are still
considering charges.
Joining us this week is Michael Haas, Wisconsin Elections
Commission Administrator.
Thanks for being here. - Nice to be here.
- How did you learn that these 17-year-olds had voted?
- Well, we initially learned on election day.
We started to receive calls.
Questions from either voters about whether or not they could
vote or from clerks about what was going on at the polls.
Eventually our statewide voter registration database
requires clerks to enter voter participation for everybody who
votes, and then their voter registration would indicate
their date of birth and that's how we can use that data
to detect whether or not they're eligible to vote.
- So how unusual is this?
- Well, it's a first for Wisconsin.
As you mentioned, some states allow 17-year-olds to vote
at the presidential primary
and that's why it's a little bit unique.
The thought was or the theory was: If I'm going to be 18
at the time of the November General Election,
I should be able to vote at the primary.
So this is pretty unusual.
- And describe how you think it happened that these 17-year-olds
thought this was okay here.
- Well, I think a couple things happened.
What we were hearing is that there were things
on social media.
Some campaign supporters were pushing this theory, because it
was allowed in some other states, I believe in Iowa,
one of our neighboring states.
And so that just grew through social media.
I think some of the 17-year-olds showed up at the polls then
and were pretty insistent that they could vote.
As you may recall, it was a pretty high turnout
for that presidential primary
and some of the poll workers, I think, felt
a little bit overwhelmed and thought this was plausible
and they allowed them to vote.
- Well, that brings up a couple of questions.
I guess the first, is more education required, both for
voters and for election workers at the polls?
- I think that's a fair point.
When we train, we start with the basics, that one of the voter
qualifications is you need to be 18 to vote.
We haven't really gone to the next vote of you can vote if
you're 17 or 16, it would seem to -- but, as I said, when
you're poll workers and you have a line in front of you and
you're trying to move people through, they don't always have
time to check exactly what the rules are.
And absolutely for the voters, especially for a presidential
primary, it's something we should be emphasizing more.
- With voter ID, is an election worker, will they now be
required to look at that age?
- It's a good point.
Under the photo ID law, -- the age is something that is marked
on the voter registration form when somebody registers to vote
and they sign, they certify that they're qualified to vote,
including being 18.
The photo ID law is very specific.
The poll workers are to look at the photo, the signature, the
name and to ensure that the photo ID is not expired but they
do not look at the birth date at that stage.
- Can 17-year-olds in Wisconsin register to vote if they are
going to be 18 by election day?
- Absolutely.
We encourage them to register as long as they will be 18 at the
time that they vote.
Then they can register while they're 17.
- That does seem a little confusing.
- It could be, yes.
- It also shows the careful work that election officials
have to do and meanwhile I understand the governor's
proposed budget would cut some positions in your commission.
How many and what might that mean?
- Well, the proposal is to reduce our staff by four.
To put it into context, the elections agency in the state of
Wisconsin has used federal funds for the majority of its budget
for over ten years now.
Those federal funds are expiring.
And so the governor's budget proposal does include
transferring most of those positions that are federally
funded to state GPR funds, which is great for the agency.
It's great news because it puts us on a more stable funding
platform going forward.
But the governor's proposal also is to fund 16 of those
federally-funded positions rather than 22.
Our commission met this week and directed our staff
to continue to advocate with the legislature
to try to reinstate six of those positions.
We have 31 total positions in our agency.
So it's a significant reduction for a small size agency.
I would also note that in this current budget our staff was
reduced by four.
So in total that would be ten fewer positions
out of about 35 originally.
- Seems like you have a lot to do and fewer people to do it with.
- Exactly.
Both the Legislature and Congress continue to require
more of elections administrators, both at the
state and local level, and that takes staff and resources to be
able to accomplish those things.
- We need to leave it there. Thank you very much.