Don't Make It Harder to Vote Absentee

Number 1, it’s wrong to prohibit the Wisconsin Elections Commission or any municipal or county clerk or election board from sending out absentee ballot applications en masse to registered voters. In a democracy, we should be encouraging people to vote, and that’s what such mass mailings do. It’s one reason why voter turnout was so high in 2020. And particularly in a pandemic, it makes sense for these governmental agencies to facilitate safe voting.

The mass mailing of absentee ballot applications gives the voters the choice of how and when to vote, which ensures that voting is accessible and convenient for eligible Wisconsinites . It should be up to the voter to decide whether it makes sense to vote in person or with an absentee ballot, especially during a pandemic. And the decision by the Wisconsin Elections Commission to send out absentee ballot applications en masse was made by bipartisan agreement due to the gravity of the COVID pandemic, and the Commission should retain the flexibility to do so again, under similar circumstances. Wisconsinites should never have to choose between exercising our fundamental right to vote or risking our health or our very lives.

Number 2, SB 204 would impose a huge burden on those who are indefinitely confined or overseas non-military voters because they would no longer be able to receive their absentee ballots automatically. Now they would have to show an ID when they fill out an absentee ballot request, and many indefinitely confined voters don’t have a voter ID, and don’t have access to getting one or submitting one. Plus, they would need to fill out an absentee ballot request every election Forcing indefinitely confined voters to fill out an absentee ballot request “every election” is nuts. Will they have to request an absentee ballot for a February primary and then for the spring election and then for the November election, every year?

First, this bill would require the administrator of a retirement home or residential care facility to notify relatives of the occupants as to when the special voting deputies will be coming to the facility to assist in the casting of absentee ballots. This is the worst kind of paternalism, as it assumes that everyone in a retirement home or residential care facility needs to have a family member next to them when they are voting. Most people in these homes and facilities make decisions for themselves every day of the week. They don’t need to be babysat by some relative when they are doing their duty in our democracy. They shouldn’t have their right to the privacy of their vote violated.

Second, this bill would also make it illegal for employees of a retirement home or residential care facility to even encourage a resident to go out and vote. Here’s the language: “No employee of a qualified retirement home … may influence an occupant of the home or facility to apply for or not apply for an absentee ballot or cast or refrain from casting a ballot.” In a democracy, we all should be encouraging each other to vote! Plus, no other set of employees is prohibited from encouraging fellow citizens to vote, so this would likely violate their First Amendment and Fourteenth Amendment rights.