The Sconi

A Dane County judge has set a May 15 hearing date for the appeal of a Wisconsin Elections Commission (WEC) dismissal of a complaint that Madison city officials and WEC violated the constitution and the states’ elections laws leading up to the 2020 general election.

The WEC dismissed the complaint, brought by the Wisconsin Voter Alliance (WVA), in December along with complaints brought by WVA against four other cities including Racine, Kenosha, Milwaukee and Green Bay. In January, the WVA appealed all the dismissals to county courts of those cities. 

The courts in Racine, Brown, Kenosha and Milwaukee counties have yet to set hearing dates.

In the 2020 presidential election, President Joe Biden carried the counties of Milwaukee and Dane while former President Donald Trump won Racine, Kenosha and Brown (Green Bay area). Biden carried Wisconsin by more than 20,000 votes.

WVA President Ron Heuer said he wasn’t surprised when WEC dismissed his group's complaints against the cities, but that filing with WEC before going to the courts was a necessary part of the legal process.

“I’m confident we will win in one if not all of these counties,” Heuer told The Sconi.

The complaint alleges that Madison Mayor Satya Rhodes-Conway, City Clerk Maribeth Witzel-Behl and WEC administrator Megan Wolfe created an unconstitutional, two-tiered voting system by working with a nonprofit, the Center for Tech and Civic Life (CTCL), which granted funds on a disproportionate basis to the Democratic cities as a way to get out the vote. The CTCL received its funding (nearly $400 million total) from Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and his wife, Priscilla Chan. Besides Wisconsin, CTCL granted money to election officials in other battleground states.

The complaint also alleges that the WEC and city officials violated the state’s election bribery law, which prohibits a city from receiving private money to encourage increased in-person or absentee voting.

“The Wisconsin legislature, in enacting [the law] chose to enact a prohibition on election bribery that is much broader than what other state legislatures have enacted, and this choice by the Wisconsin legislature supports a broad interpretation of [the law],” the complaint states. “Unlike these other states, Wisconsin law prohibits election bribery to increase ‘going to the polls.’” 

Heuer said Dane County Circuit Court Judge Stephen Ehlke indicated in the scheduling hearing he will be rendering his decision quickly.

The WVA's complaints filed against the other four cities similarly allege violations of the Wisconsin Constitution and state election laws.