AR18: Resolution Text

LRB-4453/1

RAC:emw

2023 - 2024 LEGISLATURE

2023 Assembly RESOLUTION 18

November 2, 2023 - Introduced by Representatives Brandtjen, Allen, Behnke, Bodden and Wichgers. Referred to Committee on Government Accountability and Oversight.

AR18,1,3 Relating to: the impeachment of Meagan Wolfe, the Administrator of the Wisconsin Elections Commission, citing allegations of maladministration in office and potential violations of election laws.

AR18,1,5 Whereas, the following articles of impeachment are presented to the Wisconsin State Assembly and Senate:

AR18,1,7 Article 1. Administrator Wolfe's Maladministration During the 2020 Presidential Election

AR18,2,2 Administrator Wolfe promoted and encouraged illegal alterations of absentee ballot applications during the administration of the 2020 presidential election in Wisconsin. It is important to note that absentee voting, in contrast to in-person voting, is regarded as a privilege rather than a right, primarily due to legislative concerns regarding potential fraudulent activities associated with absentee voting that are not as prevalent in in-person voting. This perspective on absentee voting has been acknowledged since former President Carter's review of the 2000 presidential election identified absentee voting as a significant source of potential election fraud.

AR18,2,11 To address the perceived vulnerabilities of absentee voting, the legislature established a series of safeguards, with one of the primary requirements being that absentee ballots must be witnessed by a third party who provides their name, signature, and address. Unfortunately, some Wisconsin Elections Commission (WEC) members, with whom Administrator Wolfe concurred, criticized these security measures as “vote suppressors" and employed derogatory characterizations. As the chief elections official in Wisconsin, Administrator Wolfe was responsible for advocating for adherence to the laws set by the legislature and advising commissioners while publicly supporting adherence to the law.

AR18,2,24 Throughout the relevant period, Administrator Wolfe was aware, or should have been aware, that absentee ballots failing to meet legal requirements, such as missing witness signatures or addresses, should not be counted. Despite this knowledge, Administrator Wolfe approved and endorsed specific instructions within the Election Administration Manual for Wisconsin Municipal Clerks, which stated that clerks “may add a missing witness address using whatever means are available." This so-called “ballot curing" procedure violated the legislative intent for strict compliance with absentee ballot requirements and did not guarantee accurate corrections. This maladministration of “curing," promoted and encouraged by Administrator Wolfe, created disparities in how voters were treated, allowing some deficient ballots to be “cured" while others were not. The decision on which votes would count was left to the municipal clerk, whereas the legislature had previously determined it.

AR18,3,10 Wisconsin Statute § 6.87 (6d) explicitly states, “If a certificate is missing the address of a witness, the ballot may not be counted." However, the law does provide a lawful method to correct missing absentee ballot information under Wis. Stat. § 6.87 (9). According to this law, if a municipal clerk receives an absentee ballot with an improperly completed certificate or no certificate, the clerk may return the ballot to the elector inside the sealed envelope if available, along with a new envelope if necessary, allowing the elector to correct the defect and return the ballot within the authorized period under subsection (6). Contrary to Administrator Wolfe's directive to clerks, it was the voter's responsibility to correct absentee ballot errors, not the clerks' responsibility.

AR18,3,20 During the investigation into this matter, the Wisconsin Institute of Law and Liberty (WILL) discovered high rates of cured ballots in Green Bay and Racine. Nonprofit partners of the Center for Tech and Civic Life (CTCL), such as US Digital Response (USDR), Elections Group, and National Vote at Home Institute (NVAHI), played an active role in curing ballots in these locations. These partners offered services to streamline and automate the ballot curing process in several cities. Administrator Wolfe, as with the SVD issue outlined in Article 5, failed to fulfill her duty to take reasonable steps to ensure that essential election laws concerning the receipt of deficient and ineligible absentee ballots were adhered to during the 2020 presidential election in Wisconsin.

AR18,3,22 Article 2. Administrator Wolfe's Neglect of Duty in Safeguarding Wisconsinites' Personal Data

AR18,4,8 Administrator Wolfe committed maladministration by unlawfully failing to protect Wisconsin citizens' confidential and personal information as mandated by state statutes. These statutes require the Administrator to enter into a contract with the Electronic Registration Information Center (ERIC), a private nonprofit, of which Administrator Wolfe was the Chairman until recently. ERIC's stated purpose is to assist states in maintaining accurate voter rolls. Yet, it has proven to be ineffective, evident in the fact that Wisconsin, with approximately 4.5 million eligible voters, has over 7 million names on its voter rolls—a situation that Administrator Wolfe has actively contributed to. Furthermore, in the calendar year 2023, eight states have terminated their relationships with ERIC, casting doubt on its ability to achieve its stated objectives.

AR18,4,21 Notably, Kevin Kennedy, the then-chief legal counsel for the Government Accountability Board, signed a contract with WEC shortly after the statutes authorizing WEC's creation were enacted. The Government Accountability Board was dissolved by statute due to its perceived dishonest and partisan activities. Despite this, Administrator Wolfe has never signed a contract with ERIC. It is crucial to underline that the duty to sign such a contract is explicitly laid out in the statute to protect the confidential information of all Wisconsin citizens. Administrator Wolfe was well aware of this duty through her four-year term as Administrator of the WEC or her concurrent role as Chairman of ERIC. Her failure to uphold this vital statutory duty has left ERIC, an organization with partisan implications if not in name, with unrestricted access to sell, distribute, or share confidential data. Administrator Wolfe's neglect of this straightforward and essential duty is indefensible.

AR18,4,23 Article 3. Administrator Wolfe's Maladministration in Ensuring Safeguards Against Fraudulent Voting

AR18,5,8 Administrator Wolfe unlawfully failed to establish the minimum required safeguards to prevent fraudulent voting in Wisconsin. Under Wisconsin law, residents temporarily residing overseas can cast ballots in Wisconsin's elections. It is also incumbent upon Administrator Wolfe to establish, implement, and maintain a comprehensive database containing the names of these individuals. This database serves as a crucial tool for municipal clerks to cross-reference voter requests with the overseas voter list, thereby ensuring the legitimacy of such requests. This safeguard is especially significant because, unlike military overseas absentee voters, non-military overseas voters are not required to provide a photo ID when requesting an absentee ballot.

AR18,5,20 Regrettably, Administrator Wolfe's maladministration unfulfilled her responsibility to create, implement, and maintain this reference database for our clerks. Consequently, this method of ballot gathering is left vulnerable to fraudulent activity, akin to the vulnerabilities seen in the military overseas voting system. In other words, just as demonstrated by the case of Kim Zapata, who fabricated three fictitious names and addresses of non-existent military absentee ballot requesters and had all three ballots sent to Representative Brandtjen's home, anyone, from anywhere, at any time, can similarly obtain an unlimited number of non-military absentee ballots. Much like the ballots sent to Representative Brandtjen's home, there is no mechanism to verify the authenticity of non-military overseas absentee ballots obtained through this process. This lack of verification results directly from Administrator Wolfe's complete and inexcusable failure to fulfill her duties.

AR18,5,22 Article 4. Administrator Wolfe's Unlawful Advocacy for Ballot Drop Boxes

AR18,6,4 Administrator Wolfe unlawfully promoted maladministration with the use of ballot drop boxes. In her role as Wisconsin's chief elections official, Administrator Wolfe was responsible for guiding clerks regarding the procedures outlined in the state's elections law. However, there have been instances where Administrator Wolfe acted as if she, and not the legislature, had the authority to establish rules for Wisconsin's elections. One such instance was her purported authorization of ballot drop boxes.

AR18,6,9 Ballot drop boxes were unfamiliar in Wisconsin before the 2020 presidential election cycle. Their use was mandated for the state's five largest cities through contracts signed with the “Center for Tech and Civic Life" (CTCL), a private corporation funded by Mark Zuckerberg to conduct partisan Get Out the Vote (GOTV) campaigns in Wisconsin and other swing states.

AR18,6,17 Under the guise of her official role, Administrator Wolfe fully supported and promoted the use of these unauthorized drop boxes by issuing a series of memoranda (prepared by WEC staff under her supervision) to municipal clerks. This endorsement and promotion of ballot drop boxes ran counter to Wisconsin law, as highlighted in the Teigen case, which concluded that WEC's staff erred by authorizing a voting method not sanctioned by law. The memos created a ballot drop box system entirely absent from Wisconsin's election code, as the legislature's procedures for absentee voting do not allow for voting via ballot drop boxes.

AR18,6,25 Ballot drop boxes present opportunities for election fraud by reducing the likelihood of detection, and their maladministration use, as endorsed and promoted by Administrator Wolfe, likely had a significant and unfair impact on the outcome of the November 2020 presidential election in Wisconsin. The cities of Green Bay, Kenosha, Madison, Milwaukee, and Racine received $216,000 from CTCL specifically to purchase and utilize 44 ballot drop boxes in Wisconsin's five largest metropolitan areas. The exact number of ballots deposited in these unlawful drop boxes during the 2020 election remains unknown.

AR18,7,2 Article 5. Administrator Wolfe's Role in Enabling Unlawful Absentee Voting in Long-Term Care Facilities Without Special Voting Deputie s

AR18,7,12 Administrator Wolfe was involved in facilitating illegal absentee voting in long-term care facilities without the presence of Special Voting Deputies (SVDs), as required by Wisconsin law. According to Wisconsin law, when absentee voting is conducted in long-term care facilities such as nursing homes, each municipal clerk or their designated representatives must be accompanied by two SVDs, one from each of the two major political parties. These SVDs receive specialized training and take an oath to ensure that absentee voting is conducted strictly with the law. One of their essential functions is to challenge the competency of potential voters in nursing homes and other long-term care facilities, as outlined in Wis. Stat. § 6.875 (4).

AR18,7,24 Administrator Wolfe caused maladministration by assisting five out of the six WEC commissioners in consistently voting to unlawfully direct Wisconsin's clerks to disregard the statutorily mandated SVD procedure. This disregard for the law occurred in 2020 during the administration of three separate elections, including the presidential election. Several authorities, including the Racine County Sheriff's Department, the Racine County District Attorney, Wisconsin's Legislative Audit Bureau (LAB), and the Wisconsin Assembly's Special Counsel to Investigate the 2020 presidential election, all reached the conclusion that WEC violated Wisconsin election law each time it permitted absentee voting in long-term care facilities without requiring the presence of at least two special voting deputies. It is indisputable that the actions of those five commissioners and Administrator Wolfe were illegal.

AR18,8,2 Throughout the relevant period, Administrator Wolfe publicly and privately supported this illegal scheme and encouraged Wisconsin's clerks to participate in it.

AR18,8,4 Article 6. Administrator Wolfe's Neglect in Safeguarding the Votes of Overseas Military Voters

AR18,8,10 Administrator Wolfe is charged with maladministration for failing to protect overseas military voters' votes, as Wisconsin Statutes require. These statutes assign to WEC and its Administrator, Meagan Wolfe, the responsibility to establish, implement, and maintain a process through which the identities of Wisconsin residents serving in the military and stationed overseas can be made available to municipal clerks.

AR18,8,16 Upon receiving an application for a ballot from a purported serviceman or woman, the municipal clerk is then statutorily obligated to refer to the identification list created, implemented, and maintained by WEC to verify the individual's military service status. This verification process is especially crucial because military service personnel are exempt from the statutory requirement to present photo identification before voting.

AR18,9,5 The significance of the system that WEC is mandated to create, implement, and maintain cannot be overstated; it serves as the protective barrier between access to military ballots and those who may attempt to fraudulently obtain them by falsely claiming eligibility. The need for such a verification system was unequivocally demonstrated in October 2022 when Kim Zapata, then employed as the Deputy Director of the Milwaukee Election Commission, intentionally fabricated three fictitious names with non-existent home addresses and submitted them online to generate three fraudulent ballots, which were subsequently mailed to the residence of Representative Janel Brandtjen, who was serving as the Chairman of the Assembly Committee on Campaigns and Elections at the time. These fraudulent ballots were indeed delivered to Representative Brandtjen's home, prompting her to turn them over to law enforcement. Kim Zapata later admitted her actions, explaining that she did so to illustrate to Representative Brandtjen and others the “true" vulnerability to fraud in Wisconsin elections.

AR18,9,9 Crucially, due to Administrator Wolfe's negligence, if anyone had cast the three fraudulent ballots created by Kim Zapata, there would have been no means to detect the fraudulent activity or the resulting disenfranchisement of three legitimate military absentee ballots.

AR18,9,12 When a lawsuit sought declaratory and injunctive relief to compel Administrator Wolfe to address this dereliction, she engaged the services of a private law firm, the Mark Elias Law Group, in an attempt to avoid remedying the situation.

AR18,9,14 Article 7. Administrator Wolfe's Involvement in the Employment of Partisan, Out-of-State Residents for Election Administration in 202 0

AR18,9,24 Administrator Wolfe facilitated, promoted, and encouraged the employment of partisan, out-of-state residents to administer Wisconsin's elections in 2020. In this maladministration, Mark Zuckerberg's stated objective in 2020 was to aid in the defeat of President Donald Trump. Zuckerberg enlisted the services of David Plouffe, one of former President Obama's principal political advisors and the author of “The Citizen's Guide to Beating Donald Trump," to oversee a plan aimed at staffing the offices of the largest cities in swing states with partisan employees and agents to administer the elections in those cities. An essential aspect of this plan, called “block-by-block political warfare," was directed at cities like Detroit, Milwaukee, and Philadelphia.

AR18,10,13 David Becker, a highly partisan individual employed by George Soros and the administrator of the partisan Electronic Registration Information Center (ERIC), played a central role in executing this scheme. It is noteworthy that while Administrator Wolfe was the Chairman of ERIC, David Becker was in charge. In this context, Zuckerberg, Plouffe, and Becker arranged for the Center for Tech and Civic Life (CTCL) to distribute payments totaling $8.8 million to the five largest cities in Wisconsin, namely Milwaukee, Madison, Racine, Kenosha, and Green Bay (referred to as the “Zuckerberg Five" or the “Cities"). The contracts governing the transfer of these funds required the Cities to perform various services for Zuckerberg, with a primary obligation being the installation of illegal ballot drop boxes in unmonitored locations. Additionally, the Cities were required to “cooperate" with Zuckerberg's directives and follow the instructions of CTCL's designated personnel in administering the elections.

AR18,10,22 One of the individuals involved in this scheme was Michael Spitzer-Rubenstein, a Brooklyn, New York resident and known partisan. In an email to the clerks of the Zuckerberg Five Cities, Administrator Wolfe provided her authorization to utilize Michael Spitzer-Rubenstein as part of their election administration efforts. Although Claire Woodall-Vogg, the Milwaukee Election Commission's leader, recommended Michael Spitzer-Rubenstein to Administrator Wolfe without indicating that she had vetted him, Administrator Wolfe promptly forwarded this recommendation to the clerks of the Zuckerberg Five Cities, suggesting they reach out to him if they were interested in learning more.

AR18,11,4 As a direct result of Administrator Wolfe's recommendation, Michael Spitzer-Rubenstein, a designated “partner" of Zuckerberg and CTCL, assumed control over various aspects of the Green Bay election, including overriding the Clerk's recommendations, signing contracts, controlling access to a key location, and determining the acceptance of ballots after the 8 p.m. deadline. Mr. Spitzer-Rubenstein lacked the requisite training, certification, and oath of office necessary to work in Wisconsin elections.

AR18,11,12 Wisconsin Statute § 5.02 (4e) defines an election official as an individual charged with duties related to election conduct. The Wisconsin Election Administration Manual emphasizes the importance of qualified and well-trained election officials. Michael Spitzer-Rubenstein did not meet these qualifications and was disqualified due to his New York residence. After Administrator Wolfe's recommendation, any roles assigned to Mr. Spitzer-Rubenstein by the clerks would have involved his participation in election activities, constituting a violation of Wis. Stat. § 5.02 (4e).

AR18,11,19 Spitzer-Rubenstein also played a significant role in the Racine 2020 election, setting up systems, collecting ballots, and creating absentee ballot logs. He authored the Election Day Manual in Milwaukee, had exclusive access to critical information, and recruited out-of-state personnel. This scheme included “ballot navigators" who could visit citizens' homes, represent themselves as being “from the City" (although funded by Zuckerberg/CTCL), offer assistance in completing absentee ballots, and potentially illegally return the ballots to the clerk's office.

AR18,11,23 Administrator Wolfe's cooperation in this scheme was vital for covering the Zuckerberg Five Cities clerks. By participating in and facilitating this scheme, Administrator Wolfe betrayed the trust of Wisconsin citizens who had entrusted her with the position of Administrator of WEC.

AR18,11,25 Article 8. Administrator Wolfe's Maladministration of Third-Party Submission of Absentee Ballot Applications

AR18,12,4 Administrator Wolfe's actions regarding submitting absentee ballot applications by individuals other than the voter, contravening Wisconsin election laws, were unlawful. Administrator Wolfe is responsible for the guidance provided in the Election Administration Manual for Wisconsin Municipal Clerks.

AR18,12,8 According to the manual, “If an absentee ballot request is delivered by someone other than the registered elector (spouse, campaign volunteer, etc.), it is treated as a by-mail request." This directive lacked a legal basis, and Administrator Wolfe's actions in this regard were unlawful, as outlined in the Teigen case.

AR18,12,14 Wisconsin Statute § 6.86 describes six distinct “methods for obtaining an absentee ballot," and § 6.86 (1) (a) 2. specifies the law for submitting an absentee ballot application directly to the municipal clerk, stating, “In person at the office of the municipal clerk or at an alternate site under s. 6.855, if applicable." Notably, Wis. Stat. § 6.86 (1) (a) 2. allows the elector to personally submit their absentee ballot application at the clerk's office.

AR18,12,19 Administrator Wolfe's directive to clerks, permitting a “spouse," “ campaign volunteer," or other agents to submit absentee ballot applications on behalf of electors, contradicted the plain language of Wis. Stat. § 6.86 (1) (a) 2. Furthermore, her treatment of absentee ballot applications submitted by agents as “by-mail" requests also conflicted with the statute's language.

AR18,13,2 How Wolfe mishandled the return of absentee ballot applications paralleled her maladministration of absentee ballot returns. In the Teigen case, the Wisconsin Supreme Court addressed the delivery of absentee ballots and emphasized that Wisconsin law did not allow agents or anyone other than the elector to submit an elector's absentee ballot directly to a clerk's office. Similarly, Wisconsin law did not permit a family member or agent to submit an elector's absentee ballot application directly to a clerk's office, as Administrator Wolfe allowed.

AR18,13,11 The court noted that the guidance provided by Administrator Wolfe in the March 2020 memo was contrary to Wis. Stat. § 6.87 (4) (b) 1., similar to the situation with absentee ballot applications. Wis. Stat. § 6.86 (1) (a) 2. required a person-to-person exchange between the elector submitting an absentee ballot application and the clerk or the clerk's authorized representative. The court reaffirmed that absentee ballots could only be returned through two authorized methods: mailing by the voter to the municipal clerk or personal delivery by the voter to the municipal clerk. Therefore, Administrator Wolfe's memos advising otherwise conflicted with the law and were rightly void.

AR18,13,13 Article 9. Administrator Wolfe's Inadequate Absentee Ballot Request Web Page and Violation of Wisconsin Election Law

AR18,13,15 Administrator Wolfe's absentee ballot request web page potentially facilitated ballot maladministration and contradicts Wisconsin election law requirements.