Wisconsin Supreme Court does not allow absentee voting

MADISON, Wisconsin-

The conservative-controlled Wisconsin Supreme Court ruled Friday that absentee ballot drop boxes can only be placed in election offices and that no one other than the voter can return a ballot in person, marking a critical defeat for voters. Democrats in the battleground state.

The court did not address the question of whether someone other than the voter can return their own mail-in ballot. Election officials and others argued that drop boxes are a safe and convenient way for voters to return ballots.

The decision sets absentee voting rules for the Aug. 9 primary and fall election; Republican US Senator Ron Johnson and Democratic Governor Tony Evers are seeking re-election in key races.

The court’s 4-3 ruling also has critical implications in the 2024 presidential race, in which Wisconsin will once again be among a handful of battleground states. President Joe Biden defeated Donald Trump in 2020 by just under 21,000 votes, four years after Trump narrowly won the state by a similar margin.

The popularity of absentee voting exploded during the pandemic in 2020, with more than 40 percent of all voters casting their ballots by mail, a record. At least 500 drop boxes were set up in more than 430 communities for that year’s election, including more than a dozen in Madison and Milwaukee, the two most Democratic cities in the state.

After Trump lost the state, he and Republicans argued that mailboxes facilitated cheating, though they offered no proof. Democrats, election officials and some Republicans have argued that the boxes are safe.

The conservative law firm Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty sued in 2021. In February, the state Supreme Court banned the use of drop boxes outside election clerks’ offices in April elections for local offices, such as mayor, city ​​council and seats on school boards. The court ruled Friday on the question of whether to allow secure ballot boxes in places like libraries and grocery stores.

State law is silent on drop boxes, and the court said absentee ballots can only be returned at the clerk’s office or a designated alternate site, but that site cannot be an unstaffed drop box. Wisconsin’s bipartisan Election Commission had told local election officials that ballot boxes can be placed in multiple locations and ballots can be returned by people other than the voter, but has put that on hold pending the court’s ruling. Supreme.

Republicans who control the Wisconsin Legislature have also tried to enact laws limiting the use of absentee ballots, but Evers has vetoed them.

Republicans have taken similar steps since Trump’s loss to restrict access to ballots in other battleground states. The restrictions especially target voting methods that have been gaining in popularity, putting a damper on mail-in voting and early voting that saw explosive growth during the pandemic.

The majority opinion was written by Justice Rebecca Bradley and was joined by conservative Justices Patience Roggensack, Brian Hagedorn and Chief Justice Annette Ziegler. The three dissenting liberal justices were Ann Walsh Bradley, Rebecca Dallet, and Jill Karofsky.

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