Looks like my anecdotal experience about how well the election went yesterday in West Bend was pretty universal. Here are some details::
In West Bend, voter turnout was more than anticipated, City Administrator Jay Shambeau said,
with 1,480 ballots cast by 6 p.m on Election Day. The city consolidated its polling centers from eight to six, eliminating two senior living locations. The in-person voting went well due to the assistance given at the county level, he said, including sending county employees to help as needed.
And of the 17,872 registered voters in West Bend, more than 8,100, or 45 percent, voted absentee, which Shambeau said was a record
for the city. This form of voting was a success, he said, that the city plans to build on for future elections.
“The city of West Bend clerk’s office went above and beyond to accomplish this election as safely and as efficiently as possible,” Shambeau said. “From the onset, we took an active approach to promoting absentee voting both by mail and in-person at City Hall.”
If these numbers are right, then turnout was over 50%. That’s higher than I expected for this kind of election, but it’s great. Perhaps all of the media attention about the election reminded more people to get out and vote.
Hats off to the folks at the City Clerk’s office and the City of West Bend. Well done.
Extremely small in-person turnout in the City of Milwaukee. Barrett engineered his re-election.
Hats off to all municipalies in area for doing same.
Ceiticism is well deserved for awful Milwaukee leadership that staged its own insanity.
Dad,
That appears to be the case. He scaled back in-person voting to disproportionately disenfranchise the Black communities. In the process, Barrett may have sacrificed the Supreme Court election to protect himself, so there’s that…
Wisconsin Democrats can’t afford to keep Tom Barrett on the team much longer.
Who did the WisGOP want to discourage from voting, Owen?
Perhaps strong leadership would have anticipated several weeks ago that by this point in time in-person voting may not be practical, and that people should be requesting absentee votes as soon as possible & taking advantage of early voting opportunities. Strong leadership would have encouraged election personnel at the state and local levels to pull out all stops to get as many ballots out and returned ahead of time. Schools and businesses were shut down several weeks ago in anticipation of the virus, yet the election was treated as “business as usual”.
I imagine this whole clown show is going to be the catalyst for internet voting in the future.
jjf, WisGOP doesn’t run Milwaukee.
Be brave, say it out loud: The Wisconsin Republicans would love to discourage likely Democrats from voting. The more they can do to discourage Certain Areas from voting, the happier they’ll be.
Smooth clean elections in the WOW counties, nothing to worry about!
But that’s not what happened. We had an election that had been scheduled for years. We had it on schedule. Up until about last Friday, both Governor Evers and the Legislative Republican leadership agreed that we should go through with the election. The governor introduced some confusion with his actions over the past few days, but judging by turnout, most voters handled it fine.
Local leaders had weeks to account for the abnormal circumstances introduced by the Covid pandemic. Some local leaders managed it well. Some did not. What we are witnessing is the quality of local leadership in tough times. What happened in Milwaukee was a conscious decision to limit in person voting from 180 sites to 5. Remember that that decision was made a couple of weeks ago – when everybody agreed that the election was going to go on time. So the question is.. why was the decision made? Incompetence or nefarious vote suppression? Whatever the reason, it was made in the offices of the Mayor of Milwaukee and the Milwaukee Election Commission – not in Madison or Waukesha.
Wow, jjf is attempting to talk without his liberal talking points that are put in front of him at the breakfast table. It’s a rather sad sight to see him go off the reservation and try and talk by himself.
Milwaukee has no excuse for disenfranchising minorities. They knew the election was coming, except for about 24 hours.
They were not prepared.
The suburbs were.
And who runs the City of Milwaukee?
Write it slowly so jjf can understand.
Liberals control the City of Milwaukee.
I hope jjf can understand that.
As I’m saying, the GOP-dominated Legislature could’ve / should’ve taken a role in responding to the pandemic. Yes, there’s plenty of poor decision-making and incompetence all around.
But when it came down to it, the WisGOP was happy to let Milwaukee fail and suppress that Dem vote, right? The volunteer poll worker solution didn’t work there.
No need to try to find a solution, just sit back and watch. Gavel in, gavel out. They knew Evers would try some probably Constitutionally unacceptable declaration. Too little, too late. And the WisGOP had the lawyers at the ready.
Milwaukee’s voter suppression was intentional and rests squarely on Tom Barrett. He determined his only priority to be public safety without regard to electoral consequences. Reality in Milwaukee is that elections only replace one Democrat with another whether turnout is ten thousand or three hundred thousand. Mayor Tom’s public safety halo protected Mayor Tom first and foremost no matter who Democrats choose to blame for the fallout.
Had Barrett made even a mediocre effort at turning out a vote in Milwaukee, Evers would not have had to attempt the 60 day suspension and absorb the subsequent judicial whipping trying to mitigate Barrett’s impact on a statewide race. Gotta be a little love lost there.
jjf,from what I have read, the polling places were probably more sanitary than your average hospital.
Yes, but here’s a fun theory: Evers, Barrett, and the twit Mayor/Green Bay were all following orders from the Dem National Committee. The horrific “management” in Milwaukee and GB, the insane “order” from Evers, etc., are setting up the grounds for lawsuits.
While the Democrats may lose the lawsuits, they will–ideally–be able to gain traction with the tear-jerk stories (all lies, of course). They will sue for some “reasonable” middle ground leaving plenty of space to manipulate the rules to arrange their upcoming Progressive Dictatorship.
Are the Chinese involved, Dad29? The Russians?