Sen. Ron Johnson Attacks Milwaukee Elections
While calling for an end to "division and anger," Johnson levies attack on Milwaukee's vote counting
Sen. Ron Johnson speaks to reporters after appearing at the Rotary Club of Milwaukee. Photo by Jeramey Jannene.
U.S. Senator Ron Johnson said Tuesday morning he wants to restore confidence in the U.S. election system, then he pivoted to make a baseless claim about Milwaukee that does the opposite.
“I hope Milwaukee can get their vote count in on time. That certainly doesn’t restore confidence. What’s the deal there? Everybody else can get their votes done. Figure out a system to get votes counted on time so we’re not waiting until one in the following afternoon the following day when they know just how many votes they might need. That dramatically reduces confidence in our system,” said Johnson, who made the comments in response to a question on election integrity while speaking to the Rotary Club of Milwaukee.
Throughout multiple press conferences on Nov. 4, 2020, then-mayor Tom Barrett and Milwaukee Election Commission executive director Claire Woodall-Vogg openly discussed the city’s progress of counting a record number of absentee ballots, including announcing the total number of ballots received, number processed and estimated time of completion.
The 8:00 p.m. press briefing included an estimate that there were approximately 169,000 absentee ballots and that the work would be done by 4 a.m. The city submitted the results of its 169,541 absentee ballots to the county just after 3 a.m. Milwaukee County announced its results at approximately 4 a.m.
The entire absentee counting process was held in a downtown office building, open to the public for its duration. Several hundred workers processed the ballots while observers and media members looked on. Those that couldn’t attend in person were able to watch one of the multiple cameras live streaming the process.
What does getting your ballots in “on time” even mean? The only true deadline municipalities face is to transmit the results of their “canvas” to their respective county by 4 p.m. on the Monday following the election. The board of the Milwaukee Election Commission regularly meets on Friday afternoon following elections, ahead of the deadline, to certify the canvas and send the results to the county.
There is at least one clear option to speed up absentee ballot counting. Under current state law, municipalities cannot begin processing absentee ballots until polls open on election day. Despite demonizing Milwaukee Tuesday, Johnson previously was open to addressing the timing issue. In a September 2020 appearance on Upfront, he called on the Wisconsin State Legislature to pass a law allowing absentee ballots to be counted before polls open at 7 a.m.
Several Wisconsin communities, including Milwaukee, use a “central count” facility to process absentee ballots. This eliminates the need to route ballots returned on election day to the proper polling place, and yields a single location where any absentee is being stored and processed. The counting of ballots cannot stop once it has started.
Milwaukee has the largest central count operation owing to its population. But it isn’t always the slowest. In November 2020, both Kenosha and Green Bay completed their absentee processing after Milwaukee. The entire central count process has taken on more visibility and required more workers as the pandemic triggered a record surge in absentee voting.
“This isn’t rocket science. I think it’s pretty easy to restore confidence,” said Johnson on Tuesday.
Defund the Police, January 6, Abortion Referendum and More
Johnson’s remarks weren’t limited to election integrity. He also touched on a variety of topics, including the “defund the police” movement, the 2021 insurrection and a potential abortion referendum.
“To call what happened on January 6 an armed insurrection isn’t accurate,” said Johnson. He said those entering the U.S. Capitol followed the rope lines and that no guns were recovered by police. However, he said 2020 racial justice protesters taught people how to use flag poles and other instruments as weapons.
The senator also floated the idea of a one-time referendum to address abortion. Johnson said there would be a 10-choice, single-question ballot. The question would be: “At what point does society have the responsibility to protect life?”
Will such a thing be necessary for gay marriage? The senator said there is no risk of the court overturning that decision. It’s also the reason he said he’s not backing fellow Wisconsin senator Tammy Baldwin‘s bill to codify gay marriage into law.
Johnson also discussed the “defund the police” movement during his opening remarks. He said he met with the Milwaukee Police Association Monday and asked about the movement’s impact on policing.
“It has a dramatic impact,” said Johnson. “Because of the hostility towards law enforcement in some quarters, police are backing off. They are not policing the way they used to. They’ll answer calls, but if they see something they’ll back away.”
He said recruitment numbers and the number of law enforcement officials are down across the state.
The senator said communities weren’t making law enforcement a priority, but in Milwaukee, the MPD budget will have been virtually even with or greater than the entire property tax levy for eight years. The city has had to cut officer positions, but almost entirely because its contract with the police union has raised officer salaries. No layoffs have occurred.
“Aren’t you getting tired of the division and the anger? I am,” said Johnson.
Johnson’s opponent, Lieutenant Governor Mandela Barnes, is scheduled to address Rotary in the coming weeks. You can watch a recording of Johnson’s speech on WisconsinEye.
Wisconsin voters need to understand that Ron Johnson is following in the footsteps of Wisconsin Senator Joseph McCarthy who has permanently shamed Wisconsin with the word McCarthyism, a dictionary word meaning the “use of tactics involving personal attacks on individuals by means of widely publicized indiscriminate allegations especially on the basis of unsubstantiated charges” (Merriam-Webster). Examples in this article show how Wisconsin is now home to RoJoism, the practice of exploiting misinformation or using political attacks to undermine a fair and open political process. Ron Johnson’s attacks on Democracy are attacks on all of us. Ron Johnson, a supporter of Donald Trump, wants to continually exhibit his hatred for voters in Milwaukee. It is time for RoJo to go!
Racism is the root of everything.
Lets get Rojo the Nazi out of office.
You can draw a line from RoJo back to the South after the Civil War. Republicans do not want black people to vote. They believe, as did the slaveowners, that only rich white people should be allowed to vote.
yes, ron johnson, i am tired of the division and the anger and if you could manage to stop lying and distorting facts, that would go a long way to assuage my anger. it was an armed insurrection with purpose of overturning a democratic process. black lives matter protests were not armed insurrections and their purpose was to bring awareness to the murders of black men and women usually be armed police. you know this and you wish to continue with your alternate facts. do wisconsinites a favor and go away.
I think there is another reason for Milwaukee’s use of a “Central Count” facility. Under state law, a ballot may only be counted if it arrives at the COUNTING LOCATION by 8pm on Election Day. Since, in a big city like Milwaukee, mail-in ballots cannot be mailed to a voter’s specific polling location (Do we really want unopened ballots sitting, unguarded, in a fire house or school for weeks before an election??), Milwaukee has no choice but to use a “Central Count”. (A small town with a single voting/counting location in its town hall doesn’t face this problem.)
But I have one question about the counting delay issue… When did Madison finish their count in 2020?
I assume Madison uses a Central Count (for the same reasons as Milwaukee) and I think they also had a huge number of absentee ballots, but I never heard anything about when they reported their count.