Dodge County Clerks Backtrack on Using Drop Boxes
Republican sheriff and Trump supporter urges them not to, despite their legality.
Superior had a drop box for absentee ballots outside the city’s government center polling location in 2020. Danielle Kaeding/WPR
Some town and village clerks in Dodge County were considering using absentee ballot drop boxes in the upcoming November presidential election. They changed course when the county’s Republican sheriff urged them not to, in order to prevent the perception of voter fraud.
Wisconsin election clerks were re-authorized to use absentee ballot drop boxes in July, when the Wisconsin Supreme Court’s liberal majority reversed a ban on absentee ballot drop boxes issued by the court’s previous conservative majority in 2022. The decision didn’t require clerks to use drop boxes, but it gave them the option for the first time in the two years.
According to emails obtained by WisPolitics, Republican Dodge County Sheriff Dale Schmidt reached out to three town and village clerks who he’d heard were considering using the receptacles. He told them while it was their right to use them, “I strongly encourage you to avoid using a drop box.”
In a phone interview with WPR, Schmidt said his email contained questions for the clerks about whether the boxes would be monitored by video cameras and how they’d ensure ballots were dropped off by voters and not someone else.
Schmidt said he wasn’t trying to stop the clerks from using them.
“They have the right to do that, but I wanted to raise those concerns so they can make their own independent decision,” Schmidt said. “I am not in favor of those, but of course, as I laid out in my emails to them, that’s their choice to make.”
Former President Donald Trump criticized the use of drop boxes following the 2020 election as he made a variety ongoing, unsupported claims that the election was rigged against him.
Schmidt, who has endorsed Trump for re-election, said he shares many of the same viewpoints on election security that Trump does.
“And I think opening ourselves up to having even the perception of election fraud opens up questioning the integrity of our election process,” Schmidt said. “I don’t think we want to do that. So, I think this is a good thing. And I think that Dodge County clerks are doing it the right way to maintain that integrity.” Michelle Leisener, clerk for the Dodge County Town of Ashippun, told WPR using drop boxes “was a thought” for the November election but the town will not use them this fall.
Town of Hustisford Clerk Agnes Schultz told WPR that while she received an email from the Schmidt, the town board had already decided against accepting absentee ballots in a drop box used for collecting property tax payments “because of security purposes.”
“It’s unmanned,” Schultz said. “I mean, we have a camera on it, but it’s not physically manned. Just for security purposes, we are not using it.”
In a statement sent to WPR, Democratic Party of Wisconsin spokesman Joe Oslund called it “unfortunate that the Dodge County Sheriff is trafficking in Donald Trump’s conspiracy theories to cast doubts on our elections.”
“Ballot drop boxes are a convenient and secure way for folks in communities across the state to cast their vote, a reality that even (Republican Assembly Speaker) Robin Vos acknowledged back in 2020 before Trump lost,” said Oslund.
Dodge County clerks backtrack on using drop boxes after concerns from Republican sheriff was originally published by Wisconsin Public Radio.
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Drop boxes are just as secure as mailboxes. Is there also a camera on every mailbox? How can they be sure it was the voter that put the ballot in the mail? I don’t see the difference between a secure metal box that requires a stamp to use and one that doesn’t.
It seems more and more counties across the country are seeing county sheriffs become the local conservative political kingpin, like the character “Boss Hogg” from the Dukes of Hazard. You see them posing with Trump for political ads or promoting extreme positions on guns with gun rights activists. Milwaukee County residents still remember our own version of Boss Hogg, Sheriff David Clarke.
Is “Deputy Dawg” a member of the “Constitutional Sheriffs conspiracy”, excuse me, “association”? These proto-fascists need to have their chains yanked.