Governor Tony Evers announced vetoes of a series of Republican-backed election integrity bills, including one that sought to define what information voters and witnesses must provide on an absentee ballot envelope to ensure legitimacy before the ballot is counted.
Evers also signed four dozen bills on Thursday, including one that requires the disclosure in political ads of content generated by artificial intelligence. This change will impact spots that run this fall. Along with AB 664, Evers also signed AB 298. It bars closing more than half of a municipality’s polling places within 30 days of an election.
Among the vetoed bills was one that sought to require local election officials to allow observers to be closer to the action as they watched various aspects of voters casting their ballots. Under current law, election observers may be no closer than 3 feet, but no further than 8 feet, away while watching voters register and announce their names and addresses at the polls. AB 543 sought to change that to no more than 3 feet.
Evers wrote in his veto message that such a change would increase the potential for observers to intimidate eligible voters and officials who are performing their duties.
The bill was written after GOP observers voiced their concerns following the 2020 election that they were unable to adequately monitor proceedings.
Governor Evers also vetoed:
*AB 476, which sought to require special elections to fill vacancies in the offices of secretary of state, treasurer, attorney general, and state superintendent of public instruction. If those vacancies occurred on or after Jan. 1 in the year of a regularly scheduled election, the Gov. would have had to send a nomination to the Senate for confirmation.
Evers called it a “purely partisan reaction” to his appointment of former Dem Treasurer Sarah Godlewski to secretary of state after longtime Dem incumbent Doug La Follette suddenly resigned months after being sworn in for a new term.
*AB 570, which would make a series of changes to absentee voting, including defining in state law what elements must be included on an absentee ballot envelope to constitute a complete address for the vote to be counted. It also includes provisions barring clerks from fixing mistakes or filling in missing information, as well as changes to the process for voting in a retirement home or residential care facility. Those issues have been the subject of court cases over the last two years, and a Dane County judge earlier this year barred clerks from rejecting absentee ballots with incomplete addresses.
Evers wrote the bill would “effectively require all ballots with even the most inconsequential mistakes to be discarded unless the clerk is able to return these ballots for timely correction, increasing the likelihood that an eligible Wisconsin voter may be disenfranchised.”
*AB 572, which sought to create new requirements for courts to notify the Wisconsin Elections Commission if a person has been declared incompetent to vote and for the agency to update the voter registration list to reflect that.
Other bills vetoed include one seeking to strip him of the power to fill vacancies in constitutional offices without Senate approval and SB 549, which sought to require public and independent charter schools to allow federally chartered youth organizations — such as the Boy Scouts — to provide information to students at school.
