Wisconsin: Want to register new voters? Forget it, the Repukes have made it damn near impossible.

[Scuba]

Tests of revised voting procedures here in Wisconsin have given new meaning to the term "clusterfuck". There has been confusion about procedures, what ID's are permissible and how to deal with provisional voting among other issues.

Registering to vote at the polls will still be possible, but citizens wishing to do so will likely be faced with long lines and procedural confusion. This could be especially troublesome with lots of new voters being motivated for the first time to cast ballots (read: voters pissed at Scott Walker).

Solution: Register voters in advance.

In the past, one could go to the GAB and become certified as a Statewide Registration Deputy (SRD). SRD's were authorized to register any voter from any municipality in Wisconsin. The Republican voter-suppression law did away with the SRD program. Now one must go to the specific municipality in which one wishes to register voters, and then be trained by the municipal clerk from that area.

OK, that's problematic. If one wishes to register voters in five municipalities that's five different certifications by five different municipal clerks. But it gets worse.

The municipal clerks I talked to have not only not been certified to conduct the necessary training for Deputy wannabe's, they didn't even know they were responsible for doing this training.

So, if you want to be a Registration Deputy for municipality A, go to the municipal clerk, inform them that they must conduct this training and wait for them to confirm that fact. Then wait for him/her to request and schedule training from the GAB and become certified to train others to be Registration Deputies. At that point, the clerk can finally train you!

Why do I suspect this nightmare is exactly what the Republicans wanted?


Anybody else have any experience with this Catch 22? Please tell me I've gotten something wrong.

[gateley]

1. I agree - exactly what they wanted. Send this post to Rachel, Ed, KO, whomever else you think

might cover it -- get some national exposure/pressure so hopefully eyes turn to WI regarding this clusterfuck.

God - they are our enemies!

[beac]

2. GOP = enemies of democracy. Always.

[Downwinder]

3. Are municipal clerks trained to register people?

[Scuba]

4. Yes, or at least they're supposed to be.

[madrchsod]

5. ok...they are assuming that no new republican voters will sign up

so after the recall is over will they be under federal scrutiny for their registration practices....?

boy, oh ,boy, are the republican`s shitting themselves over the recall and walkers investigation. if they were smart they`d throw walker under the bus and find someone else. i know...the republican`s are not that smart

[TheMastersNemesis]

6. Suppression Of Voters I Akin To Treason

By deliberately scheming to take away a voter"s rights because he or she won't vote for you akin akin to treason. It is a form of partisan political violence. Voter ID laws as constructed are treason. The GOP may win with these tactics but they will not live in peace with such policies. Eventually they will be challenged one way or the other.

Free and fair elections are a right of the people. The GOP is removing that right to millions of Americans. The GOP are equal to the terrorists in attempting to put democracy to death.

[hue]

8. the GOP is owned by the oligarchy who are racking up ownership of the US state by state..n/t

[msongs]

7. used to be the FEDS looked into this sort of things->

when you have a system designed from top to bottom to cause confusion for the purpose of disenfranchising people, that's a federal issue, unlike local confusion from people who are not sure of any given rules.

[Scuba]

9. Self kick hoping for better answers than mine.

[sybylla]

10. Add to it that the municipal clerk can refuse to certify anyone.

Let's remind them, if they refuse, that they are up for election in April. A barrage of LTTE's might change their mind.

Worse, keep in mind that there are black-out periods before election dates that prevent a third party (anyone but the municipal clerk) from registering voters. With the recall elections on the horizon, we may have very few opportunities to register anyone between our April election and the Recall General, depending on when the GAB sets the election dates.

Locally, the talk on trainings has turned to finding a municipal clerk (or maybe even the county clerk who often trains the municipal clerks) to host the SRD training, then persuade other municipal clerks to accept training in the first municipality to register SRD's in their municipality.

There's a bigger drawback to this kind of SRD system not obvious on its face. Each municipality gives it's own SRD's a different SRD ID number that goes on each registration form. So if you are trained to register voters as an SRD in 10 municipalities, you have to submit those registrations to each municipality using 10 different registrant ID numbers. That's a lot of shit to keep track of.

I would suggest we find lots of people in each county to take on several municipalities and then work together to register voters regionally. That way, no one has to take on too many municipalities.

[Scuba]

11. Yes, yes, yes and yes. Please share more about the local talk....

... on what I'll call "group training/cross certification".


What are you doing to make sure folks who signed are registered? What are you doing to encourage predominately Democratic-voting registrations?


I really feel like the process has ground to a halt, and it concerns me greatly.


BTW, the clerks I've talked to have been eager to help, if not necessarily prepared to do so.

[sybylla]

12. Well OFA is really taking the lead.

But spring and fall candidates want registrations as much as OFA/Obama. So everyone is pulling together to discuss how we go forward for the next few months.

No municipal clerk will do trainings on registration until after the primary. So we're spending the next two weeks trying to get trainings lined up and to persuade municipal clerks to work together.

In the mean time, we'll regroup our recall volunteers to focus on getting people to the polls and making sure they can vote.

I hope that by the time the primary is done, we'll have access to the names of those who signed the petitions in our area. We'll start calling or going door to door to make sure everyone is registered and prepared with ID to vote.

Those recall volunteers want something to do. Until we have a recall election date set and candidates to work for, we might as well focus on voting requirements.

If you feel things have ground to a halt and want to work on this, get in touch with your state OFA people. This is their baby. They have the tools to help you make this happen on the ground.

[midnight]

13. Of course they did away with a program that helps get people the right to vote....