Wisconsin Republicans unleash 'world of crazy' in bid to remove election administrator

Republicans aired 2020 election conspiracies at a Wisconsin hearing on reappointing the state's election administrator.

A state Senate committee is now hearing public testimony on the reappointment of Meagan Wolfe, who heads the Wisconsin Elections Commission, but Democrats say Republicans intend to drive her out of office as retribution for Donald Trump's election loss nearly three years ago, reported Wisconsin Public Radio.

“I think that it’s largely out of a desire to find an explanation for Donald Trump’s loss other than fewer people voted for him than Joe Biden,” said Ann S. Jacobs, one of the Democratic commissioners on the WEC. “She is the chief elections officer, she offers a face to the conspiracy theories.”

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Wolfe did not appear before the Republican-led Committee on Shared Revenue, Elections and Consumer Protection's public hearing, which is a step toward reappointing her to a second four-year term, but WEC commissioners and Democratic attorney general Josh Kaul say these proceedings are not allowed under state law.

"This committee cannot take up a nomination that has not been made," said state Sen. Mark Spreitzer (D-Beloit). "This nomination is not properly before us."

Spreitzer said the matter would end up in court if Republicans take up a vote on Wolfe's reappointment because the commission had not moved a nomination forward, as required by law, but Republicans argue that she should be subject to a standard legislative process.

"I will not abdicate my authority, or the Senate's authority, in this process," said State Sen. Dan Knodl (R-Germantown), the committee chairman.

Rep. Janel Brandtjen (R-Menomonee Falls), who was one of three legislators to sign on to an effort to decertify the state's election results, was the hearing's first witness, and she rehashed disputes she had with the WEC during her tenure as chair of the Assembly's elections committee and pushed conspiracy theories about the state's voting system.

Next came former Menomonee Falls village president Jefferson Davis, who told the committee “we have the evidence” of election fraud, but he would only show that to people who signed non-disclosure agreements.

Other witnesses testified about "Zuckerbucks," a grant that funded additional costs of running an election during a pandemic, and conspiracy theories about the nonprofit election security consortium ERIC, and one witness was previously convicted of felony mail fraud and another is facing felony election fraud charges for requesting absentee ballots by impersonating other voters.

Knodl set the tone for the hearing early one when he challenged Lisa Tollefson, the clerk for Rock County and an outspoken defender of Wolfe's record.

“In your testimony you mentioned we’re going to be in a world of crazy,” Knodl said “What are you predicting, or do you have information that something is on the horizon? Can we just follow the law and the election should go okay? What’s that mean, the world of crazy?”