Another election — another constitutional amendment ballot question. Unlike the two ballot questions we defeated in August, this one undermines our right to vote. On the surface it seems unusually meaningless. The current language reads: "Every United States citizen age 18 or older who is a resident of an election district in this state is a qualified elector of that district who may vote in an election for national, state, or local office or at a statewide or local referendum." The text of the ballot question reads: "Shall section 1 of article III of the constitution, which deals with suffrage, be amended to provide that only a United States citizen age 18 or older who resides in an election district may vote in an election for national, state, or local office or at a statewide or local referendum?" In other words, the amendment would change "every United States citizen" to "only a United States citizen." See Ballotpedia for the full text.

So why is this change so pernicious? For one thing, it's unnecessary. It is already illegal for non-citizens to vote. For another thing, it's vanishingly rare for someone who is not eligible to try to vote. Since 2019, only three people who were not eligible nevertheless tried to vote in Wisconsin! For a third thing, the amendment process circumvents the governor. The legislature originally passed this language as a bill but Governor Evers vetoed it.The GOP-gerrymandered legislature could not muster the votes to override the veto and so is trying to amend the constitution instead because the Governor cannot veto a proposed constitutional amendment.

More importantly, the change opens the door to unwarranted challenges to voter registration and participation by allowing election officials, poll observers, and others to challenge voters to prove their citizenship with a birth certificate, naturalization papers, or a passport, documents to which as many as one in 10 Americans lack easy access. So we urge you to VOTE NO and to encourage your family and friends to so the same. In the section of the newsletter with details about how you can DO SOMETHING, you can sign up to write postcards about this amendment to other Wisconsin voters.

On the state of the presidential race since the debate, Simon Rosenberg has some cheery news for us in yesterday's Hopium Chronicles. All the polls cited can be found on 538. Here's a sampling:

• Harris 51-43 (+8) Big Village (new this am, +4 pts from before debate)
• Harris 51-45 (+6) Morning Consult (new this am, +3 since last Monday)
• Harris 52-46 (+6) Ipsos/ABC
• Harris 49-44 (+5) Monmouth
• Harris 47-42 (+5) Ipsos/Reuters
• Harris 51-47 (+4) RMG
• Harris 50-46 (+4) Data For Progress

The latest Marquette Law School Poll, in the field before the debate but after the Democratic National Convention, showed that Harris has a 4 point lead over the Butternut Berlusconi, still within the 4.6 margin of error but 3 points better than the previous poll. You can find a discussion of the results on Marquette University Law School website. The poll includes results for the US Senate race between Tammy Baldwin and Eric Hovde. It is also the subject of WisEye's Rewind. The conversation is full of caveats. And I'll add mine: polls have not been our best friends in the last two presidential elections. Best not to put too much weight on them. Instead, remember that we are always inside the margin of effort.

In RFK Jr news, a district court has ruled that his name must remain on the Wisconsin ballot. For a nerdy legal treat, you can view Judge Ehlke eviscerating Kennedy's case. Kennedy has now appealed. Whether his name remains on the ballot matters because in the latest Marquette poll, he stands at 6%. If he were pulling more votes away from the Harris/Walz ticket, he would want to remain on the ballot. The fact that he is trying so hard to be removed speaks volumes about who his campaign (or Adolf Twitler's) thinks voters for him would be harming.

In fact, ballots have already been sent to Americans abroad and will soon be mailed to those who have already requested absentee ballots. In its filing for the 2nd District Court of Appeals, the Wisconsin Department of Justice writes that "what Petitioner cannot do is require his name to be removed from the ballot: Wis. Stat. § 8.35(1) prohibits candidates from withdrawing once they have qualified." The brief goes on to note that at this late date, removing Kennedy's name from the ballot would force "county and municipal elections officials to miss state and federal deadlines for providing ballots to absentee voters, including military and overseas voters. The timing barrier here is just as acute as in Hawkins, where the Wisconsin Supreme Court held it was too late for a change to the general election ballot. That harm far outweighs Petitioner’s desire to convey to voters his support for another candidate through his absence from Wisconsin ballots."

As part of his argument for removing his name from the ballot, Kennedy's lawyers apparently proposed placing a sticker on every one of the millions of ballots needed for the presidential election. The task would be "herculean." Plus, stickers might actually gum up the works. "The voting equipment to be used for the upcoming election has not been tested with stickers applied to ballots. The stickers could peel off, get jammed or stuck in the voting tabulator, or stick to and rip other ballots, to name a few possible likelihoods." Anyway, the filing states, "placing stickers on ballots is not legal."

This drama serves to remind us of just how harmful third party candidates can be in elections that are as close as those in Wisconsin have typically been. The Marquette poll cited above has the total of all third party votes at 10% of likely voters. Emilee Fannon on Rewind reports that Charles Franklin, the director of the poll, apparently expects the third party vote to dwindle by Election Day. It was about 3% in the 2020 election. But even that smaller proportion of the votes could affect the outcome here.

In a brief discussion, JR Ross, editor of Rewind, drills down on the race between Baldwin and Hovde to note that a major Republican super pac is not buying ad time in Wisconsin, possibly because Hovde is so wealthy that he may not need their funds but also possibly because Baldwin has just been so strong, winning by nearly 11% when she was last re-elected in 2018. Also notable is that the poll finds her with 52% of the vote. For those of us who are math-challenged that means more than half the respondents chose Baldwin in the most recent poll.

Before I turn you loose on the things you can be doing in the next couple of weeks, I want to make a case for voting early, either by absentee ballot or in-person. Voting early "banks" your vote, leaving you free on Election Day to do good work by driving people to the polls (sign up with Souls to the Polls), by doing some last minute canvassing to turn out the last votes, by being a poll observer (volunteer with the Wisconsin Democratic Party), or even by volunteering with your local municipal clerk to be an election inspector (i.e., a poll worker). Elections run on the labor of ordinary citizens as well as with paid election administrators. So working to make our elections free and fair is a wonderful way to be a proud participant on Election Day. Also, as Yogi Berra once said, “It's tough to make predictions, especially about the future.” You never know when you will be ill or called out of town or have a car accident that prevents you from voting on November 5!

Absentee ballots are a little fiddly — because the certification envelope needs the signature and address of a witness — but they are secure and not, as some would have it, rife with corruption. They can now be returned three ways: in the US Mail, in a drop box, or in your municipal clerk's office. The ballots already requested will start to be mailed to you tomorrow. So you'll have plenty of time to look up key positions of the candidates: you can start by visiting our web page for the November 5 election. And you can have your ballot right next to the device you're using to do your research! You can get a sample of the ballot for your area at MyVote.WI.gov and you can also use that site to request an absentee ballot.

Voting early in person is actually just a different method for voting with an absentee ballot. The main difference is that you do it live and in person, typically in your municipal clerk's office. You can find out when and where to use this method on our Early Voting Information page for the North Shore and Ozaukee communities and on our page for the City of Milwaukee. Of course, you won't have the convenience of leisurely research as you would with an absentee ballot. So you'll need to use a smart phone to look up information about candidates as you vote in person. As you will, of course, if you vote on Election Day.

Now here are some SOMETHINGS you can DO:

• Write postcards for Jodi Habush Sinykin. The Jodi team has been assembling postcard bags — each bag has 60 postcards, 60 stamps, 60 addresses, and a Directions Sheet. The campaign has 100 bags ready to go. You can pick up a Postcard Baggie on Sunday, September 22, from 2:00pm to 5:00pm at 400 E Daphne Road, Milwaukee, WI 53217. Call or text Talia at 414-795-1433 with any questions.
  
  
• Write postcards for the VOTE NO campaign to defeat the Wisconsin Constitutional Amendment on the November 5 ballot. Part of the message reads: "This amendment addresses a problem that doesn't exist and lays the groundwork to assault the voting rights of eligible voters (e.g., elderly, students, women) who might have trouble proving citizenship at the voting booth." You can request the postcards in lots of 50.

EVENTS

Wednesday, September 18

Thursday, September 19

Friday, September 20

Saturday, September 21

Monday, September 23

Tuesday, September 24

Wednesday, September 25

Friday, September 27

Monday, September 30

Tuesday, October 1

SAVE THE DATE

Thursday, October 10

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