Join our band of writers and use your skills to create op-eds and letters to the editor of Wisconsin news outlets to help keep key topics and ideas in the public eye. To help you, we have a list of links to news outlets for you to download.

Contact Kath Michel to join the group: [email protected].

The 2021 Primary Election is only two weeks away. The most important election on that ballot statewide is the race for State Superintendent of Public Instruction. See a list of all the candidates and links to their statements, their websites, and their Facebook pages. The statements run long so for a very succinct three bullets about each, see the list at WEAU 13 News.

For lists of candidates for municipal, judicial, and school board elections, follow the links from our Races 2021 page. In many cases there will be no primary for the races because there are few races in which more than two candidates are competing. To request an absentee ballot and to see a sample ballot for your location, visit myVote.WI.gov.

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The following candidates will appear on all Milwaukee County Ballots on April 6. Only one judicial office is contested: County Circuit Court Judge Branch 3. The names of the candidates for Circuit Court Judge Branch 3 are linked to their websites. The rest are all incumbents who are running unopposed.

The following candidates will appear on Ozaukee County Ballots on April 6. The only contested election is for Court of Appeals Judge, District 2. Because there are only two candidates for that position, both will appear only on the April 6 ballot and only for those who reside in district 2 of the Court of Appeals.

None of the races listed here will involve a primary but ALL of them will be on the April 6 ballot.

On Friday, January 8, I encouraged everyone to get in touch with Senator Ron Johnson, U.S. Representative Scott Fitzgerald, and U.S. Representative Tom Tiffany — the three Republican elected officials from Wisconsin who either voted to accept the spurious objections raised to the electoral votes of Arizona and Pennsylvania or originally committed to doing so but thought better of it after the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol was put down. These three men should no longer be eligible to serve in the Congress, according to section 3 of the 14th amendment to the Constitution:

Here's the contact information you need. Make your voices heard and hold these men accountable:

U.S. Rep. Scott Fitzgerald: (202) 225-5101
Email and office locations are not yet available.

U.S. Rep. Tom Tiffany: (202) 225-3365
email
1719 Longworth HOB, Washington, DC 20515

Sen. Ron Johnson: (202) 224-5323
email
328 Hart Senate Office Building, Washington, DC 20510

We only have eight more days of the tRump administration to go. But there are plenty of pundits predicting new violence on January 17 and on Inauguration Day, both in DC and in every state capital. See "Americans across the political spectrum fear what the Capitol attack portends" in the Washington Post, "Drumpf supporters plan to surround the Capitol in 'chilling' insurrection plot" in Daily Kos, and "Right-wing violence will now be a regular feature of American politics" in the Plum Line blog. In Madison, "Tony Evers calls up National Guard to protect Capitol, boards up windows after FBI warning of 'armed protests'". Sadly, this seems to be the world we live in right now.

Still, the work of our organization proceeds apace. Dan O'Keefe, the leader of the Criminal Justice Reform Issue Team, invites interested Grassroots North Shore supporters to sign up. The Team is working on arranging a Zoom meeting with State Senator Alberta Darling and welcomes everyone to participate. Details of the meeting will be announced to those who sign up as soon as they are available.

There are going to be seven candidates on the ballot for the office of Superintendent of Public Instruction. Our page with links to candidate's campaign sites is now up so that you can find out something about each candidates' positions. You can also watch a forum with them, sponsored by the League of Women Voters of Wisconsin and Wisconsin Public Education Network and originally held on January 7, 20221.

And don't forget the People's Map Commission hearing on Thursday, January 14. You can participate by submitting comments or just registrating for the public hearing (required).

Two candidates have prevailed in the February 16 primary. Below you will find their names, links to the candidate statement they submitted to Grassroots North Shore, plus a link to their campaign websites and/or Facebook pages.

Grassroots North Shore will hold a candidate forum, moderated by Pablo Muirhead, Shorewood School Board member, on Sunday, March 14, on Zoom. Please RSVP to receive the link information.

This calendar will list the meetings for the Issue Teams. To sign up to attend a meeting, click the appropriate meeting listed below.

Issue teams are forming around topics of interest within the Grassroots North Shore community. Each team will host a monthly Zoom meeting featuring a speaker followed by a discussion. You can sign up for an Issue Team meeting on our calendar page. We have issue teams forming around Fair Maps and Voting Rights, Criminal Justice Reform, and Violence Prevention. 

If you'd like to lead an Issue Team on some other topic, please contact Paul Geenen at [email protected].

This section of the Elections 2021 site includes information about the candidates in each of these categories. In many cases, the races are uncontested and may therefore not be included on the ballots for the primaries on February 16. Wherever possible, there will be links to online information provided by the candidates' campaigns.

• Candidates for Superintendent of Public Instruction
  
  
• Milwaukee County Municipal Candidates
  
  
• Milwaukee County Judicial Candidates
  
  
• Ozaukee County Municipal Candidates
  
  
• Ozaukee County Judicial Candidates
  
  
• School Board Candidates
  
  

Return to the presentation sign-up page.

Bill Holahan takes us through the most recent jobs report, for a Mythbusters segment on the economy. It's not good news for the country, or for Donald Trump. After explaining why, Bill goes into the remedy for this malaise, and that cure is electing Joe Biden. Bill has the numbers on that.

Where to Drop Off Your Ballot

State Superintendent of Public Instruction

Grassroots North Shore is pleased to endorse Dr. Jill Underly for State Superintendent of Public Instruction. Dr. Underly has worked across many levels of education, as a high school and middle school social studies teacher, a University of Wisconsin College of Letters & Science academic advisor, 5 years as a Title I Consultant and assistant manager at the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction, an elementary principal and Director of Instruction, and most recently, as the Superintendent of the Pecatonica School District. Grassroots North Shore endorses her for Superintendent of Public Instruction for her breadth of experience, and for her opposition to the funding of private schools with public money, which diverts much-needed resources from already-underfunded public school systems.

Milwaukee County Circuit Court, Branch 3

Grassroots North Shore endorses Katie Kegel for Branch 3 of the Milwaukee County Circuit Court for her fierce defense of all those who come to her for help and her fresh approach to sentencing. Ms. Kegel's advocacy for sentencing innovation such as deferred prosecutions, restorative justice, treatment courts, and other alternatives that avoid destroying people even before they can come before the court, reflect the goals of Grassroots North Shore for a fairer, more supportive justice system.

Because we cannot be certain that voting in person on Election Day will be safe either for voters or for poll workers, we urge everyone to plan to vote by absentee ballot. (If it is safe, you don't have to use the absentee ballot so you can still vote in person if you prefer.) The dates of the elections are August 11 for the partisan primary and November 3 for the national general election. 

Requesting an absentee ballot online can be frustrating, but it does not have to be. The best way to accomplish the task is to use your smartphone or tablet. In the following illustration, a red arrow signifies a field you must complete. A blue arrow signifies the action to take when you have completed the screen.

Step 1: use an up-to-date browser (older ones are not well supported) and go to myvote.wi.gov.

Step 2: Choose "Vote Absentee" from the menu. The screen should look something like this illustration but it may be formatted differently depending on the device you are using:

Step 3: On the next screen, enter your name and date of birth. The system will then check to make sure you are a registered voter.

Step 4: Assuming you are a registered voter, you will next need to verify your name and address:

Step 5: Select the address you want your absentee ballot sent to. In most instances, you will choose your home address, but college students might well choose an address that is not the one they use when they're at school:

Step 6: On this screen you will choose the election(s) for which you want to vote with an absentee ballot. At this point in the year, you are required to request an absentee ballot for BOTH the August and the November elections. But remember that you can decide not to use the absentee ballot you receive in the mail. You can instead, if you choose, vote in person on election day.

Step 7: You will now be asked to upload a photo ID, usually your drivers license – but NOT A SELFIE!. (Here's a list of acceptable photo IDs.) If you have already done this before, you probably will not have to do it again. But some people have reported that they have needed to complete this step a second time, even though they used the system to request an absentee ballot in the past. Also, if you are using a computer with this system, you will need to take a photo of your ID, send it to yourself (sharing it and emailing it to yourself is usually the simplest method). Then save the photo from your email inbox. At that point, you can use the "Add Files +" button (see below) to upload your picture. If you are having trouble with the photo ID part of the process, please contact the Voter Protection Hotline at 608-336-3232.

If you are using a smart phone or tablet, the screen should look something like this:

After you click the button, the screen should display the following: 

Using the camera in your device, take a picture of your photo ID and then click on "Use Photo."

Step 8: Congratulations! You're done.

Here's a video from the Democratic Party of Wisconsin that shows the steps on a smartphone. For some reason, the sound doesn't play for me (your results may vary) but the dynamic pictures of the screens are very clear. And here's another video, from Citizen Action of Wisconsin. It was made for the April 7 election, but the steps remain the same for every election. Just remember to choose "all elections this calendar year" rather than the April 7 election which is, of course, over and done with!

If you'd prefer to use another method, you can

• Download and print a form, print a copy of your photo ID, and mail both documents to your municipal clerk. You can look up the clerk's name and address on myvote.wi.gov or find it on your municipality's website. Instead of putting your request form in the US mail, you can use a secure dropbox at your village or city hall to turn the documents in.
  
  
• Call, email or fax your municipal clerk. You can find contact information on your municipality's website or on myvote.wi.gov.