Posted on 01/01/2012 11:35:51 AM PST by afraidfortherepublic
Recall activists who on Thursday were denied a chance to intervene in a lawsuit over procedures for vetting recall signatures said Friday they'd appeal that ruling and are asking a judge for a stay in the lawsuit, pending their appeal.
Jeremy Levinson, attorney for recall groups targeting Gov. Scott Walker, Lt. Gov. Rebecca Kleefisch and three Republican state senators, had sought to make the groups, and some individuals connected with them, parties in a case brought by Walker's campaign committee and Stephan Thompson, state GOP executive director, against the state Government Accountability Board.
Waukesha County Circuit Court Judge J. Mac Davis on Thursday denied their motion to intervene.
The GOP suit asked a for a court order to the accountability board, which must rule on whether there are enough valid signatures to force public officials into recall elections, to look for and eliminate duplicate signatures, clearly fake names and illegible addresses. A hearing in the case is scheduled for Thursday, but that could be delayed if Davis agreed to grant the stay.
Accountability board attorney Michael Haas said Friday that workers could flag apparently fictitious names and illegible addresses, and accountability board staff could recommend those signatures be stricken from petitions. But he said duplicate signatures "would be what would require the most work and resources" to catch.
"Obviously," he added, "we will comply with any decision by the court."
The Recall campaigns were launched Nov. 15 against Walker, Kleefisch and four GOP senators, though only three of the senatorial recall campaigns were represented by Levinson — those against GOP Sens. Pam Galloway of Wausau, Terry Moulton of Chippewa Falls and Van Wanggaard of Racine. Signatures are due to the accountability board Jan. 17 in the recalls.
The lawsuit, filed Dec. 15 in Waukesha County, can be brought in one of the most Republican counties in the state because of a change in state law earlier this year by GOP lawmakers and Walker that allowed lawsuits to be brought against the state outside Dane County, the seat of state government. Republicans argued that Dane County judges are too liberal. Judge Davis used to be a Republican state senator.
Levinson said that same law allows his clients to file their appeal in Madison-based District 4 of the state appeals court. He said they'd file the appeal on the next day that court is open, probably Tuesday.
Levinson had said Thursday that he didn't think an appeal of Davis' ruling would be worthwhile, but he said legal research Friday convinced him otherwise, and his clients decided to go ahead.
Without the recall groups in the case, Levinson's pleading says, "Win or lose, such proceedings give Scott Walker's campaign committee a stage and a megaphone to continue disparaging and impugning Wisconsin's constitutional recall process and the integrity of the GAB's administration of elections. Absent a competing view point, this will harm the public interest regardless of the outcome of the case."
Told of the filing, Ben Sparks, communications director of the state Republican Party, said:
"The Republican Party of Wisconsin is committed to ensuring that Wisconsin electors are not disenfranchised during this recall process.
"The Democrats continue to show they’re committed to preserving the status quo, where a man can sign a recall petition 80 times. This frivolous attempt to intervene in this lawsuit only reinforces their willingness to force this baseless recall on Wisconsin voters at any cost."
The recall efforts mark the state’s second big round this year, in the wake of battles over the budget and limitations to public-employee collective bargaining last winter and spring.
Three Democratic and six Republican senators were targeted in last summer's elections; two Republicans were voted out of office, reducing the GOP majority in the Senate to a narrow 17-16 margin.
I’d like to see them at least throw out all of the “Mickey Mouse”, “Donald Duck” and “Adolf Hitler” signatures on the petitions. They just don’t pass the smell test with me.
Wisconsin “Making the GAB do its Job” Lawsuit Ping
If you would like your name added to, or deleted from, this Wisconsin interest ping list, just send a FReep mail to me and it shall be done.
I agree, but we are required to count them as write in votes and report them to the canvas as election inspectors. It’s something peculiar about Wisconsin.
I often wonder what would happen if enough people wrote in Mickey Mouse that it would be the majority of votes cast? They’d have to scrounge around and find a law that says that a fictional character cannot be elected. Believe me, it would make the election inspectors’ jobs easier on election night as we are consolidating our data, if they didn’t allow those bogus names.
Of course, you never can tell when it might be a real person. I went to high school with a young man named Sandy Claus. Real name. Real person.
I know what you mean. I went to high school with a guy named Dick Tracy.
When I lived overseas (Laos) in my teens I knew a guy named Rick Shaw and a girl named Libby Glass.
A perfect reason why you just can’t disallow crazy names unless you can prove that there is no one living at the address provided.
When I was in college at UC Berkeley, I had a sorority sister who used to “collect” unusual names. (She worked in the registrar’s office.) The one I remember the best was “Mary Beth Overfelt”. Poor girl was blackballed from more than one sorority just because of her name (considered scandalous in the ‘50s). All the girls whispered that it was lucky that she was a girl ‘cause she could get married and lose that unfortunate surname. :^) I’m sure that she was probably very nice and not a “round-heels” at all.
Yes, it will take marginally more work to eliminate duplicate signatures. But the way to do this, just in case the board does not realize we are in the age of computers, is to enter all the legible names with addresses into a computer database and to flag those that are illegible or without addresses. Then sort the database first by last name, then by first name, then by address and look for dupplicate names and addresses and duplicate names with different addresses eliminating the former and checking the latter. Finally, sort purged database by precinct and have the computer compare the segmented database against the database of registered voters for the precinct again eliminating those that do not meet that requirement. Put the segmented databases back together and have the computer determine the number of names of valid voters who signed the petitions. If the numbers is above the minimum required, the recall goes forward. If it is not above the minimum, the recall does not go forward.
Finally, print the names of those who signed multiple petitions and those who were not registered voters who signed petitions in the newspaper.
Also put the database of those who validly and who invalidly signed the petitions online for inspection.
Not sure what is so tough. These guys are organizing parties with like 80 people, each of them signing each other petitions generating 6400 signatures. Should be easy to catch....and prosecute.
Good plan. I’m sure that Walker’s people (and also the TParty people indendently) are planning to do this. But, it’s really the job of the GAB, and it is disgusting and disheartening that they refuse to do it.
Libby Glass was the first girl I ever had a date with. Believe me I was not pleased with her choice of a date for the Sadie Hawkins Day Dance. The teen dance was up in Vientiane, Laos. In between me being asked and my Mom accepting for me and the dance we moved way down south to Savannakhet, Laos and I thought, mistakenly, that I had escaped my cruel fate. Because it involved me having to get on an Air America Milk run flight to get there. My Mom made sure I was on a flight up there. Drats! I spent some time water proofing, with wax, a box of matches, made sure I had my trusty knife and a bunch of twine with me on that flight. I was praying we would crash in the jungle! LOL
Libby, was at that time, a plain Jane - don’t know how she eventually turned out. I had never danced before and the most popular song that was played (over and over) at the dance was “The Lion Sleeps Tonight” and I was wishing I was in the jungle!
How do you dance to “Lion...”?
Oh, those teen age dances. What memories. My grandchildrenn are going through that phase now. It’s funny that my most awkwardly social grandson loves the dances. Probably because his mom enrolled him in “Cotillion” as a 6th grader, so he knows exactly what to do as a 9th grader. Next year he wants to volunteer as a Cotillion monitor — an older boy who helps keep order and demonstrates how to behave to the younger members.
There is an advantage to growing up in the south!
I don’t think any of us knew we couldn’t dance to “The Lion ...” LOL Can you believe they also played a few Polka Tunes also. We were way behind the times in Laos in 1964.
We did not know a band called the Beatles even existed. The first time I heard one of their songs I was on my way to go back to the states to go to school. My mother and her best friend and her son had escorted us on a flight to Hong Kong. We stayed in the President Hotel and our Mothers took us down to one of the lounges in the hotel one evening. There were 4 very nice looking Chinese girls on stage playing Beatles Songs, same type hair and all. They were very good. When I got back to the States I finally heard the songs on the radio and saw a few pictures and actually believed I had seen the Beatles in Hong Kong. LOL - How wrong I was!
The court squabbles continue.....here’s hoping it’s moot. I was at the Milwaukee Airport today and the gals at the Recall Walker table were being ignored...not a single signer in the few hours I was there. There is also a park on a main drag near my home where they’ve been pretty much camped out for weeks -totally abandoned now.
Give me a break! Transfer it to an Excel spreadsheet and Access database and I'll find the damn dupes for them.
Exactly right!
If the GAB doesn’t have anyone with the expertise to do this, what in God’s name are they being paid for? Shut them done and start from scratch!
That’s great news.
You might have the REAL reason why they don’t want reasonable checking done.... such checks might result in prosecutions!
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