Felons served as election deputies

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
Oct. 22, 2004

TOM KERTSCHER

Two men deputized by the City of Milwaukee to register voters are convicted felons who are on probation and are therefore not eligible to register people to vote, court records show.

Both felons became so-called deputy registrars through Project Vote, whose voter registration activities are being investigated by the Racine County district attorney's office.

Told Friday about the probation status of the two Milwaukee men, Milwaukee Election Commissioner Lisa Artison could not say how many voter registration applications they had submitted. But she said in an e-mail that a voter 'cannot be disenfranchised' because of errors by election officials or deputy registrars.

The work of deputy registrars is important because local election clerks generally do not try to confirm the identity of the person named on voter registration applications that are submitted by the deputies.

By contrast, election clerks must see proof of identification from a person seeking to be registered if their application was submitted by someone who is not a deputy registrar.

Local election clerks give deputy registrars some instruction and make them swear an oath to work honestly, but no criminal background checks are done.

"It's like an onion, with every layer you strip off you're finding another layer of corruption here," said Chris Lato, spokesman for the Republican Party of Wisconsin. "Clearly there are flaws in the system when felons can apparently very easily get involved in the Wisconsin election process."

The Republican Party held a news conference this week to highlight a felon in the Dane County Jail who tried to vote by absentee ballot - though the attempt had already been caught by jail and election officials.

People convicted of felonies become eligible to vote only after completing their sentence, including any probation or supervision. Deputy registrars must be eligible to vote.

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