Wisconsin judge defies Democratic attorney general with last-minute voting rule change

Wisconsin election officials will now be required to provide disabled Wisconsin voters, who legally cannot vote independently, an absentee ballot via email.

Dane County Circuit Court Judge Everett Mitchell ordered last week that voters with disabilities such as blindness or other physical disabilities that impair one's dexterity are entitled to vote electronically. Voters will still need to turn in the ballots by mail or deliver it to a local clerk’s office because they cannot submit their ballot via email.

Mitchell’s temporary order will be in place through the November election, according to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel . It’s a move that Wisconsin Attorney General Josh Kaul, a Democrat, opposed, citing security risks and voter confusion just four months out from the general election.

“This court cannot change the rules of the election now ... regardless of how hard or easy it is to make those changes,” Assistant Attorney General Karla Keckhaver told the judge.

State election officials will now need to act quickly to enact Mitchell’s order so long as it is not appealed to higher courts. A Wisconsin Department of Justice attorney representing the Wisconsin Elections Commission also agreed with Kaul that the move could create security risks and give election officials too short of a time line to implement ahead of November.

The move comes after Disability Rights Wisconsin, the League of Women Voters, and four disabled people filed a lawsuit in April arguing some disabled people cannot fill out a ballot without assistance, infringing on their right to cast a secret ballot.

“It is a good step for these voters to be able to vote privately and independently, but it's definitely not the end goal," Disability Rights Wisconsin Public Policy Manager Lisa Hassenstab told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. “The end goal is for the entire process of receiving, marking, and returning a ballot to be truly accessible for voters with print disabilities.”

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Wisconsin previously allowed voters to request an absentee ballot electronically from home and mail it back to clerks until 2011, but that changed under then-Gov. Scott Walker, a Republican, who signed a bill that changed the rules so only military and overseas voters could use that method.

Other states such as Colorado, Nevada, and North Carolina have similar ballot rules in place that allow for ballots to be emailed to those with disabilities. Since 1986, the Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act has required each state to allow military and overseas voters to cast ballots. The law was updated in 2000 to allow those voters to receive their ballots electronically and return them through mail.