After Tuesday night’s Wisconsin Supreme Court election, a computer error in heavily Republican Waukesha County failed to send election results for the entire City of Brookfield to the Associated Press. The error, revealed today, would give incumbent Supreme Court Justice David Prosser a net 7,381 votes against his challenger, attorney Joanne Kloppenburg. On Wednesday, Kloppenburg declared victory after the AP reported she finished the election with a 204-vote lead, out of nearly 1.5 million votes cast.
On election night, AP results showed a turnout of 110,000 voters in Waukesha County — well short of the 180,000 voters that turned out last November, and 42 percent of the county’s total turnout. By comparison, nearly 90 percent of Dane County voters who cast a ballot in November turned out to vote for Kloppenburg.
Prior to the election, Waukesha County Clerk Kathy Nickolaus was heavily criticized for her decision to keep the county results on an antiquated personal computer, rather than upgrade to a new data system being utilized statewide. Nickolaus cited security concerns for keeping the data herself — yet when she reported the data, it did not include the City of Brookfield, whose residents cast nearly 14,000 votes.
Throughout the day Thursday, official canvass numbers flipped the lead back and forth between Prosser and Kloppenburg. While many believed a recount was inevitable, the addition of the Brookfield votes for Prosser could push the justice’s lead beyond the legal threshold that would trigger an automatic recount. Under state law, Kloppenburg could still ask for a recount up to three days after the official canvass, but would have to pay for it herself.
“Waukesha County officials have announced a press conference for 5:30 CST.”
More details as they become available.
— Christian Schneider is a senior fellow at the Wisconsin Policy Research Institute.
From your lips to God's ears!
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI have to say, I'm not surprised to hear this.
On election night, I followed the returns very closely at the AP website. At around midnight, Waukesha County, which had 140 of 198 precincts reporting, suddenly went to 198 of 198 - with NO CHANGE IN THE VOTE TOTAL.
My immediate reaction was, "Huh?! How do you have 58 empty precincts in an URBAN county?"
Now we see...
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseDo you think AP hoped to engineer a Prosser concession in the face of Kloppenberg declaring victory in reliance on the AP numbers reported on election eve? That seems journalistic malpractice of the highest sort. But, sadly, to my cynical self, not out of the question.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseA link might help, don't you think?
And now, let's hear the right-wing spin machine continue to scream about tallies being suddenly "discovered" and the "obvious" voter fraud.
What's that I hear? Crickets?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseYou sure about this - this story from yesterday seems to indicate those votes were already counted, and it was fairly high turnout already -
External Link
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseSeems unlikely MFK - Waukesha reported the wrong numbers to the AP and it sounds like they admit as much - these new numbers were never reported to state officials or the media. It wasn't the AP trying to hide the ball.
But on the new numbers - I'm not seeing this information anywhere. Is any news outlet other than NRO reporting this yet? Where's the information coming from?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseGreat reporting Chris! You can take my car any time.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseIs there any better example of the hopeless incompetence of government than the fact that we are completely unable to count votes in an accurate and timely manner?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseOMG! This is awesome. Of course, the Dems have contingency plans to steal it no matter how many votes Prosser has.
My dream outcome: We win it and win it in such a way that the Left truly believes that we stole it (we don't do that) and will be so insane with rage that they swallow their tongues.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseOne lone wingnut in the state's reddest county who keeps everything on her personal computer instead of using the harder-to-hack state system miraculously finds 7,000 votes two days after the election.
Go figure.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThis development (if true) will rightly be treated as perfectly legitimate by the commenters here, Republican pundits, etc.
But if it happened the other way and Kloppenburg stood to gain 7,500+ votes from a mistake, there would be howls of complaints of "fraud." Republicans should think hard about how much they demean the system.
(And anyone who doubts what I'm saying should look at the comments on the other posts today about today's WI canvass -- immediately full of imagined claims of *Democratic* fraud.....)
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseOh, good grief. You know all of those accusations against the Dems and unions about voter fraud that have been on NRO's comments threads since yesterday? They will be eclipsed by the other side screaming about suspiciously huge computer errors in Prosser's favor.
Mind you, I'm not one of those who is convinced that voter fraud on either side decided this race, but the gander better get ready for the sauce that was ladled over the goose to get dumped upon it.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseOf course, if this had happened in the other direction, all of the people cheering now would be screaming about vote fraud.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI predict a disaster of biblical proportions. Old Testament...real wrath of God type stuff. Fire and brimstone coming down from the skies! Rivers and seas boiling! Forty years of darkness! Earthquakes, volcanoes... The dead, having been disenfranchised, rising from the grave! Human sacrifice, dogs and cats living together...mass hysteria!
All right, all right! You get the point.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuserr528 - I had noticed the exact same thing when I was watching the returns come in. I was sure there was a mistake somewhere, but figured it was just AP not updating the precinct numbers instead of the vote numbers.
Now that this info comes out, it makes total sense as they updated the precinct numbers, but didn't include any votes for those precincts.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseBWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHa!
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThanks for the endorsement Sarah!
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI think the solution, is NO MORE UNOFFICIAL VOTE TALLYS. Only official finished numbers. No more guess-estimates.
Would help with eliminating the phony "suddenly found" Democrat votes.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"Kloppenburg could still ask for a recount up to three days after the official canvass, but would have to pay for it herself." Translation: Kloppenburg would have to fund the recount, but the money will come from her left wing supporters.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseUh, Brookfield's votes were already counted. This story seems to be a little bit of a house built on sand. Wet sand. In a Thunderstorm.
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