GOP County Clerk Dinged For Past Elections Handling “Finds” 7,381 Votes For Prosser
Posted by Phoenix Woman on April 7, 2011
Photo by Invisible Hour (Flickr Creative Commons)
Something is stinky in Waukesha County, Wisconsin. A whole bunch of people are calling shenanigans over this:
Waukesha County Clerk Kathy Nickolaus just announced that she forgot to report votes from the City of Brookfield on election night, giving Justice David Prosser an additional 7,381 vote edge, ending any free recount possibilities, and giving Prosser the election.
The scenario, given the cast of characters, requires one to suspend disbelief to accept it as true.
Nickolaus, a highly partisan Republican who formerly worked in the Republican Assembly caucus, has been under fire for insisting on keeping voting records in her own personal computer rather than using a more sophisticated system most of the rest of Wisconsin uses.
Who brings us the news? Not a legitimate media outlet, but Christian Schneider, an operative of the right-wing Wisconsin Public Research Institute. The first “breaking news” came from the National Review Online. How did he get the news?
Nickolaus said in a news conference tonight that “human error” was responsible for her failure to include City of Brookfield totals in the vote counts she reported for Waukesha County on election night.
“It was human error … which I apologize for … which is common,” she said somewhat haltingly.
In fact, earlier in the day, before the magic laptop votes appeared, One Wisconsin Now noted the really odd poll results pattern in Waukesha County:
On Tuesday, shockingly-large turnout suddenly emerged from Waukesha County, which did not comport with either the results of previous spring elections, or even internal estimates from city officials mid-day. In fact, a Waukesha City Deputy Clerk said at 1:18pm that turnout was very typical, predicting somewhere between 20 to 25 percent. As Tuesday night wore on, reporting in Waukesha County stopped altogether for hours, leaving observers to wonder what was going on. Then suddenly, results suggesting massive turnout started to pour in rapidly with Prosser adding dramatically to his total by a 73-27 percent margin.
One Wisconsin Now estimates put overall turnout near 38 percent, a wild outlier to historical data and the earlier mid-day estimation of Waukesha’s own officials. In April 2009, turnout was 20 percent; April 2008, turnout was 22 percent and in April 2007, turnout was 24 percent. All of these elections had hotly-contested Supreme Court races as well.
And when you add in the fact that Waukesha County Clerk Kathy Nickolaus, a former staffer for the Republican State Assembly Caucus when Prosser led that caucus, has been chastised before and repeatedly for her secrecy and her rather hinky handling of election data, suddenly things start to look REALLY suspicious.
Here’s what super-duper stinky about this: If these magic laptop votes, discovered two days after the election, are allowed to stand, they make it so that Prosser’s margin is just large enough to avoid an automatic recount; Kloppenburg would have to pay for one if she wanted one. How convenient — for Prosser, who used to be her boss. What a coincidence — that they would be found in a county whose voting system was run by someone known for her penchant for secrecy and cutting corners, as well as being a hardcore Republican ideologue.
(Crossposted to Renaissance Post.)
8 Responses to “GOP County Clerk Dinged For Past Elections Handling “Finds” 7,381 Votes For Prosser”
Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.
Mercury Rising 鳯女 
Charles II said
I’m not optimistic about this. The Journal-Sentinel is reporting that Prosser gained votes in a series of counties:
Also, the Democrat on the County Canvassing Board, Ramona Kitzinger, has vouched for Nickolaus. While she could be a plant, that’s going to make this more difficult to paint as purely partisan misdeed.
And Nate Silver doesn’t find it suspicious, though I doubt he’s done any detailed analysis.
I would be suspicious that this is a “Palm Beach”: a distraction to misdeeds elsewhere. The Republican pattern in past elections is, I believe, to switch Democratic votes in Republican precincts and spoil votes in Democratic precincts. While Wisconsin supposedly has a less tamper-friendly system than, say, Florida, it’s always possible to cheat. And what better way to do it than to have a high-profile pseudo-goof that takes everyone’s attention off the rest of the state?
jo6pac said
Well I’m shocked at this news but not suprised. Repugs hate to lose and will do everything to win and I’m sure the feds will not get involved as they should. This goes to show if it’s close the demodog will lose, you have to win big.
LW said
They weren’t discovered two days later. They were reported in the wee hours after the polls closed: http://brookfield-wi.patch.com/articles/brookfield-gives-prosser-nearly-11k-votes
Phoenix Woman said
Not by Nickolaus they weren’t. How one loses 24 wards on one’s computer is beyond me. (And as the article notes, these were “unofficial, unaudited results”.)
As for Nickolaus, it looks like she’s a mix of equal parts partisanship and incompetence, as the 2006 election was screwed up too: http://news.firedoglake.com/2011/04/08/kloppenburg-seeks-open-records-request-from-waukesha-county/
And even before the bombshell announcement, people had been noticing various sorts of hinkiness in Waukesha County: http://uppitywis.org/blogarticle/waukesha-republican-county-clerk-finds-7381-more-prosser-votes-h
That’s why Kloppenburg is filing an Open Records request for Waukesha County — as Prosser (aka Nickolaus’ old boss) would do if he were in this situation.
LW said
“Not by Nickolaus they weren’t”
oh, no argument there. I don’t know if she can be fired, but if she can’t, I hope she does the honorable thing and resigns. I would have done so after the press conference, were I in her shoes.
But you appear to contend that the votes exist only in her computer, and that report indicates that they exist in reality. And indeed those are unofficial counts; the whole point of canvassing is to review them so they become official counts.
A review of the whole affair is an excellent idea, however, whether or not there is a recount.
Phoenix Woman said
Nickolaus’ story gets hinkier the more it’s examined. For instance, the “I forgot to hit ‘save’ after I typed the results in Access” story makes no sense, as all versions of Access automatically save any edits:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/04/07/964645/-Kathy-Nickolaus-in-Waukesha-forgot-to-saveReally
Charles II said
LW, it’s going to take more than that.
Prosser is under a cloud. He has already identified himself as a part of the Walker movement, not as an impartial judge. This is doubly a problem because he has a background as a partisan politician. The Walker Administration is in trouble for having violated the law with the vote in the Legislature, and the issue may well come before the Supreme Court. There are lots of people who believe, rightly or wrongly, that Kloppenburg votes have been suppressed, particularly in Milwaukee (and, yes, that’s the pattern that would be predicted, per my post above).
There is a strong and growing feeling that the people running this train in Wisconsin are lawless, that they will do anything to seize power, and that the will of the people means nothing. Those are the conditions when uprisings occur.
And, you know, that’s why we have elections: so that people feel that they are being heard. Unless it can be proven to the satisfaction of everyone that this election was clean, Wisconsin is on the path to a general strike. If you don’t know what those are, I suggest you dust off your history books. They aren’t pleasant, and they often leave scars that last generations.
mahakal said
Yes, exactly.