All eyes are on Wisconsin. We are told we are the ultimate swing state. We are divided right down the middle and the winner of the November election will have a razor thin margin. The purpose of this narrative is to shape expectations and groom us to passively accept an implausible Biden win. If we fortify our elections against all of the opportunities for cheating that currently exist, a close election is improbable. Until we correct the systemic problems, we will remain a magnet for dirty money and dirty schemes. A robber does not enter a house that is guarded by a strong man. A robber enters an unguarded house.
Florida is a step ahead of us in doing the work necessary to guarantee election integrity. Governor Ron DeSantis and the Florida legislature made secure, transparent elections an administrative priority over the past few years. They took a proactive approach to addressing any issues because they understand that voter confidence in the integrity of elections is essential to maintaining our democratic form of government.
Strengthening Florida’s election laws required ending ballot harvesting, strengthening cyber defenses, requiring voter rolls to be reviewed and updated annually, strengthening voter ID requirements for mail in ballots, establishing an Office of Election Crimes and Security, prohibiting unsolicited mass mailing of ballots, and prohibiting private money from the administration of elections.
Predictably some liberals screamed voter suppression to distract from the important work being done. The Governor and legislature took great care to protect every eligible voter’s right to vote and to protect the vulnerable from undue burden. They provided exemptions for immediate family assisting loved ones and ballots collected during supervised voting in assisted living facilities and nursing homes.
The results speak for themselves. Once the integrity of Florida’s elections was secured, Florida moved from a battleground, swing state to solidly red. Some say that the population of Florida has been changing in recent years from liberal to more conservative. More likely, with the election system cleaned up and cheating locked out, the will of people can now be clearly expressed through election results.
Wisconsin would do well to use Florida as a model. Our current election system has multiple avenues for cheating. They make our elections unverifiable and we will have no reason to believe November’s election result if these issues go unaddressed. They include:
- An estimated 4 million ineligible voters’ names are maintained by the Wisconsin Elections Commission on the registered voter list. There is no defensible reason to keep these names on the list and they are a reservoir available for hacking by sophisticated internet criminals. These names must be purged from the list immediately.
- An estimated 250,000 driver’s licenses have been issued to non-citizens who are here legally. There is no mechanism in place to prevent these licenses from being used as ID to vote.
- Anyone can declare themselves homeless and vote without ID if a social service agency certifies they are homeless. They can list a park bench as their residence.
- People who are “indefinitely confined” can bypass voting requirements. Criteria for this designation must be clarified and strengthened.
- Ballot drop boxes are likely to be brought back by the liberal Supreme Court creating chain of custody and cheating risks.
- 38 municipalities in Wisconsin have “central counts” meaning ballots are transported to a central location for counting. Rules about who can handle the ballots and chain of custody are insufficient. All ballots should be counted at the polling place where they are cast.
- Internet transmissions of ballot counts from polling place to county to state are opportunities for cybercrime. Cybersecurity must be strengthened.
- Non-resident college students are legally allowed to vote in Wisconsin. Massive get out the vote efforts must be closely monitored and the role of college administrators needs to be evaluated.
This list of deficiencies is far from complete but provides those with sinister intent ample opportunity to throw an election.
Names like “election denier,” “conspiracy theorist,” and “MAGA extremist” are used by the corrupt media and others to silence citizens who are concerned about clean elections. We have been told time and again that our elections are safe and secure because there has been “no evidence of widespread voter fraud.” This effort to distract sidesteps the issue. Wisconsin’s election system is not designed to prevent cheating to the extent humanly possible.
The work I know best provides a useful analogy for the kind of rigor we must apply to our elections. As Vice President for Patient Care at St. Mary’s Hospital in Madison, I was administratively responsible for our surgical services. When we constructed a new surgical suite with 18 operating rooms, we were moving into a facility with many new workflows and state of the art technology, much of which was new to us. Before we occupied our new space, we conducted a “failure modes analysis.” Every discipline that had a role in the new space came together to brainstorm what could possibly go wrong. The surgeons, anesthesiologists, nurses, techs, pharmacists, lab techs, biomedical engineers, maintenance workers, and housekeepers all participated to ensure we achieved our primary goal – delivering exceptional clinical outcomes to those who entrusted their lives to us in the safest possible environment. We did not wait until someone was harmed or died to discover we had a problem. Proper system design places great emphasis on engineering every conceivable failure out of the system.
Wisconsin’s election system defects have nothing to do with finding evidence of widespread fraud after the election is over. Recounts are not the issue. These deflections are intended to make vigilant, concerned citizens look foolish and mask real problems. The central issue is proactively verifiable elections to prevent cheating before it is buried where it will never be found. Governor Evers and our legislators refuse to acknowledge and address the serious problems that make our elections vulnerable to cheating. With the Governor and legislators derelict in their duty, and the absence of honest, investigative journalism, our only recourse is to make it clear we will not tolerate inaction. We start by making everyone – family, friends, neighbors, colleagues – aware of this serious threat to our freedom and continue with our unrelenting, unified voice insisting on immediate reform. Wisconsin is not purple. Wisconsin has a corruptible election system.
