Elections chief Meagan Wolfe gets extra security while Donald Trump foments false accusations

MADISON - Seven months before Wisconsin voters cast ballots for the next president, the presumptive GOP nominee is publicly targeting the battleground state's top election official and pressuring top Republicans in the state to remove her before November.

Former President Donald Trump's decision to attack Wisconsin Elections Commission administrator Meagan Wolfe comes as the Wisconsin governor has already added security measures for the state's chief election administrator in light of continued threats against her.

The former president is publicly and falsely accusing Wolfe of rigging this year's election four years after Trump and his allies sought to meddle with another battleground state's elections by pressuring Georgia's secretary of state to overturn Trump's loss to President Joe Biden there and terrorized two Georgia poll workers, leading to election subversion charges and a civil defamation lawsuit.

"Meagan Wolfe will try and steal another election," Trump said in an interview Tuesday on Green Bay-based WTAQ. "Robin Vos should terminate Meagan Wolfe and they should put somebody in who's going to be fair, not for the Republicans — just fair. And if they do that, we're going to win the election by a lot in Wisconsin."

"I've given out big ship contracts ... a lot of big contracts that nobody else would have given to Wisconsin I gave and it never made sense to me. Now, we find out why. No, she should be gone."

Election officials and experts interviewed by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel warn Trump's rhetoric could lead to fewer people entering the election administration field, more distrust of election outcomes and, at worst, threats to workers' physical safety.

Wolfe in a statement to the Journal Sentinel did not respond to Trump's latest comments but in it countered his characterization of Wisconsin's election administration as a "crime scene."

“Every day I see firsthand evidence that our elections are run accurately and with integrity at the state level and by our local election officials, who do an incredible job registering voters, issuing ballots, and managing the voter rolls in each of our state’s 1,850 cities, towns, and villages," Wolfe said.

"There are many times I wish I could respond more directly to defend myself, my staff, Wisconsin’s local election officials, and the upstanding way in which we administer elections in this state. However, my role is nonpartisan, and my focus is on impartially administering the upcoming elections."

Wolfe said moving forward, she hopes she and other election officials "are given the support we need to prepare for November, when we will administer elections fairly and ensure every eligible voter can exercise their rights."

Wolfe has become a symbol of Trump's false 2020 election narrative. She represents a commission that has been under fire for four years by those who say they believe in false claims put forward by Trump to convince supporters he won an election he lost and because of policies commissioners approved during the 2020 presidential election to navigate the coronavirus pandemic.

President Joe Biden won Wisconsin by about 21,000 votes in 2020, a defeat that was key to Trump's reelection loss that year. The election outcome was confirmed by judges, state audits, Trump-financed recounts, a Republican-led review and a study from a conservative law firm.

Even so, Trump has continued to claim he won Wisconsin's 2020 presidential election and is now blaming Wolfe by name for his loss.

"Every time that they repeat these lies about Meagan Wolfe, her security is jeopardized," said Ann Jacobs, a Democratic member of the Wisconsin Elections Commission who was chairwoman during the 2020 election. "Election work never used to be something involving risk of safety and yet here we are."

"I am aware of significant threats that have been made to Meagan and I am grateful that security is available to her," Jacobs said.

Gov. Tony Evers approved the additional security measures for Wolfe and is "continuing to evaluate and discuss additional efforts aimed at ensuring Administrator Wolfe’s safety as she continues to do her important work," according to Evers' spokeswoman Britt Cudaback.

“Donald Trump’s most recent comments about Administrator Wolfe are vile and disturbing. He’s also wrong. Administrator Wolfe serves with integrity, she is trusted and respected by her colleagues both in Wisconsin and beyond, and I continue to have full confidence in her leadership," the Democratic governor said in a statement. "I can’t say the same about Donald Trump."

"Republicans’ rhetoric and actions have consequences — they have not only undermined basic tenets of our democracy and the integrity of our elections, but by participating in targeting, harassing, and threatening dedicated election officials for simply doing their jobs, including Administrator Wolfe, Republicans have enabled and emboldened others to do the same," Evers said. "It's irresponsible, and it’s dangerous."

Wolfe may be the first in her position to receive such security.

"I know it's become more of an issue in recent years for similar election officials across the country," said Michael Haas, the first administrator of the Wisconsin Elections Commission. "It was certainly not an issue when I was there."

Haas, who was fired in 2018 by Republican lawmakers under similar criticism and now works as Madison's city attorney, said even with the turmoil that surrounded his departure, "nobody ever got to the point that anybody thought that I needed to have security."

Riley Vetterkind, spokesman for the state elections commission, said addressing concerns over personal safety is a "new reality" for election officials in the state and nationally. He said Wolfe and commissioners receive additional security measures "when the need arises."

Rhetoric 'can invite extreme responses'

Such rhetoric about Wolfe and other nonpartisan election workers is concerning because it "can invite extreme responses by some members of the public," said Marek Posard, a sociologist with the nonpartisan think tank RAND corporation and a Milwaukee native.

"After all, who would want to help administer elections in Ozaukee, Dodge, or Dane county under these conditions?" said Posard, who co-authored a recent analysis studying election threats and voter trust ahead of the 2024 election.

"... the former President’s rhetoric obscures the rare cases where there are illegal attempts to interfere in the U.S. elections. The U.S. has a judicial process to address these issues," Posard said. "While rare, they do happen, but it’s not particularly helpful for American democracy for candidates to throw around general claims of election interference without evidence."

The November matchup of Biden and Trump is likely to again be decided by a slim margin, with the campaigns of each candidate scrapping for every vote they can get in this purple state.

A February survey of registered voters nationwide by the Marquette Law School Poll showed Biden and Trump in a dead-even matchup. In the most recent poll of Wisconsin voters, Marquette pollsters found the same even split. As of now, Trump has voter enthusiasm on his side compared to Democratic voters, according to Marquette polling.

Don Millis, the Republican chairman of the Wisconsin Elections Commission, said Trump should be focusing on issues voters care about.

"There are lots of important issues that the President (Trump) should be running on. New inflation numbers came out today. He should be talking about the economy. He should be talking about Israel. He should be talking about issues that people care about," Millis said. "And I think one of the issues that people who he's got to convince, or the issue that those people don't care about, is Meagan Wolfe."

"2020 was a challenging year in a lot of respects because of COVID. And you had Wisconsin and other states trying to do the best they could to deal with the situation. If there was a crime scene, I haven't seen any evidence," Millis said.

Republican state Sen. Dan Knodl, chairman of the Senate committee overseeing elections, said he disagrees Wolfe will affect the election outcome, but he said he believes she should be removed and brings scrutiny on herself by not leaving her post.

"I'm going to be more forward-looking. The coming up election will not be rigged. It will not be stolen. And as long as the clerks and the elections commission stay within the statutory requirements, all should be fine," Knodl said.

"(Wolfe) has made the choice to keep herself as a focus by remaining in office after her term has expired, after the Senate has voted to say that her term is over, and that she should not be in that position," Knodl said.

In September, the state Senate in a party-line vote rejected the appointment of Wolfe. Minutes after the vote, Democratic Attorney General Josh Kaul filed a lawsuit asking a judge to block Republican legislative leaders from appointing a new administrator and to declare Wolfe administrator, arguing the Senate did not have the power to oust her. A judge ultimately sided with Kaul and Wolfe remains in her job as the lawmakers appeal the ruling.

"So as long as that's the situation that she's in, and she continues to keep herself in that position, that will continue to bring up questions," Knodl said.

Knodl also blamed Evers for not doing more to address trust in elections by vetoing some Republican-authored bills, including one that would have required the state Department of Transportation to note on new identification cards issued to non-U.S. citizens that the card is not valid to use for voting purposes.

"I think the governor has some responsibility here that I think he has failed on in not signing on to some of these bills that we have put on his desk to take away those questions," Knodl said.

But Barry Burden, University of Wisconsin-Madison's Elections Research Center director, said the main source of distrust in elections are messages from political leaders to their followers indicating they should be distrustful.

"As the most important voice in one of the major parties, Trump has a unique ability to undermine public confidence through his rhetoric, even though it is often detached from facts about the situation," Burden said.

"Confidence in election systems is necessary for a democracy to function in a healthy fashion. False allegations to serve a politician's self-interest might help him energize some supporters but it harms the integrity of the electoral process."

Kathy Bernier, a former Republican lawmaker and election clerk, said she disagreed with some measures allowed during the 2020 election but has spent four years trying to persuade members of her party to view the election landscape accurately.

She pointed to allowing non-election workers help administer elections in Green Bay as a problem, as well as a pandemic-driven decision by the Wisconsin Elections Commission to advise clerks to ignore a state law requiring poll workers known as special voting deputies to try to visit the nursing home facilities twice to assist with voting before sending the residents absentee ballots, in order to ensure the residents could cast ballots in time for the election.

"Mistakes were made, but it didn't cost Donald Trump the election because that has been proven over and over again," she said. "If he can't win in 2024, under the current circumstances, under the current practices and procedures, it's about him and no one other than him."

Molly Beck can be reached at molly.beck@jrn.com.

This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Wisconsin elections chief Wolfe gets extra security as Trump attacks