Waukesha County Clerk Kathy Nickolaus (MICHAEL SEARS - Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel / Associated Press)
A wild swing in the vote totals has changed the face of the heated Wisconsin Supreme Court election watched across the Badger State and the nation as a test for Republicans after they unleashed a controversy over aggressive legislation stripping public employees of collective bargaining rights. At this point, there are more questions than answers.
The latest development comes in a nail-biting finish to the race between conservative incumbent Justice David Prosser and liberal challenger JoAnne Kloppenburg. Prosser was heavily favored for months with his opponent deemed a longshot at best. But the results from Tuesday’s election produced a narrow victory for Kloppenburg and a sharp rebuke for Prosser, a former Republican state legislator and an ally of GOP Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker.
Kloppenburg declared victory on Wednesday, but now the outcome has been put in doubt and potentially reversed after 7500 new votes for Prosser were “discovered” on Thursday by the Republican county clerk in heavily conservative Waukesha County. The new numbers gave Prosser just enough of a lead to escape an official recount, and he will be the winner if the revised figures stand.
Kathy Nickolaus, the clerk in Waukesha, described the phenomenon as “human error” and attributed it to her failure to save data in a computer program that records vote totals. No one else noticed the “error” until she reported it on Thursday.
Incumbent Justice David Prosser gained a 7,500-vote lead in the hotly contested state Supreme Court race Thursday after the clerk in conservative-leaning Waukesha County announced she undercounted the votes because of an inputting error.
If the new results stand, they would swing the election to Prosser after unofficial results Wednesday showed challenger JoAnne Kloppenburg was the winner with a 204-vote lead out of nearly 1.5 million votes cast.
The new totals showed Prosser with 92,263 votes in Waukesha County, while Kloppenburg had 32,758. County totals previously showed Prosser with 81,255 votes and Kloppenburg with 29,332.
Waukesha County Clerk Kathy Nickolaus said the votes from the city of Brookfield weren’t reported to The Associated Press on Tuesday because of “human error.”
“This is not a case of extra votes or extra ballots being found,” she said. “This is human error, which I apologize for.” She added that human error “is common in this process.”
The missing numbers were all from Brookfield, said Nickolaus, who said she discovered the error Wednesday. Apparently, she said, she entered the numbers into the system and failed to hit “save.”
Nickolaus said when she came in to upload the information for the statewide canvass, she noticed all of the fields and columns for the city of Brookfield results were blank.
She said the mistake occurred on the “day-to-day system” she uses in her office and had “nothing to do with the election software or system at all.”
But this is hardly the end of the story. Nickolaus, the county clerk in Republican Waukesha, has a record of significant ethical and accidental errors both in her current position and in previous jobs compiling data.
As the Wisconsin State Journal notes, she was part of an investigation into illegal use of state data for political purposes ten years ago, then just last year was rebuked for improper storage of election data that could have compromised security and performance.
Last year, county officials raised objections to her practice of storing election data off the county’s computer network, instead keeping it on computers in her office, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported.
The practice, which Nickolaus said was aimed at keeping the data more secure, prevented the county’s information technology specialists from verifying the system was fail-safe, the county’s director of administration said at the time. Auditors later recommended Nickolaus improve security and backup procedures.
In 2001, Nickolaus was granted immunity to testify about her role as a computer analyst for the Assembly Republican Caucus, then under investigation – along with the Senate Republican Caucus and the Democratic caucuses for both houses – for using state resources to secretly run campaigns.
Nickolaus, who worked for seven years as a data analyst and computer specialist for the Assembly Republican caucus, headed up an effort to develop a computer program that averaged the performance of Republicans in statewide races by ward.
Even beyond Nickolaus’ Republican ties, she actually worked for Justice Prosser during her time at the Republican Assembly caucus when Prosser was a member and Assembly Speaker. As another reporter for the Wis. State Journal reports via Twitter, Prosser was “her boss.”
Progressive groups and voting rights organizations have immediately raised questions and concerns about the “discovery” of so many Prosser votes, and just enough to tip the scales in the race. Citizen Action of Wisconsin has issued a call for an “independent” investigation by federal authorities of the situation, asking the the computers and ballots at the heart of the discrepancy be impounded.
Even more importantly, the state government is getting involved in searching for more substantive answers to the problems in Waukesha. The Government Accountability Board oversees elections in Wisconsin, and they are dispatching officials to Waukesha County and ordering Nickolaus to hold the returns and relevant datat for “public inspection. Representatives of both campaigns were also scheduled to meet with state officials and Nickolaus.
The state Government Accountability Board is dispatching officials to the Waukesha County Clerk’s Office Friday afternoon to review procedures used in tallying results of Tuesday’s Supreme Court election.
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“Because of the attention on vote totals from Brookfield, I am dispatching GAB staff to Waukesha County today to review the business processes and verify the reported results in the election for Supreme Court justice,” said Kevin Kennedy, GAB director and general counsel.
“I have been in close contact with Waukesha County Clerk Kathy Nickolaus since her news conference on Thursday, and have directed her to make the official returns from the polling places available for public inspection. These documents are public records. I believe she is now taking steps to ensure transparency and public confidence in the official results.”
A high-profile election in an atmosphere of heightened political tension.
A neck-and-neck finish, down to the proverbial wire.
A declaration of victory from one side, an “error” that leads to just enough new votes to give the opposing conservative candidate a victory.
A county election official with a recorded past of unethical behavior and sloppy performance.
John Nichols of The Nation gives the situation a dose of perspective…
Suppose the Democratic governor of Illinois had proposed radical changes in how the state operates, and suppose anger over those proposed changes inspired a popular uprising that filled the streets of every city, village and town in the state with protests. Then, suppose there was an election that would decide whether allies of the governor controlled the state’s highest court. Suppose the results of that election showed that an independent candidate who would not be in the governor’s pocket narrowly won that election.
Then, suppose it was announced by a Democratic election official in Chicago that she had found 14,000 votes in a machine-controlled ward that overwhelmingly favored the candidate aligned with the Democratic governor. And suppose the Democratic official who “found” the needed ballots for the candidate favored by the Democratic governor had previously been accused of removing election data from official computers and hiding the information on a personal computer, that the official’s actions had been censured even by fellow Democrats and that she her secretive and erratic activities had been the subject of an official audit demanded by the leadership of the Cook County Board.
Now, suppose that the number of additional votes tabulated for the governor’s candidate was precisely the amount needed to prevent the independent candidate from demanding an official recount.
Would even the most naïve Illinoisan simply accept at face value that the new count was “legitimate” or that the governor’s candidate should suddenly be presumed to have been “elected”? Not likely.
Wisconsinites should respond with equal skepticism to the news that Waukesha County Clerk Kathy Nickolaus, a former Republican legislative staffer who worked for Prosser when he served as Assembly Speaker and with Walker when he was a GOP rising star, has found all the votes that justice needs to secure his re-election and that the governor needs to claim a “win” for his agenda.
There is no need for a conspiracy theory. The facts raise the questions that lawyers, campaigners and activists are now asking.
Strange. Normally, post-election “found” votes favor Democrats. Well, I guess there’s a first time for everything.
It’s funny that this huge chunk of votes just “magically appeared” in the hands of a Republican County Clerk (previously known for shady happenings in her office)? Wonder what would have happened to all those votes if they had been Democratic? Remember: Its not who votes that counts but who counts the votes!
Nah, this story can’t be true. We all know that computers bring perfect accuracy and reliability to vote counting. Diebold told us so.
Ms. Nickolaus’ claims pegged my Bullshit Meter into – and beyond – the red zone. But this is very interesting and would seem quite damning. Those computers should be impounded and gone over by forensic experts.
“Wonder what would have happened to all those votes if they had been Democratic?”
There were thousands of votes for both candidates, just more for Prosser in the Republican-strong county.
Jr, When was the last time there were “found” votes that favored a Dem? I cant recall any. GW in Florida is the last time I remember any “found” votes. Can you enlighten me? Please? I am not trying to be sarcastic. Just searching for the answer. Apparently I havent entered the correct terms into google???
Gosh Layne, I remember one of your heroes Al Franken had lots of “found” votes at the last minute, consisting of those most reliable of Democrat constituents: the dead, the illegal, and the incarcerated.
But look on the bright side! Kloppenberg can demand a recount! Of course, since Prosser’s margin of victory seems to be so large The Klopp will have to pay for it herself. Actually, Wisconsin’s public employee unions will have to pay for it. Leaving less money available to smear Republicans!
I say haul every person working the polls in that county that night in front of a grand jury, give them immunity and let the games begin. Somebody knows something and it will come out. She could not have done this by herself.
“Jr, When was the last time there were “found” votes that favored a Dem?”
Washington Governor race between Gregoire and Rossi.
But I was wrong about this case. These actually were not found votes. They were apparently tabulated the night of the election, but the results were not saved.
When can we expect a long-winded concession speech about the rule of law and bipartisanship out of Old Kloppy? Perhaps, NEVER. Someone ought to tell the Honorable High Marxist “intellectual” union wind bag that a 200 part per million lead ain’t much to hang your hat on.
I look forward to another midnight press conference.