Senate Author of Voter ID Bill Admits He Has No Evidence of Fraud

MADISON, Wis. — In response to One Wisconsin Now’s simple open records request of the author of Wisconsin’s unconstitutional voter ID law for “all evidence in possession by your office of voter fraud in the state of Wisconsin”, Sen. Joe Leibham provided an analysis of the state open records law, but no proof.

One Wisconsin Now Executive Director Scot Ross commented, “Yet another top lawmaker, this time the lead Senate author of the unconstitutional voter ID law, has been forced to admit that their efforts to make it harder for legal Wisconsin voters to exercise their right to the franchise are based on nothing but unsupported accusations and misinformation.”

In addition to Leibham, Joint Committee on Finance co-chair Senator Alberta Darling and Assistant Senate Republican Leader Glenn Grothman admitted, when challenged, that they also lacked any proof to back up public allegations they made about voting impropriety. One Wisconsin Now has also written Assembly Speaker and advocate of eliminating same day voter registration, Rep. Robin Vos, requesting he provide proof to back up his recent public statements alleging voting impropriety. Vos continues to refuse to respond.

In a letter responding to Sen. Leibham’s admission that his office lacks any documentation of voting impropriety in Wisconsin, Ross wrote, “Posing for holy pictures, as you did at your press conference on the front lawn of the family of the young man studying to become a priest that you falsely accused of voting impropriety, was bad enough. It is appalling that the author of legislation that could deny an estimated 300,000 legal voters access to the franchise, ostensibly to prevent voting impropriety, would as you have admitted not have a single document in their office to justify a heavy handed, and unconstitutional, voter identification law.”

He concluded, “Once again, the real fraud in Wisconsin today is being committed by legislators like Senator Leibham knowingly spreading unsubstantiated allegations to justify their manipulation of voting laws. It is apparently too much to ask these politicians to put a higher priority on upholding state constitutional protections for the right to vote than protecting their own partisan political self interest.”