Overview
- The Milwaukee Election Commission reported a small trickle of absentee ballots on Election Day followed by 269 delivered the next morning in what officials called a highly unusual pattern.
- State law requires absentee ballots to reach the polling place by 8 p.m. on Election Day, so the late arrivals are ineligible even though many had Election Day or earlier postmarks or no postmark.
- The commission opened a joint review with the U.S. Postal Service, and director Paulina Gutierrez said some voters did everything right yet lost their vote because the mail arrived too late.
- In Madison, poll workers counted 23 absentee ballots that reached four polling places after the 8 p.m. cutoff, the clerk notified the state, and the Dane County canvass will decide whether to include them.
- Wisconsin courts have allowed canvassers to count certain late ballots under a substantial compliance standard, and central-count cities like Milwaukee and Wauwatosa have used that process, while precinct-count cities like Madison face stricter delivery-to-poll rules.