From the Green Lake County Dems and Friends
A Republican boondoggle has cost Wisconsin taxpayers over $2.7 million (and counting) due to the absurd review of the 2020 presidential election by former conservative Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Michael Gableman and current Republican Speaker Robin Voss.
The discredited review, in support of former President Donald Trump’s groundless claim that the 2020 election was stolen from him, has not produced a single piece of evidence to justify Trump’s bogus claims. Nor has Gabelman’s fruitless search for voter fraud. Funny (dark humor) how the GOP loves to scream about supposedly wasteful spending by Dems, but they are silent on this ludicrous search for things that don’t exist.
A Dane County Circuit Judge recently ruled that Vos must pay $135,000 in legal fees and costs to American Oversight, because of its successful lawsuit against Gabelman and Vos. Ouch. But Vos, of course, doesn’t have to pay the fees himself; we as taxpayers are on the hook. Vos vows to appeal the judge’s decision. He clearly wants to appeal all the way to the conservative-friendly Wisconsin State Supreme Court. That court, dominated by conservative partisan judges, will probably support Vos on ideological grounds, not legal.
Former Republican President Donald Trump could have made this unnecessary if he had shared a report commissioned by his campaign (according to Forbes) that deflated Trump’s claim that “dead people” voted in states like Nevada and Georgia. “I think the number is close to about 5,000 voters,” Trump was quoted as having said in the Forbes article. In Georgia, Trump’s lawyers wrote in a court filing that “1,506 ballots were cast in the names of dead people and 42,284 voted twice.” Really? What Trump and his supporters did not do was present any evidence to back their claims. Georgia election officials, many of whom are Republicans, did audits of the votes cast not once but twice to ensure that the vote counts were fair and accurate. They were.
The Trump campaign-commissioned research said it had “high confidence that only 12 ballots were cast in the names of deceased people” in Nevada, and that in Georgia there was a “potential statewide exposure of 23 such ballots”, which is 4,977 fewer than Trump’s 5,000 made-up claim. As long-time Milwaukee Brewer announcer Bob Uecker famously said, “Just a bit … outside.”
Did Trump reveal the results of his own campaign’s research? Of course not. Instead, he continued to claim that the 2020 presidential election had been stolen from him. Why? Because he knew, like Fox Entertainment did, that his claims were lies and if he revealed the truth he would lose his platform, visibility, and relevance. Republicans across the country would turn from him. His brand, and that of Fox Entertainment, would suffer. Can’t have that can we, even if it means misleading and lying to your supporters/viewers.
Which brings up the crucial question: why do so many Republicans, even today, insist that Trump defeated Joe Biden? Trump and his acolytes have not presented any evidence that the election was stolen, crooked, and corrupt, prompting Republicans in many states–including Wisconsin–to launch fishing expeditions to find the nonexistent fraud.
But it simply doesn’t exist. It never did. Vos and friends in Wisconsin have spent more than $2.7 million dollars (according to reports from reputable news sources) on a Republican led boondoggle. Have any of our elected representatives in Madison Joan Ballweg, Jon Plumer and Alex Dallman acknowledged this waste of taxpayer dollars? Of course not.
Why not contact Senator Ballweg and Representatives Dallman and Plumer and ask how they can justify this misguided, misleading, and shameful waste of time and money. Remind them they are supposed to work for us, not Donald Trump.