MADISON, Wis. (SPECTRUM NEWS) – Wisconsin's spring election is in less than a week and it's full speed ahead right now, even though clerks across the state told the Wisconsin Elections Commission they are short nearly 7,000 poll workers.
According to court documents, Gov. Tony Evers plans to use the Wisconsin Army National Guard to staff polling places but even that won't fill the gap.
Republican Assembly Speaker Robin Vos says he isn't opposed to the idea.
“If the National Guard does not have other duties making sure that our communities are safe, I certainly support the idea of using them in limited circumstances where potentially there's no poll workers or where there's a real short supply,” Vos said.
Nine states had presidential primaries planned for April, but as of right now Wisconsin is the only one planning to carry out its election as scheduled.
Calls to postpone Wisconsin's spring election next week continue to pour in, but not just from clerks or groups filing lawsuits. Now, presidential candidates are weighing in.
Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, who's on the ballot for Wisconsin's presidential primary, says people should not be forced to put their lives on the line to vote.
In a written statement, the Democratic hopeful is urging Wisconsin to postpone its election, extend early voting, and move entirely to voting by mail.
Even if the election goes on as planned, Sanders is asking his supporters to vote absentee.
Both Gov. Evers and Republican legislative leaders want to keep the April 7 election date but disagree over the best way to carry out the election, including whether to make absentee voting easier.
Requests for absentee ballots continue to break records with clerks having received more than a million requests as of Wednesday morning.
Speaker Vos says he's in favor of giving clerks more time to count those absentee ballots but doesn't like the idea of giving people more time to vote.
“If you send a ballot in and you mail it in on Monday or Tuesday you should know that that ballot has a decent chance to be counted at least through the end of the week,” Vos said. “I think that's not an unreasonable place. I think if we allow people to keep casting ballots after they begin to hear about results on Tuesday that would kind of upend the way we normally do our elections. There's got to be a finite time period.”
Right now, absentee ballots must be received by 8 p.m. Tuesday when the polls close, but that's being challenged in court.
Democrats and liberal-learning groups filed three lawsuits in Madison in an attempt to postpone in-person voting, send all registered voters a ballot, and give clerks extra days to count absentee ballots.
U.S. District Judge William Conley was scheduled to hear testimony Wednesday afternoon.
When a ruling might be released is unknown, but in the meantime, the state Elections Commission is going ahead as planned by delivering extra supplies like ethyl alcohol and pens to hubs across