By Jack Phillips
Campaign alleges state illegally issued absentee ballots to in-person voters, wants thousands of votes tossed.
A Trump campaign lawyer in Wisconsin is attempting to get potentially his own vote—and thousands of others—thrown out due to the allegedly illegal way in which they were cast.
Jim Troupis, a former Dane County judge and lawyer representing President Donald Trump’s campaign, said that both he and his wife voted via Wisconsin’s early, in-person absentee option. The Trump campaign has sought to deem such ballots as illegal, saying that Wisconsin elections officials illegally issued absentee ballots to in-person voters without requiring them to first fill out an application.
Troupis told the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel that his name and his wife’s name appeared on exhibits that he sent to the Dane County Board of Canvassers on Sunday as election officials in the county were re-tabulating votes following a Trump campaign petition. Elaborating, he said the exhibits include lists of voters who voted in an allegedly illegal fashion.
The Board of Canvassers rejected the campaign’s claims that it is an illegal practice.
Although more details were not provided, Troupis introduced the exhibits of absentee voter lists to establish evidence for a potential legal challenge.
“I’m sure I’m on that list,” he said to the paper of the voter lists.
“This is not a litigation prep session, this is a recount,” said Diane Welsh, an attorney for Joe Biden’s campaign, in response, according to the report.
Before that, Troupis told The Associated Press last week that Dane County, which includes Madison, and Milwaukee County need recounts.
“Regrettably, the integrity of the election results cannot be trusted without a recount in these two counties and uniform enforcement of Wisconsin absentee ballot requirements,” he said. “We will not know the true results of the election until only the legal ballots cast are counted.”
Last Wednesday, a petition filed (pdf) by the campaign said Wisconsin officials illegally gave absentee ballots to in-person voters without first requiring them to fill out the application. The challenge would invalidate about 170,000 votes in Dane and Milwaukee counties, which lean heavily Democratic.
Election data shows Biden is ahead of President Trump by about 20,000 votes.
The petition also claimed that state election officials filled in the witness address portion of the ballot envelope for some voters. They also said that officials encouraged voters to say they’re indefinitely confined to subvert Wisconsin’s voter identification law.
Administrator Meagan Wolfe said that during in-person absentee voting, the ballot envelope itself acts as the application.
“They fill out the ballot, they put it in the certificate envelope, and they fill out the information on the certificate envelope attesting to their qualification as elector and serving as their absentee ballot application,” Wolfe said, according to the Wausau Pilot and Review. “So especially in the case of in-person absentee, it serves as not only the certification, but as the application for that voter as well.”
