The Case For Recall Reform In Wisconsin

Since February, recall elections have been on the minds of nearly everyone in Wisconsin.

And while the diehards on the Left continue to spout off about recalling Scott Walker, most Wisconsinites are fatigued and a bit overwhelmed by the whole recall experience. Democrats failed in their goal to take the majority in the Senate. Republicans failed to unseat Democratic senators that fled the state.

In the wake of last week’s recall election, Republican Rep. Robin Vos proposed recall reform legislation. Vos’ bill would force recall committees to provide “a statement of reason related to the official responsibilities of the person being recalled.” Currently, Wisconsin is only 1 of 19 states that allow legislative recalls, and the current process does not require a reason for state officials. According to Vos, “it (the recalls) undermines our democracy and wastes precious taxpayer dollars that are needed elsewhere.”

As mentioned, the current law on recalls for state officials does not require a reason. Recall committees must only gather enough signatures (one quarter of the total votes in the governor’s race in that district) within the 60-day time frame and a recall election is triggered.

In two cases, one Republican and one Democrat, the candidate did not even gain as many votes as signatures on the recall petition.

Senate District 2 (23,959 signatures)

Nancy Nusbaum (D) 18,039 votes (-5,590)

Senate District 30 (15,540 signatures)

David Vanderleest (R) 11,054 votes (-4,486)

Three of the recall challengers, two Democrats and one Republican, gained less than 4,000 votes more than their signature total.

Senate District 10 (23,685 signatures)

Shelly Moore (D) 27,250 votes (+3,565)

Senate District 14 (22,207 signatures)

Fred Clark (D) 24,365 votes (+2,158)

Senate District 22 (17,138 signatures)

Jonathan Steitz (R) 19,662 votes (+2,254)

A common theme in all five of these recall elections where the challenger had less votes than signatures, or barely outpaced the signatures, the challenger lost by a significant margin. And in the two elections where incumbents did lose, a myriad of reasons beyond the collective bargaining vote led to the demise of Sens. Hopper and Kapanke.

Among the other recall elections, Sandy Pasch and Jennifer Schilling exceeded their signatures gathered by over 11,000 votes while Kim Simac and Jessica King outpaced signatures by just over 5,000.

And while Democrats are already criticizing Vos’ bill for “limiting democracy” and “diminishing political accountability,” Vos’ proposal recognizes that the threshold for recall elections in Wisconsin is far too low. The Republican senators did not break any law, but only took a tough vote that made them the target for millions of dollars in special interest money. The case can be better made that the Democrats were not performing their duty as legislators, but even in those cases their constituents re-elected them with overwhelming margins.

All nine senators that faced recall elections will be up for re-election in just 15 months. With recall reform, legislators might be able to work more for their constituents and less on the campaign trail.

By Collin Roth

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