The Nov. 3 midterm election is just one week away, and early voting is underway. President Trump and other Republicans continue to stoke fears over election security.
These concerns are part of a larger effort by some Republicans to sew doubt in the results of our elections and have targeted election workers like Marge Bostelmann.
Bostelmann is a Republican member of the Wisconsin Elections Commission, where she has served for seven years. Before that, she served as a county clerk in Green Lake County for 24 years.
She joins Lake Effect’s Joy Powers to talk about the midterms and the security of Wisconsin’s elections.
This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.
Joy Powers: What has it been like dealing with the kinds of conspiracy theories around the work that you've been doing for decades?
Marge Bostelmann: Well, it really makes me a little testy. I understand what municipal clerks do. I understand the integrity that they have. I understand that fact that Wisconsin elections are very open.
Those who run the elections in this state are our neighbors. When we go to see our children or our grandchildren play at high schools or grade schools, these people are sitting in the bleachers with us. They're the people we see at grocery stores. They're people that we know from church. They're people that we know from our community.
These are honest people who work the polls. They do it because they want to do it, and because they want make sure that everything is done fair and open and honest in Wisconsin.
JP: That speaks to some of the misconceptions and conspiracy theories around election work. What are some of the things that you've heard, where you hear them and you go, “This has no basis in reality?”
MB: You know, I don't hear as much with regard to Wisconsin as I hear in other places. But, when we talk about absentee voting, a person has to provide a picture ID to be able to request and receive an absentee ballot. When someone gets the absentee ballot and fills it out, they then return it to the municipal clerk in a sealed envelope. The envelope has to be witnessed by someone, proving that they are the person who was there. The witness has to have their address on it. And if there's anything on that absentee ballot that’s done incorrectly, the municipal clerk is required to not count it. It has to be done right.
Those absentee ballots are not opened until election morning. Their names are read at the polling place to make sure that everybody knows who's voting — just like when you come in and show your ID and say your name as you vote. That’s a safeguard so that people can listen to who is voting. And they can form an objection by saying, “I know that that person was my neighbor, but has now moved to another place.”
There's a reason why Wisconsin elections are run the way they do. And I just think that absentee ballots are very safe. I think they're very secure, just like I believe the entire election process is safe and secure and honest.
JP: As we head into the midterm election, what do you want Wisconsinites to know about how elections are administered and what this election is likely to be like?
MB: Wisconsin elections are run at a very, very local level. They're run by people that those in the community know and trust. I believe that Wisconsin elections are open. Anybody can go and observe an election. Anybody can ask questions of their municipal clerk and understand how elections run. I think Wisconsin elections are so well done and so above-board. They are so open that I don't understand why people would believe there's fraud at all in the processing of our ballots.
And that's because I work with it. I've seen it, and I've been involved in it. And it specifically bothers me when people — maybe from another state, newscasters — are expounding about Wisconsin elections when they really don't understand how they're run.
We are the most decentralized election in the country. We have 1,850 municipal clerks, and each one of those municipal clerks runs the election in their municipality. They know what's going on, and the voters who come in generally know their clerks. And I think that gives us confidence in Wisconsin to know that our elections are honest, and they are open, and they are secure.
_
