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Thursday, Oct. 27, 2022

Has Ron Johnson proposed disbanding the Wisconsin Election Commission?

Jacob Alabab-Moser, Wisconsin Watch
yes

U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson has expressed support for Wisconsin lawmakers taking control over federal elections from the bipartisan-run Wisconsin Elections Commission, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports. "The state Legislature has to reassert, reclaim this authority over our election system," Johnson said in 2021.

Republicans who control the state Legislature introduced a bill in January 2022 proposing to dissolve the WEC and grant the secretary of state, a partisan elected officer, control over elections. Currently, the commission is led by a nonpartisan administrator and a six-member board of three Republican and three Democratic appointees.

Republican gubernatorial candidate Tim Michels also has called for the WEC to be disbanded. In 2015, the Republican-run Legislature voted to form the Wisconsin Elections Commission as a solution to what the GOP saw as the previous elections agency's bias against members of its party.

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