WisDems: NEWS: Eric Hovde calls for GOP surveillance of ballot drop boxes… but only in Wisconsin’s cities

MADISON, Wis. — A breaking news report from the Washington Post today revealed that Eric Hovde wants 24-hour GOP surveillance for ballot drop boxes in Wisconsin’s urban cities. Hovde also leaned into the “fake ballots” conspiracy theory at the center of the discredited right-wing film “2000 Mules.” 

Hovde has a history of sowing doubts in our elections and insulting Wisconsin voters, recently saying that people in nursing homes should not be allowed to vote.

Read more below:

Washington Post: Senate candidate calls for drop box monitoring in Wisconsin college town
By: Patrick Marley

The top Republican running for the Senate in Wisconsin this week suggested without evidence that absentee ballot drop boxes could be stuffed with fake ballots, and he called for monitoring them around-the-clock in one of the state’s most Democratic cities.

Republican Eric Hovde made the comments to supporters on Wednesday, five days after the Wisconsin Supreme Court’s liberal majority reversed a two-year-old decision and allowed the use of ballot drop boxes this fall.

“Who’s watching to see how many illegal ballots are being stuffed?” Hovde said, according to a recording of his remarks obtained by The Washington Post. “Look, we’re probably going to have to have — make sure that there’s somebody standing by a drop box everywhere.”

Hovde faces nominal opposition in next month’s Republican primary and is expected to handily win the nomination to face Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.) in November. A businessman with banking and real estate holdings, Hovde has seeded his campaign with $8 million from his personal fortune.

He made his remarks at a campaign stop in Ashland, in far northern Wisconsin, and said he wanted to focus the monitoring in Madison, home to the University of Wisconsin and one of the most Democratic areas in the swing state.

“It’s probably not a risk up here in this part,” Hovde said of northern Wisconsin. “But, you know, I think in Madison, let me assure you, we’ve got to make sure that there’s somebody standing by that drop box literally 24 hours a day, you know, for, you know, 45 days to make sure that you don’t have people just jumping, jamming fake ballots.”

By raising the prospect of fake ballots, Hovde leaned into a discredited theory at the center of the right-wing film “2000 Mules,” which focused on ballot drop boxes in 2020. Salem Media Group, which produced the film in part, removed it from its platforms last month in response to a lawsuit.

Hovde offered no evidence that fake ballots were used in Wisconsin or anywhere else. There were no reports of fake ballots in Wisconsin in 2020 after recounts, lawsuits and a detailed review by a conservative nonprofit law firm.

If fake ballots were placed in drop boxes, they would probably be detected. Election clerks in Wisconsin issue absentee ballots only when they receive valid requests from registered voters. The voters must return them in envelopes that include their name, address and signature and the signature of a witness. Officials check the information on the envelopes before counting the ballots and ensure the number of ballots matches the number of voters, said Madison Clerk Maribeth Witzel-Behl.

The city has 14 drop boxes at or near fire stations. They are under 24-hour video surveillance.

A spokesman for Hovde declined to comment Friday but said he may weigh in later. A spokesman for Baldwin declined to comment on Hovde’s remarks.

Hovde lives just outside Madison, and public records show he has voted absentee three times in recent years — in the 2018 midterm elections and in the 2021 and 2023 elections for state offices.

Hovde floated the possibility of fake ballots three months after suggesting that nursing home residents shouldn’t be allowed to vote. “If you’re in a nursing home, you only have a five-, six-month life expectancy,” he said. “Almost nobody in a nursing home is in a point [in life] to vote.” After facing blowback, Hovde said he believes that elderly people should vote.

“Mr. Hovde seems determined to insult every group of voters in Wisconsin one after the other,” Madison Mayor Satya Rhodes-Conway said in a statement. “Drop boxes, whether in Madison or Ashland, Milwaukee or Eau Claire, are a safe, secure and convenient way for eligible voters to return their ballots.”

Monitoring drop boxes 24 hours a day for a month and a half would require dozens of volunteers and would divert crucial GOP resources away from contacting voters and making sure they go to the polls.

Brian Schimming, the chairman of the state Republican Party, said Thursday he didn’t like the court ruling on drop boxes but believes that Wisconsin voters can have confidence in the results this fall. He made his remarks at news conference before The Post obtained the recording of Hovde’s comments and did not mention launching a drop box monitoring program in line with what Hovde promoted.

Ballot drop boxes were widely used in 2020 in Wisconsin, as voters turned to absentee voting in large numbers in response to the covid-19 pandemic. In 2022, conservatives who then controlled the state Supreme Court barred the use of drop boxes because state law does not specifically authorize them. Last week, the liberals who now hold a majority reversed that decision, saying depositing ballots in drop boxes is the equivalent of turning them in personally in the offices of election officials.

The latest ruling allows cities to use drop boxes but does not require them to do so.

On Thursday, the state’s bipartisan elections commission recommended that local officials who use drop boxes ensure they are secure and monitored by video cameras. The commission noted that people are allowed to observe drop boxes but said they could be subject to criminal penalties if they interfere with voters returning their ballots.