Wis­con­sin vot­ers approve bans on pri­vate fund­ing for elec­tions

Wisconsin voters approve bans on private funding for elections

Wis­con­sin vot­ers approved a pair of Repub­li­can-led con­sti­tu­tion­al amend­ments on Tues­day that will change how elec­tions are con­duct­ed in one of the country’s most polit­i­cal­ly com­pet­i­tive states. 
One mea­sure will bar state and local gov­ern­ments from using pri­vate funds to con­duct elec­tions, while the oth­er man­dates that only elec­tion offi­cials can car­ry out elec­tion-relat­ed tasks. 

Vot­ers in the state’s pres­i­den­tial pri­ma­ry elec­tion reg­is­ter their votes at UW-Madison’s Memo­r­i­al Union in Madi­son, Wis­con­sin, on Tues­day, April 2, 2024. (AP Photo/John Hart, Wis­con­sin State Jour­nal)

With 99% of the votes in, 54.4% of vot­ers had approved the first ques­tion, and 58.5% had approved the sec­ond, accord­ing to the Asso­ci­at­ed Press. A major­i­ty of Wis­con­sin vot­ers must vote in favor of a con­sti­tu­tion­al amend­ment for it to go into effect.
Repub­li­cans have com­plained the state has turned into a mag­net for “dark mon­ey” and that its elec­tions were influ­enced by out­side spe­cial inter­est groups. They also claimed that des­ig­nat­ing ele …