Biden’s magic number: Anti-Joe voters draw a line in the sand on protest movement
President Joe Biden‘s skeptical voters have put a number on what they think will be a successful protest vote in Wisconsin on Tuesday.
The “uninstructed” vote, inspired by Michigan’s “uncommitted” campaign, urges Wisconsin voters to push Biden on his Israel policy to help people living in Gaza. Wisconsinites will also vote on two GOP-backed referendums that would change election laws statewide.
“The margins of our elections are so incredibly close — less than 1% in the last two presidential election cycles — so I think it would behoove the administration to pay attention,” Reema Ahmad, the lead organizer of the “Listen to Wisconsin” campaign, told the Guardian.
Organizers of the “uninstructed” campaign are seeking to gain as many votes for their cause as Biden won the state in 2020.
Those margins in Wisconsin were razor thin, with Biden defeating then-President Donald Trump by about 20,000 votes, or 0.36%. It’s a state Trump won in 2016 against former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton by a little more than 27,000 votes. In 2020, Biden captured a key base in the state that voted for Trump in 2016: suburban women, especially in Milwaukee’s suburban “WOW” counties, which have been Republican strongholds for decades.
“We’re watching the precincts in Madison and Milwaukee the closest, and there is a flurry of activity in those areas,” said Halah Ahmad, a spokeswoman for the “uninstructed” campaign. Biden is expected to visit Madison, Wisconsin, next week, which is in a solidly Democratic county.
Some union members are also supporting the “uninstructed” campaign. Union members are a key demographic for Biden, who has touted himself as “the most pro-union president in history.”
“As trade unionists, we feel like it is our obligation to stand in solidarity with them and to pressure our electeds and our unions to do more and to do better to stop the U.S. support for the genocide in Gaza,” Jacob Flom, who sits on the board of the Milwaukee Area Labor Council, told the Guardian.
Both parties are energizing their base on Tuesday, especially ahead of two ballot referendums that could change election laws in the state’s constitution. Voting rights organizations said these initiatives could have a negative effect on election administration in the Badger State.
The first ballot initiative would bar election officials from accepting private grant money. The controversy with these “Zuckerbucks” comes from funding from Mark Zuckerberg and his wife Priscilla Chan’s Center for Tech and Civic Life, to which they donated money to help mitigate COVID-19 spread in polling places during the 2020 election.
Republicans argued these funds unfairly support Democratic candidates. There is no evidence that this funding statewide helped Biden win the election.
The second ballot referendum would place an existing Wisconsin statute in the state’s constitution that would make it so “only election officials designated by law may perform tasks in the conduct of primaries, elections, and referendums.” Opponents said Wisconsin laws already outline who an election official is and that this would baselessly narrow who can give out election information.
Some warn that the First Amendment could leave Wisconsin without fully funded elections, as there have been no additional funds given to Wisconsin’s electoral process in this year’s budget. This could result in slower tallying and longer lines at the polls, as additional election workers cannot be hired.
“There’s no guarantee that the election will be funded fully in the absence of outside money,” said Debra Cronmiller, the executive director of Wisconsin’s League of Women Voters. “They might not have the opportunities that a bigger municipality that has deeper pockets might have in order to serve their citizens.”
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Gov. Tony Evers (D-WI) has previously vetoed these two measures.
Connecticut, New York, and Rhode Island also have primaries on Tuesday. Voters in Connecticut and Rhode Island will have an “uncommitted” option on their ballot.
