Top Wisconsin Republican Robin Vos hires former cops to investigate November election

This story was republished on Jan. 7, 2022 to make it free for all readers

MADISON - Assembly Speaker Robin Vos is hiring retired police officers to investigate aspects of the November election, joining with Republicans from around the country who have questioned President Joe Biden’s victory.

Vos, of Rochester, said he recognizes Biden narrowly won Wisconsin and is not trying to change the results with his taxpayer-funded investigation.

He said he hopes the investigators can get to the bottom of issues Republicans have raised unsuccessfully in court, such as how the state’s largest cities used more than $6 million in grants from a private group to run their elections.

Vos in a Wednesday interview said he was giving the investigators a broad mandate to spend about three months reviewing all tips and following up on the most credible ones. In addition to the grant spending, he said they may look into claims of double voting and review how clerks fixed absentee ballot credentials.

“Is there a whole lot of smoke or is there actual fire? We just don’t know yet,” Vos said.

Ann Jacobs, a Democrat who leads the Wisconsin Elections Commission, said she was worried the investigation would undermine confidence in an election that was conducted properly.  

"I think it's unfortunate that the Legislature is using its resources to investigate what has already been thoroughly investigated and it is my hope that instead they could work toward expanding opportunities and ease of voting for Wisconsin voters," she said.

Vos said he is hiring three former law enforcement officers along with an attorney who will oversee them.

As contractors with the Legislature, they will have subpoena power. Anyone they subpoena will be immune from criminal prosecution, he said. 

Vos said the investigators likely will provide him a report by the fall with their findings. He said he wants to identify laws that should be changed rather than try to find people who the investigators believe have violated the law. He did not rule out the possibility the investigators would refer some matters to prosecutors.

The move comes after voters in Georgia sued to review ballots and the Arizona Senate seized Maricopa County’s ballots so a private company called Cyber Ninjas could review them. Some Republicans have called the Arizona review laughable and dangerous because it involves a company that has not previously audited elections using microscopes and UV lights to examine ballots.

Vos said he couldn’t speak for Arizona but he expected to avoid that kind of controversy by hiring investigators who will produce a report the public can trust.

"My hope is that they come back and they build the case to show Gov. (Tony) Evers and the Democrats who are in the 'Casablanca' mode — 'nothing to see here,' 'everything’s fine,' 'they just want to suppress the vote.' No. These are professional investigators," Vos said.

"A sizable chunk of people believe the election was illegitimate. And democracy cannot flourish if both sides don’t believe in the end both sides had a fair shot."

Republican skepticism of the election results comes after months of former President Donald Trump railing against the results. He and his supporters lost dozens of lawsuits, including ones that went before judges nominated by Trump.

Republican lawmakers in February directed the nonpartisan Legislative Audit Bureau to review aspects of the election. The investigators Vos is hiring would perform work separate from the audit bureau.

Jeffrey Mandell, an attorney with the nonprofit voting rights legal firm Law Forward, said he was disappointed to learn of the investigation. He noted election officials have identified a few dozen cases of potential fraud over four recent elections — a tiny fraction of the millions of ballots cast.

"Separate and apart from the fact that this is a fishing expedition in a dry lake, to look for fraud in 2020, I also just think that trying to perpetuate the big lie and continuing to give oxygen to this is just bad for democracy," said Mandell, who has represented Evers and other Democrats in court. 

Despite Vos' claims of irregularities, he acknowledged there is no way to change Biden’s victory over Trump. He said the report could help Republicans who control the Legislature write new election laws.

"The election's already over," he said. "My job is to be frustrated with the result, which I am, especially with what’s going on in Washington, D.C. … My job is to say where are the laws being followed, where are they not? If they’re not being followed, how can I fix it?"

Republicans have already started passing election legislation, and any bills they approve face likely vetoes from Evers.

After Biden won, Trump and his allies challenged numerous election practices.

They argued clerks were wrong to fill in the addresses of witnesses on absentee ballot envelopes. They claimed too many people were allowed to claim they were indefinitely confined because of age or disability, which allowed them to vote absentee without submitting a copy of an ID. They said cities shouldn’t have established drop boxes for absentee ballots.

All those issues were raised in lawsuits, only to be quickly shot down by state and federal courts.

Republicans have also questioned grants provided to Milwaukee, Madison and other Democratic-leaning cities by the Center for Tech and Civic Life. The nonprofit group gave funds to cities around the country using hundreds of millions of dollars provided by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and his wife, Priscilla Chan.

Courts have rejected three lawsuits over the grants, but conservatives have filed new complaints over them with the Wisconsin Elections Commission. The commission consists of three Republicans and three Democrats.

Contact Patrick Marley at patrick.marley@jrn.com. Follow him on Twitter at @patrickdmarley.