Green Bay City Clerk rigs early voting against students

Kris Teske, city clerk of Green Bay, has complained that her office lacks the funding and resources necessary to expand early voting. With Wisconsin's fiscal troubles under the Walker administration, Teske's claim could have been taken at face value. According to newly released e-mails, Teske and the City of Green Bay had the funding, they just did not want liberal leaning UW-Green Bay students to have fair access to early voting.

Kris Teske was appointed to her job, like many city officials, by the city mayor. Mayor Jim Schmitt is a Republican and a close political ally of Gov. Scott Walker. During Gov. Walker's recall election, there were claims of Republican officials reducing or changing early voting hours in Milwaukee and other urban centers around the state. It seems that Kris Teske and the City of Green Bay have pulled out a play of the Republican handbook.EndFragment

(Image Source - WBAY)

As RawStory Reported:

“I don’t like the idea at all for many reasons: Staffing, ballot security, budget, etc.,” Teske complained in the email, which was provided to The Nation as part of an open-records request by the One Wisconsin Institute

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“I was reading the statutes and read: No site may be designated that affords an advantage to any political party,” Teske wrote. “UWGB is a polling location for students and residents on Election Day but I feel by asking for this to be the site for early voting is encouraging the students to vote more than benefitting the city as a whole.”

That’s when Teske thought she had found a legal loophole to stop students from casting ballots.

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“I have heard it said that students lean more toward the democrats and he is a democrat,” she wrote. “I have spoken with our Chief of Staff and others at City Hall and they agree that budget wise this isn’t going to happen.”

This is an overt and blatant attempt to reduce the youth vote and subsequently the minority vote in Green Bay. Green Bay, Wisconsin is a small town of around 100,000 residents. It is 77% white. The greater metro area that includes Ashwaubenon, De Pere and the rest of Brown, Kewanee and Oconto counties. This "metropolitan' area is 92% white with a population of just under 285,000 people.

UW Green Bay is the liberal and minority "bastion" in this red corner of Wisconsin. Attempting to suppress the vote on and around campus is a sure fire way to keep these counties voting Republican.

Watch WBAY-TV's report on this story below.

(Article by Jaimes Campbell)

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