A new complaint has been filed with the Wisconsin Elections Commission charging that a city clerk in Green Bay during the 2020 election actively participated in illegal absentee ballot harvesting.
The filing is just the latest to come from the Thomas More Society, which has investigated the events of the problem-ridden 2020 election, and earlier filed several complaints with the WEC over other apparent violations of the law.
The complaint was filed on behalf of a Green Bay voter, and charges that the voter, along with others, witnessed the clerk “accepting multiple absentee ballots from an individual voter – an act that is in violation of Wisconsin’s election law.”
“This is unbelievable,” said Attorney Erick Kaardal, special counsel with the Thomas More Society. “Several voters reported watching Celestine Jeffreys, the city clerk of Green Bay, Wisconsin, accepting multiple absentee ballots from the hand of a single person…and they witnessed this happening multiple times. This is ballot harvesting and it is illegal.”
The complaint charges that Wisconsin law explains it is a violation of the law if someone’s actions are deemed “illegal absentee ballot harvesting,” and that would include the circumstances of a municipal clerk accepting “multiple ballots” from one person in the clerk’s office.
In Wisconsin, the law requires an individual to deliver “one’s own” absentee ballot.
“The action is galling enough in and of itself, but when the voters who observed Clerk Jeffreys engaging in this illegal act challenged her, Jeffreys replied that it was her ‘discretion’ to do so,” the lawyer explained. “One of the voters addressed Jeffreys, stating ‘You don’t have the discretion. The law doesn’t allow multiple ballots.’ Jeffreys then countered with the words, ‘I have the discretion. I’m taking the ballots.'”
When the individual contacted the city attorney, she claimed that there was a legal “discretion” for the clerk.
But Kaardal noted the actions were “patently illegal,” and he suggested there could have been an impact of several close elections, including those for city council from the city’s District 3 and District 6.
They were decided by margins of only about 2%. The actual vote margins were 23 votes in one district and 11 in the other.
“If a small group of voters observed multiple instances of illegal activity by the city clerk of Green Bay, how many occurrences went unseen? Clerk Jeffreys’ decision to act in a manner contrary to the law has jeopardized the election for everyone. She has risked the integrity of the vote and violated the trust of Wisconsin voters.”
WND reported several weeks ago on the Thomas More Society’s complaint that officials let an incapacitated person register to vote – and vote – during the 2020 presidential election.
The organization said its complaint concerns Walter Jankowski II, who has been incapacitated since the 1970s when the Dane County Circuit Court appointed his son as his guardian.
“Yet the county’s voting records clearly show that the elderly Waunakee, Wisconsin, nursing home resident cast a ballot in the November 2020 presidential election,” the legal team reported. “On April 6, 2022, Thomas More Society attorneys filed a complaint in the state of Wisconsin before the Elections Commission on behalf of the man’s son and guardian.”
“The guardianship order declares that Walter Jankowski II lacks the capacity to exercise the right to register to vote or to vote in an election and requires these public officials to prohibit him from doing so,” explained Kaardal. “Yet, according to Wisvote, the state’s voting records database, Walter Jankowski II voted in the November 2020 election.”
The action names Wisconsin Elections Commission Administrator Meagan Wolfe, Village of Waunakee Clerk Karla Endres, and Dane County Circuit Court Clerk Carlo Esqueda.
They are accused of violating the Dane County Circuit Court Order by allowing a ward under a “do not vote” guardianship order to register and vote in the November 3. 2020 election, in the April 5, 2022 election and in future elections.
Part of the problem is that during the 2020 election officials in Wisconsin simply ignored a state law requiring special voting deputies to be sent to nursing homes for residents who are eligible to vote.
Instead, nursing home employees handled those ballots.
“Wisconsin law requires that when a person is judged by a court to be mentally incapable, he or she no longer may vote,” noted Kaardal. “But unlike our client here, many family members who act under power of attorney for a loved one in a nursing home may be unaware that a person in a memory care unit is still legally entitled to vote until a court judgment is entered ending that right. Nursing home staffers generally fail to inform families of this requirement to stop fraudulent voting under the name of an incapacitated patient.”
The organization had started its series of election fraud complaints regarding Wisconsin actions with one citing a vote by Sandra Klitzke, another nursing resident declared incapacitated.
“She has “has suffered from cognitive decline for many years,” the complaint explained, and “was legally restricted from registering to vote or from voting in any election by order of the Outagamie County Circuit Court in February 2020.”
However, in violation of that order, Klitzke was recorded in Wisconsin’s voting records database, Wisvote, as having voted in both the November 3, 2020, election and the April 6, 2021, election.
She is under the guardianship of her daughter, Linda Goodwin, and has a “no vote” order.
Nationwide, there remain many questions unanswered about the irregularities of the 2020 presidential election.
But it’s known that there were several malign influences at work against President Trump, including the $420 million Mark Zuckerberg gave to local election officials which often ended up being used to recruit voters from Democrat districts, a campaign a later analysis charged essentially bought the election for Joe Biden.
Also, many elections officials, based on COVID-19 worries, simply ignored their own state laws about mail-in ballots and ballot harvesting. And then there was the concerted legacy and social media campaign to suppress accurate, and damaging, reporting about the Biden family’s overseas business scandals just days before the election. A Media Research Center study showed had that information been distributed routinely, enough voters would have withheld their support to deprive Biden of the election.
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