Supporters of the recall submitted more than one million signatures on January 17, In order to qualify the question for the ballot, recall proponents needed at least , valid signatures. A special primary election took place on May 8, Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett prevailed in a field of five named Democrats. As of this election, only two governors in U.
David Brandt, a Walker supporter, submitted the first recall petition on November 4, , on behalf of the "Close Friends to Recall Walker" committee. Democrats denounced the move as a Republican tactic.
Once the petition was filed, Walker could legally begin collecting unlimited campaign donations for the recall election. United Wisconsin spokeswoman Meagan Mahaffey said organizers collected 50, signatures in the first 48 hours of the campaign. It's kind of like an insurance policy," he said.
Walker's campaign was in full swing once the effort began. So if there's that much outside influence, I'm going to take that seriously no matter what. On December 15, organizers announced they had collected over , signatures and had a new goal of , signatures, one-third of the votes cast in the gubernatorial election.
Organizers said they submitted more than one million signatures on January 17, The process to validate the signatures was expected to take several months. Under state law, the GAB initially had 31 days to determine if enough valid signatures were submitted to force a recall. However, with 1. Dane County Circuit Judge Richard Niess granted the extension on January 25, giving the board an additional 30 days and a deadline of March The state purchased software from Artsyl Technologies to help with the process.
Workers scanned the petitions into computers and the software read the names and converted them into type. A human operator verified each name, correcting any errors before it was entered into a database. The database could then be used to check for duplicate signatures. The petitions were processed in a secret location, but a webcam was set up to provide a live feed of the work. Under state law, Walker had only 10 days to challenge the validity of the petitions starting on January However, as GAB officials were not able to readily provide Walker with the signatures against him, Judge Niess extended the period to 30 days from when Walker received the full petitions.
This decision gave Walker until February 27 to file a challenge. The GAB delivered the petitions to Walker on January 27 and the day window to challenge began the next day. On February 13, Walker's campaign said they would be unable to evaluate the signatures in time and asked the court for another two weeks. The court filing stated, "The time needed to search for duplicates, as well as to provide a factual basis for objections to more than , signatures, cannot be met within the existing time limits.
Walker asked the GAB to review a challenge of the signatures conducted by two tea party groups; however, GAB officials said state law did not allow them to consider challenges by third parties. GAB spokesman Reid Magney did say they would look at such challenges "for any potential fraud they uncover. But we cannot consider it as a challenge under state law.
The Wisconsin Government Accountability Board GAB had originally announced it would post the scanned petitions to its website on January 30, but delayed that action after hearing concerns from a stalking victim and others who did not want their names released. In the past, the GAB had treated petitions as public records. Bill Lueders, president of the Wisconsin Freedom of Information Council , said the GAB should simply block the names of people with genuine safety concerns, such as victims of domestic violence, from the public, rather than blocking all the signatures.
Van Hollen found that, although they ran on the same ticket, a recall targeting the governor would not automatically include the lieutenant governor. In order to recall both officials, separate petitions would have to be submitted, with separate recall elections held.
Democratic Party Chairman Mike Tate said they still planned to target both. The lawsuit asked that a judge require the GAB to search for and strike duplicate signatures, fake names and illegible addresses. Stephan Thompson, executive director of the state Republican Party, stated, "The decision of one individual who chooses to sign a recall petition should not carry more weight than the decision of another who chooses not to sign. This lawsuit seeks to protect the Wisconsin electors whose voices have been trumped by those purposefully signing multiple petitions.
The GAB typically reviews signatures to ensure there are enough to trigger a recall and verify they include a Wisconsin address and are dated during the recall period. It is up to challengers to point out potential issues with signatures. Rebecca Kleefisch and three Republican state senators, filed a motion asking a judge to dismiss the suit. They argued that the suit was designed to create uncertainty, disruptions and expenses in the recall process. Davis issued a ruling on January 5, , stating that GAB must take "reasonable" actions to eliminate duplicate and illegal signatures from recall petitions.
However, he gave them discretion to decide how to achieve that, noting that requiring such action "is limited by the resources and ability they have or are reasonably able to obtain. On February 3, the Fourth District Court of Appeals in Madison overturned the ruling that denied recall organizers from joining the suit, stating that they had a valid interest to join.
The ruling also threw out Judge Davis' decision that the GAB had to actively seek to strike fake and duplicate signatures. The case then went back to Davis. PolitiFact said Kleefisch provided no evidence for the second half of her claim -- that money would be used from funds already designated for school or health care.
However, they noted that money for the election could potentially come from funds designated for other programs. The GAB asked election clerks around the state to estimate the costs of a possible recall election based on November and April elections. This undertaking is the biggest investment in the future of our state and families we can make.
The estimates were requested by Rep. Additionally, enough signatures were bagged to recall GOP state Sens. United Wisconsin launched the recall campaign at midnight on November 15 and had 60 days to gather enough signatures to recall the governor and his lieutenant. Accounting for the signature-vetting process and legal challenges, the recall elections for Walker and Kleefisch are likely to take place in late April or May.
In the end, Wisconsin Republicans rammed through the anti-union budget repair bill, and in March, Walker signed it into law. The bill later withstood multiple legal challenges by Democrats and labor unions. In response, last summer Democrats launched recall campaigns targeting six Republican state senators but ultimately ousted just two of them while protecting three Democratic state senators facing recalls —one seat short of tipping the state Senate majority to the Democrats.
Ron Kind D-Wisc. Herb Kohl D-Wisc. Even with a staggering 1 million signatures collected, Walker foes face a formidable challenge in tossing Walker out of office. Polls conducted near the end of showed Wisconsinities split on recalling Walker, though a November survey by St.
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