Wisconsin’s partial presidential election recount is now underway.
Wisconsin Elections Commission Administrator Meghan Wolfe says local officials in Dane and Milwaukee Counties will be the ones handling things.
“Those counties have already begun talking with the parties to make sure that they understand the process for designating representatives and for making sure that people will have opportunities to engage with the process and to be able to meaningfully engage with offering those objections and challenges and information.”
Wolfe says that while outside observers will still be welcome to watch the proceedings, they are not allowed to interfere with the recount process.
“They could certainly raise their concerns or their objections to somebody like the primary representative for the candidate, and if they felt like that was information that needed to be brought before the board of canvassers they could.”
Selected officials with either the Biden or Trump campaign will be able to inspect or challenge ballots, and observers can be on hand at a safe distance to watch the proceedings. The exact process will be up to local officials in either Milwaukee or Madison.
There’s also been a discussion on getting a full audit of the state’s voting equipment. Wolfe says that by law they have to inspect 3% of the voting machines in the state every election, but that they check 5%.
“Again, we’ve never had a problem that resulted from the voting equipment audits, but if there were that of course would be a huge deal and something that we would bring to the commission and the public’s attention immediately so that they can address next steps.”
Wolfe says that those audits are performed on random machines across the state through a hand counting method, so technically the machines that are under a recount are also being audited at this time.
The recount will have to be completed by December 1st.