By admin 
On MyVote Wisconsin you can track your ballot, contact WEC and report any issues you may face on Election Day or before
| Special to Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
Learn how tabulation machines work for absentee and early voting ballots
Paulina Gutiérrez, executive director of the Milwaukee Election Commission, demonstrates how vote tabulations will work for the 2024 election.
Wisconsin is at the center of another exciting presidential race, and as voting takes place here in the Badger State, we wanted to share a few things with you. Wisconsin Elections Commission is committed to ensuring that voters have confidence in us election system. After all, this presidential race could come down to a few thousand votes in a few states, including Wisconsin.
We’ve had a few since 2020 elections for the entire country included; a race for the Supreme Court, two biennial primaries, and of course the midterm and gubernatorial elections. After each of these elections, we conduct intensive audits to ensure that our security standards are met by election administrators at our nearly 2,500 polling places statewide.
Earlier this year, we released a report entitled, “How Wisconsin is Ready for the November 2024 Elections,” which details the security measures in place and the planning done by all of our Wisconsin election administrators to ensure our elections not only be safe, but that the public can also trust the outcome.
The Commission works with local municipalities that organize elections
Wisconsin has more than 1,800 local municipalities and each of these local government units is responsible for the conduct of our elections. At the Wisconsin Elections Commission, we work with local municipalities to train the more than 30,000 poll workers needed to perform Election Day duties.
We do everything with transparency. The municipal clerk’s office in your province has conducted an open test on all voting machines used in the elections to screen for problems. This test was public and even if you were unable to attend, you can still raise your concerns about the safety of the machines by calling the clerk’s office.
Clerks demonstrate that machines are never connected to the Internet and in fact cannot connect, to prevent tampering. They can explain that all votes in Wisconsin are on paper, and those paper ballots and tapes are kept secure both before and after the election to maintain a proper chain of custody. Procedures can be closely and transparently observed, from how election workers validate and double-check identification to the processing and storage of ballots.
Securing data and infrastructure has been a priority since 2020
Since 2020 we have been securing the MyVote Wisconsin site and our own voter registration data infrastructure a top priority. We have been working with state and local law enforcement to ensure our security practices are up to date, keep them informed of the security landscape, and defend against any contingencies during the election. We have worked directly with local clerks to provide cybersecurity training. We continuously monitor voter rolls to provide updates to local clerks when individuals need to be removed due to death, felony conviction, or adjudication for incompetence. Finally, we will conduct a full audit after the election to ensure our procedures are working properly.
Wisconsin has some of the most secure elections in the country, and while we have tremendous confidence in the security we have put forward, we understand there will be complaints. On MyVote Wisconsin you can track your ballot, contact WEC and report any issues you may face on Election Day or before.
Our processes and procedures work. Our clerks and elections staff are trained and tested and have handled elections of all sizes for the past four years. They have been under constant surveillance since 2020 and are working twice as hard to ensure no one cheats the system. In Wisconsin, we practice, implement, monitor and improve – this is how we approach every election and we are confident that the steps we have taken to educate the public and keep our processes transparent will pay off in 2024.
Our processes ensure that cheaters have no influence on our elections. Period. Take it from us, a Republican and a Democrat, who have dedicated our careers to this job. The winner of the state of Wisconsin will know that this process was safe and, above all, fair.
Marge Bostelmann and Ann Jacobs are members of the Wisconsin Elections Commission.