BROWN COUNTY, WI (WTAQ-WLUK) — Ahead of Tuesday’s partisan primary, local officials are offering reminders for voters.
First and foremost: even though the ballot has five different political parties listed, you only vote in one of them.
“For example, if you predominately vote Republican, you’ll want to stick with only those choices because once you choose the party you’re voting for, if you choose a candidate in another party it actually does not count,” says Michelle Seidl, the Village Clerk and Treasurer in Bellevue.
Seidl says that’s a mistake she sees often.
“The biggest thing that we see especially on the ballot, the partisan primary ballot, is the overvoting,” she adds. “They don’t stop and really read that they can only vote in that one category, so out of all the elections in a normal cycle, this is the one where we are probably going to see the most errors and the most replacement ballots needing to be issued.”
When you find your political party’s section, which is clearly labeled by black bars on the ballot, like always, you follow the prompts vertically.
“At the end of each party, it will say ‘stop,’ you’re at the end, telling our voters that because this is the party you chose, you want to be done at this point.”
The next reminder is for those in the 8th Congressional District, as voters will see some candidates’ names on the ballot twice.
The first is to vote for a candidate to serve out the remainder of former Congressman Mike Gallagher’s term.
The second vote is for the person who will serve in that same position for the next two-year term.
Lastly, Seidl offers this:
“It’s really, really important that people turn the ballot over because, in some situations, you don’t have a double-sided ballot. But in this case, there is, so, first of all, there are other parties listed on the back, but for this particular situation, there are referendum questions, two referendum questions.”
Seidl says if you make a mistake on your ballot, even as an absentee or early voter, officials can give you a new ballot to make corrections.
However, your third ballot is your last chance to get it right.
That’s why she says it’s important to do your homework like Peter Angeli did before voting on Thursday.
“We knew what to expect, I had looked under My Ballot to see what was going to be on it and I had been hearing about the multiple elections for Mike Gallagher’s spot,” Angeli says. “I could see, though, people could get confused if they didn’t read the section about it being a partisan. They could end up filling out all kinds of stuff that may not have made it a valid ballot.”
Seidl has one final request as voters begin to head to the polls, too.
“Please be polite and grateful to your election officials, a lot of them are working a 14-hour day and are trying very hard to accommodate. If you could just be gracious if you do have to wait, that type of thing. This is going to be a slower voting process because of the length and the confusion on it, people are going to need a little bit more time, and give yourself enough time to come in and not have to feel rushed so that there’s pressure for you to have to be somewhere,” she says.
