Green Bay City Clerk Celestine Jeffreys has acknowledged that she has not strictly adhered to Wisconsin’s election laws regarding Election Day registration. In response to a complaint filed by the Public Interest Legal Foundation (PILF), Jeffreys conceded that her failure to follow the statutory requirements was inadvertent due to a lack of awareness rather than any willful violation.
Green Bay city attorney pinkie-swears that THIS time the city clerk will follow WI election law. Honest!
Controversial Wisconsin Clerk Admits To Violating Election Law, Claims She Doesn’t Understand It https://t.co/cL7SUG3OeM pic.twitter.com/r7AxxBbBZE
— Theia (@Theia_Seeks) May 13, 2024
Wisconsin law requires clerks to change the status of voters from eligible to ineligible on the registration list if their Election Day registration postcards are returned undelivered. Clerks must also notify the voter of the change and provide their name to the district attorney and the elections commission.
Green Bay’s law-bending elections chief is at it again, but this time City Clerk Celestine Jeffreys admits she didn’t understand the election law she was breaking. https://t.co/XZK9p4R3wd
— *Gun Grunt™* D1/4 (@FMFGrunt) May 13, 2024
However, according to the complaint, Jeffreys repeatedly failed to report hundreds of such electors as required by law across multiple elections from 2020 to 2023. Instead, she recorded the postcards as undeliverable in WisVote but took no further action.
Thanks to our work, Green Bay City Clerk Celestine Jeffreys' office is taking steps to make sure state law is followed for the Election Day registration process, after conceding they were not following state law.https://t.co/fAdysGXfjo
— PublicInterestLegal (@PILFoundation) May 1, 2024
Lauren Bowman Bis, PILF’s director of communications, called Jeffreys’ actions “unbelievable” and noted that it’s rare for an elected official to admit they don’t know the law. Jeffreys has now vowed to formulate a plan to address the undeliverable postcards going forward in compliance with statutory requirements and guidance from the Wisconsin Elections Commission.
Green Bay, a crucial swing city, made national news during the 2020 election due to the controversial involvement of outside grant funding and activists in its election administration.
