Vice President JD Vance and Milwaukee Mayor Cavalier Johnson offered sharply different views on election integrity during Vance's visit to Milwaukee earlier this month, as local officials prepare for November's midterm election now less than 100 days away.
Vance raised questions about election fraud during his visit.
"So when I hear a guy protesting out of nowhere, 'I did not do any election fraud, I did not do any election fraud.' It makes me wonder, why is that guy protesting so aggressively? It's a little odd," Vance said.
Johnson pushed back on those concerns. "Across this country, certainly in the city of Milwaukee, we take elections very seriously," Johnson said.
Sen. Tammy Baldwin and Johnson toured Milwaukee's central count facility — the location where all early absentee ballots are opened, processed, checked and counted on Election Day — to make the point that local elections should be run by local officials without federal interference.
Baldwin pushed back on President Trump's repeated false claims he won the 2020 election and his calls to nationalize elections.
Watch: Milwaukee officials defend local election control ahead of midterms
"We have great local election officials who know how to register people to vote, to make sure that they are citizens, to make sure that elections at the local level are conducted with accuracy and fairness, and that every vote is counted," Baldwin said.
Milwaukee's election executive director Paulina Gutierrez expressed concern about mail-in ballots arriving late. During the April spring election, she said 20 were delivered on Election Day, and another 331 arrived the day after — too late to count.
A May poll by the bipartisan Democracy Defense Project asked Wisconsin voters about their level of confidence that votes will be accurately cast and counted in November's election. 69% of all voters said they were very or somewhat confident, but a significant gap emerged between Republicans at 46% and Democrats at 91%.
Washington County's elected Republican clerk Ashley Reichert said the polling results were discouraging given the work election officials put in.
"I reviewed the polling stats and, to be quite honest, it was actually very disappointing for me because we do work really, really hard to make sure that we are open, transparent, that we verify results, we run safe, secure, accurate, fair elections," Reichert said.
Gutierrez addressed the question of whether the federal government has a role in state elections.
"The Constitution is fairly clear that there is not a federal role in state elections, and in the state of Wisconsin, we're one of the most decentralized in the country, and that is a form of protection from interference," Gutierrez said.
She added that local officials do work with federal partners when appropriate. "We do work with our federal partners when it is appropriate, but it is very important to protect elections from interference," Gutierrez said
This story was reported on-air by Charles Benson and has been converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. Our editorial team verifies all reporting on all platforms for fairness and accuracy.
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