Here & Now

Here & Now for December 4, 2020

Announcer:

The following program is a PBS Wisconsin original production.

Frederica Freyberg:

From the voting booth to the courtroom. President Trump and his allies challenge the Wisconsin election, but the state high court sends cases back to lower courts. Meanwhile, fevers rise at the state Capitol with the arrival of long-awaited coronavirus proposals. In a post-holiday week that saw long lines at testing locations and another day of record deaths.

I’m Frederica Freyberg. Tonight on “Here & Now,” Senior Political Reporter Zac Schultz runs through the court challenges to the Wisconsin vote. U.S. Representatives Mark Pocan and Tom Tiffany are here to go over coronavirus relief bills in Congress. And the former GOP party chair in Brown County details a conversation he had with U.S. Ron Johnson, a call he says reveals why Johnson has not yet publicly accepted the Biden-Harris victory. It’s “Here & Now” for December 4.

Announcer:

Funding is provided by the Focus Fund for Journalism and Friends of PBS Wisconsin.

Frederica Freyberg:

The Trump campaign and groups on his behalf have filed several lawsuits challenging the results of the presidential election in Wisconsin, which a final canvass and recount showed Joe Biden won by 20,682 votes. The Wisconsin Supreme Court Thursday denied Trump’s request to hear the case that focused on ballot issues challenged during the recount of Dane and Milwaukee Counties, sending it instead to a lower court, which already this afternoon held a scheduling hearing. Another Trump suit filed midweek in federal court in Milwaukee calls for the Republican-controlled Legislature to determine who won. That court also held a hearing this afternoon. Now, the cases are moving fast by necessity. December 14 marks the date when each date casts their ballots for president and vice president during a meeting of the electors. Senior Political Reporter Zac Schultz has been tracking the dizzying array of litigation. He joins us now and hi, Zac.

Zac Schultz:

Hello, Fred.

Frederica Freyberg:

So Electoral College deadlines loom. Aren’t these lawsuits causing Wisconsin to blow by them?

Zac Schultz:

Well, we have them coming up rather quickly and that’s one of the things the judges and the courts have been addressing in these rulings, is they need to move very fast and each of the campaigns needs to move fast in addressing and responding to them. There are real questions about if these get resolved in Donald Trump’s favor somehow, would they even be legitimate if they take place after next Tuesday’s safe harbor day or if they’re not resolved in time before the electors are scheduled to vote on the 14th. Since Governor Evers has already certified the electors and the slate of electors that will vote for Joe Biden for our ten electoral votes.

Frederica Freyberg:

So, as we said, a federal suit calls for the Legislature to choose the slate of electors if that time line goes by the boards. In a hearing on that case today, the judge called it a bizarre remedy for his court. Could it happen, though, that the Legislature chooses the electors?

Zac Schultz:

Only if a federal judge said that’s what happens, invalidated the entire election and gave it to the Wisconsin Legislature to decide. Wisconsin’s Republicans have already said that’s not going to happen. They’re not looking to overthrow the election in that fashion. Similar lawsuits have been filed in other close swing states and they’ve all lost on those same grounds. So in theory, sure, that’s why they’re going to court. In likelihood, very low.

Frederica Freyberg:

Now, much has been made of these unsuccessful Trump lawsuits in other states and this week, our high court rejected taking a case, but to be clear on this, not based on the facts of it, but on procedural grounds. Is that right?

Zac Schultz:

Yeah. State law says they have to go through a circuit court, the lowest county level first, before it works its way up. The Trump campaign asked for an original action in the Supreme Court. Three of the conservatives said they would have taken it. One of those said they would have asked for a lower court to do some fact finding first but ultimately a 4-3 majority decided it needed to go the circuit court route first.

Frederica Freyberg:

Justice Brian Hagedorn was the swing, voting with liberal justices to reject that Trump campaign lawsuit of which you speak and also early tonight another suit brought by an allied group was rejected by the court. Hagedorn wrote in concurrence that the remedy sought to invalidate the entire presidential election was stunning, unprecedented in American history and replete with glaring flaws. He wrote, “Something far more fundamental than the winner of Wisconsin’s elector votes is implicated in this case.” “At stake,” he said, “in some measure is faith in our system of free and fair elections, a feature central to the enduring strength of our constitutional republic.” Strong words from Justice Hagedorn.

Zac Schultz:

That’s right. What the justices are being asked to do is overturn an election is a strong thing. That’s never happened in this state as Justice Hagedorn pointed out. And we should be clear Fred, there is no allegations of voter fraud in any of these lawsuits. There’s no evidence of fraud. There hasn’t been fraud anywhere. What they’re talking about are technical irregularities that may have made some of the votes cast illegal and the question of law around whether they have been able to cast them in that manner in the first place at a ballot box or through an absentee without a formal written request or if a clerk remedied an address number or zip code, small things that have been overlooked in the past that are now being questioned, does that mean the entire ballot has to be thrown out and that’s a big hurdle for some of these justices to overcome as they’ve written in their rulings.

Frederica Freyberg:

So justices sent that other case, not to be confusing with all these cases but that asked to be heard first by the high court to a lower court on those procedural grounds, which Chief Justice Roggensack wanted to hear, saying, “we as the law-declaring court owe it to the public to declare whether the Wisconsin Elections Commission advice is incorrect. However, doing so does not necessarily lead to striking absentee ballots that were cast by following incorrect WEC advice. So the remedy petitioners seek may be out of reach for a number of reasons.” So what remedy? Tossing 200,000 ballots, thereby overturning the results?

Zac Schultz:

Yeah. And that gets right to the heart of why the Trump campaign only sought a recount in Dane and Milwaukee counties, two Democratic strongholds, because the remedy here is to toss what’s called a drawdown, a random collection of ballots from those areas, because there’s no way to link the actual ballot to what may be what they call an illegal vote in the first place. So the good, the bad, all the ballots are together. So you randomly draw them down. If you do it statewide you’re going to get a draw and you’re probably going to get the same result. You do it in Dane and Milwaukee County, take 200,000 votes out, the Trump campaign says, in their footnotes, we will win if that’s what happens.

Frederica Freyberg:

No doubt. So meanwhile at the state Capitol, Republicans are holding their own election investigation next week. We have seen this in other states. We are out of time here to talk about that now, but we will be covering it and see what comes out of that. Zac Schultz, thank you very much and thanks for covering this.

Zac Schultz:

Thank you.

Frederica Freyberg:

“We can’t move forward together when we acknowledge reality in private and then peddle falsehoods in public.” That is a quote from an article published this week by the former chairman of the Brown County Republican Party, who left the party with the 2016 election of Donald Trump. In his article, Mark Becker recounts a phone call he had after this year’s election with Wisconsin Senator Ron Johnson. And by Becker’s account, he was horrified by what he heard. He joins us now from Green Bay and thanks a lot for doing so.

Mark Becker:

Thank you very much. It’s an honor to be here.

Frederica Freyberg:

So what did Senator Johnson say to you that you found, as you wrote, unconscionable?

Mark Becker:

Well, it’s just so frustrating to understand that elected officials like Ron Johnson know the truth. They understand what happened. They have a firm grasp on reality when the cameras are off, but then they don’t think that the public deserves to hear that same truth when the cameras are on and when it’s on record. And the damage that’s doing to us, to the fabric of our society, is — like I said, it’s unconscionable. It’s horrible.

Frederica Freyberg:

So he told you that he knows that Joe Biden is the president-elect, but he’s not willing to state that publicly and why did he say he won’t go there publically?

Mark Becker:

Well he said that one of the things going in the 2016 election was Ron was the highest vote getter of any candidate, Republican candidate in the history of the state of Wisconsin. He said, “My goal was to get 1.5 million votes in Wisconsin. And if I thought I got 1.5 million votes, I would win re-election in ’16.” He said, “I didn’t get that. But Donald Trump did.” And so, you know, he didn’t want to tick those voters off and he saw the big swell of people that Donald Trump has been able to get. But he wasn’t willing to rock that boat.

Frederica Freyberg:

In fact, in your article you say that he said to you, “I know Biden won, but it would be political suicide to admit it.”

Mark Becker:

Yes. Yes. That’s exactly right.

Frederica Freyberg:

So what about the silence on the part of other elected Republicans and the stoking of conspiracies? How in your mind do they undermine democracy, as you wrote?

Mark Becker:

Well, it undermines democracy because the sanctity of the vote is the most precious thing that we have in our politics. It’s stoking that. It’s unconscionable. It’s horrible to know that these elected officials value their party over the oath that they took to serve the country. And so, you know, Ron Johnson is not unique in this. I mean, there are Republicans all over the state of Wisconsin and all over the country that instead of telling people the truth, they line up behind the — you know, the one-term president. So it’s horrible.

Frederica Freyberg:

You write that in fact, though, that Johnson was unconcerned about all of that. How so?

Mark Becker:

Well, he said that the biggest thing was, you know, the pillars of our democracy are strong enough to withstand this. And, I mean, I get it. The pillars of our democracy are very strong and we are very lucky for them. But Ron Johnson is part of that pillar of our democracy, the United States Senate, the House, Congress. That is one of the pillars of our democracy. And it’s up to them to be able to stand up to a bully when they need to be stood up to and they’re failing in that miserably.

Frederica Freyberg:

So Senator Johnson declined to be on this program, but he sent this statement. He said, “I have been very consistent in both public and private statements that I believe there are way too many irregularities and suspect issues that need to be fully investigated and publicly vetted before a final result is determined and a peaceful transition of power takes place. The article,” the one that you wrote, he says, “should be viewed as the political hit piece it is and simply ignored.” So what is your response to his statement?

Mark Becker:

You know, I wish he would tell me — I wish he would tell the public what he told me in person. Yes, he was consistent about he thinks there’s irregularities, but he also said that he understands that it wasn’t enough to overturn the result of this vote. He said the same thing that William Barr, Donald Trump’s own attorney general said. So, I mean, you know, if he thinks that this should be ignored, that’s fine, you can ignore it, but why don’t you ignore the people in the Trump administration that are saying the same thing? If you want to ignore my piece, that’s fine, but why don’t we pay attention to the Republican election officials in battleground states that are saying that this vote was secure, it was over and Joe Biden won, full stop. So I wish Ron would say that.

Frederica Freyberg:

Just very briefly, what kind of reaction have you been getting from your article?

Mark Becker:

I mean, it’s been positive. I’ve been encouraged by some of the people that I know that are Republican operatives and Republican office holders who have sent me messages and said, you know, good job, thank you, because, I mean, this is a turning point and this is a deciding point for the Republican Party on where do they want to go now. You know, they lost the presidency and it’s up to them in these conversations in these very pivotal moments to figure out what the future is going to look like for their party. And right now they’re not doing the right thing.

Frederica Freyberg:

All right. Mark Becker, we need to leave it there. Thanks very much and thank you for joining us.

Mark Becker:

Thank you so much.

Frederica Freyberg:

How do other Congressional Republicans square the presidential election results? And what about COVID relief out of Washington? We turn to U.S. Representative Tom Tiffany from the 7th Congressional District in northwest Wisconsin. He joins us from Washington and thanks very much for doing so.

Tom Tiffany:

Good to be here, Frederica.

Frederica Freyberg:

So Senator Johnson told a constituent he knew that Joe Biden had won but he said it would be political suicide because of all his supporters to say so publicly. What do you say publicly?

Tom Tiffany:

I did not see Senator Johnson’s comments in regards to that so I really can’t comment on his remarks, but I believe it’s all part of the process at this point. And especially when you look at some of the events in Pennsylvania and Georgia. Georgia, there’s questions whether ballots came out at a very late hour and were counted that perhaps should not have. Pennsylvania has a very problematic situation where they counted ballots after the Election Day and that clearly violates the law in Pennsylvania. So I think there’s certainly anomalies out there and the process should be worked through here.

Frederica Freyberg:

So at this juncture you’re not ready to say that Joe Biden is president-elect?

Tom Tiffany:

No. Not until the process is completed and the electoral — I mean, who establishes the next president is the Electoral College. They have not met yet and we have not completed that process.

Frederica Freyberg:

So, as you know, and we’re kind of discussing this, the Trump campaign lawsuits alleging fraud and election irregularities have fallen across the country. They continue winding their way through Wisconsin courts right now. Is it your position that the election was rigged, as the president says, or rife with fraud and ought to be challenged in this way in Wisconsin?

Tom Tiffany:

I used the term anomalies earlier. And that clearly happened at a minimum across the country. When you see windows that are boarded up, I believe that was in Philadelphia, poll watchers being tossed out of being able to do their job, of being able to review ballots, there’s certainly concerns that are there. I think the bigger issues for me, though, I think it’s twofold. One is this accepting ballots after Election Day I do not believe should happen. The second thing is mail-in ballots, which by the way are different than the absentee system here in Wisconsin. Mail-in ballots, I believe that that needs to be ended also because as President Carter said when he was co-chairman of a commission 15 years ago, it leaves the possibility for fraud to be much more rampant.

Frederica Freyberg:

Mail-in ballots, absentee ballots are often mailed in if they are not dropped in drop boxes.

Tom Tiffany:

Yeah. That’s right. So there’s a difference. I think Wisconsin’s absentee system works because you have to request it. The difference I see is when you mail ballots to everyone. That’s what President Carter and the commission he co-chaired talked about is, it leaves the possibility for fraud to be greater in that situation. There’s a difference.

Frederica Freyberg:

All of this discussion of fraud and irregularities, do you think it does damage to the confidence of the U.S. electoral system?

Tom Tiffany:

I think possibly it could. But I think it’s also healthy for us to review our institutions. And if there’s one thing that I believe about Donald Trump, ever since he came down that escalator and announced he was going to run five years ago, he has lifted the lid on institutions that we’ve always had great faith in in this country, including like the FBI, the state department. And we’ve found that there’s some rot in there that needs to be cleaned up. And I think that there are some instances where our election system can do better, and I think he’s highlighting that, and I think that’s healthy for our country.

Frederica Freyberg:

As to elected officials doing work in Washington, there’s a COVID relief package on the table, something shy of $1 trillion. What do you want to see in that specifically and what do you think Wisconsin needs to take from that?

Tom Tiffany:

There’s two things that I believe should be in there. One is liability protections. And the other one is to have targeted relief for — for example, we’ve been promoting for three months to do the Paycheck Protection Extension Plan authored by Representative Chabot out of Ohio. Speaker Pelosi refuses to take that bill up. She hasn’t done it for three months. It really targets relief towards some business sectors that really need help, especially hospitality, hotels, restaurants. Some of them are really in dire shape. And there is a plan there to be able to pass that. Once again now this week, we saw nothing happen under the leadership of Speaker Pelosi. We had a bill in regards to tigers. We had a bill in regards to legalizing marijuana. Nothing to get relief for those businesses that have been hurt because of lockdowns through no fault of their own.

Frederica Freyberg:

We look forward to some potential action on that next week. But Representative Tom Tiffany, thank you very much for joining us from Washington.

Tom Tiffany:

Good to be with you, Frederica.

Frederica Freyberg:

Turning to the other side of the aisle, among the Wisconsin Congressional delegation, with Democratic U.S. Representative Mark Pocan from the 2nd Congressional District. He joins us from Madison and thanks very much for being here.

Mark Pocan:

Thank you, Frederica. Glad to be here.

Frederica Freyberg:

So lots to touch on. First, your reaction to the lawsuits filed by the Trump campaign and his allies in Wisconsin challenging the results here.

Mark Pocan:

Yeah. If he wants to donate $3 million to the state of Wisconsin, we’ll go through a few hoops for him. But they’re not going to go anywhere. Even Scott Walker said the way we run our elections in Wisconsin, you’re not going to find a way to overturn that many votes but if this is what Donald Trump needs to uphold his frail ego in the final weeks that he’s in office, we’ll take the money.

Frederica Freyberg:

Now our state Legislature will hold investigative hearings as we’ve seen in other states. In your mind, does this help to air doubters’ concerns?

Mark Pocan:

Again, you’re dealing with someone who doesn’t want to give up after they’ve lost the election and somehow Republicans are still part of this cult until he officially steps down and they have to do whatever he requires. I wish that they would take this time and do hearings about COVID, about what small businesses need right now and people who are unemployed, what we need to do with contact tracers, what we need to do about testing in senior living situations in places like Wisconsin. But they haven’t met for over six months to deal with any of that and now they’re going to do a hearing on something that is just to make the president feel better. Not exactly the Legislature I remember.

Frederica Freyberg:

From your perspective, has this delay and the allegations of fraud deflated Democrats’ excitement over the results?

Mark Pocan:

No. This is really all done largely for an audience of one, Donald Trump. You’re finding every day more and more major Republicans come out and say Joe Biden won the election, in fact by a quite sizable margin by presidential elections. Up to this point though, all of these actions are to make the president feel better. Honestly, COVID is killing thousands of people a day across the country. Wisconsin has a COVID epidemic. We should be focusing on COVID and COVID primarily and instead we’re following these little rabbit holes that the president can feel better. It’s just a sign of the times of how tough the political environment is right now, Frederica.

Frederica Freyberg:

There is some work going on towards COVID relief out of Washington, including – describe how urgent this is for your constituents.

Mark Pocan:

The highest. There’s no question. Anyone who’s an elected official who’s not spending almost all of their time and effort on COVID isn’t doing their job. That’s what I’ve been trying to do. So whether it be pushing the Legislature to meet and support the governor’s important mask order or temporary occupancy orders that are so important, trying to get the state to hire more contact tracers. We’re significantly down. An important part of testing, tracing and isolation. Missing those is a crucial part of what we have to do. And making sure we’re testing in our senior centers much better. By senior centers, I mean nursing homes and assisted living centers. We’re seeing quite large increases in deaths in those facilities. My job should be to get that federal bill done, which I think we’re going to do next week, to get assistance to small business owners and people who are unemployed and our front line workers and state and local governments doing the work. But if you’re not obsessed by COVID as an elected official, you shouldn’t be an elected official right now.

Frederica Freyberg:

What level of aid, what kind of spending do you support in any federal package?

Mark Pocan:

Well, it looks like we’re going to have a trimmed-down package, but having President Biden taking office on January 20, that will give us another chance to do more work. But if you talk to small business owners right now, they’re hurting badly, restaurants, bars, meetings, tourism, other industries and anyone who works with those industries. That’s causing layoffs and people unemployed at no fault of their own. We’re watching front line workers literally exhausted from trying to deal with the COVID cases and yet we still have a president telling people you don’t have to wear a mask, which is ridiculous. We need to do everything we can right now to curtail those cases to relieve the pressure on our hospitals, to relieve the pressure on the front line workers. We need more resources than this bill will have, but at least this will get us through some temporary fixes right now.

Frederica Freyberg:

Governor Evers wants priority on vaccines given that he says that statewide mitigation efforts have been blocked in Wisconsin as you’ve been referencing. Do you think DHS Secretary Alex Azar will go for giving Wisconsin priority on vaccines?

Mark Pocan:

I think they’re going to do it by demographics and populations, as they should. I mean, obviously, front line workers should be the very first to get any vaccines. Those who are older or are in risk categories need to get it next. But there are things right now we can do in Wisconsin short of this that we’re not doing, including getting more contact tracers, including having more aggressive testing in assisted living centers and in verifying what’s happening in the nursing homes. So I hope we can do all of this at the same time, right? I think the Legislature can meet and pass some of the important provisions the governor has put out of there. But the state also has to step up and do some things they can do right now without legislative work or federal assistance. If we do that and get our bill out next week that’s going to provide some importance and then have a good plan to get the vaccines out to the people who need it the most, I think we’ll at least be doing the job that we have to do to keep people as safe as possible.

Frederica Freyberg:

We leave it there. Representative Mark Pocan, thank you very much.

Mark Pocan:

Sure. Thank you, Frederica.

Frederica Freyberg:

And finally tonight, from our partners at WisContext. The pandemic has continued for about ten months now, but the rate of new COVID-19 cases in different places around Wisconsin has ebbed and flowed over that time. Charts created by WisContext show a time line of how the rate of coronavirus cases grew in all 72 Wisconsin counties on a day-by-day basis. Starting in late March, when multiple cases first started being reported, these graphics illustrate the initial spring wave, the mid-summer spike and then the sustained autumn surge in cases. One graphic breaks down the case numbers by county population and another by their census status as urban, rural or in-between. A graphic that shows the pandemic’s course by age is similar to the first two. There’s also one that looks at geographic patterns, namely through the state’s hospital readiness regions. All of these charts are available at WisContext.org.

Announcer:

And that is our program for tonight. I’m Frederica Freyberg. Have a good weekend.

Funding for “Here & Now” is provided by the Focus Fund for Journalism and Friends of PBS Wisconsin.