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United Wisconsin

As Law Forward, lead counsel (along with co-lead John Franke of Gass Turek) explains:

“The Wisconsin Constitution guarantees its citizens the right to freedom of speech and association, the promise of a free government, and the certainty of equal protection under the law. The ban on fusion voting violates each of those guarantees. For example, the ban prevents political parties from associating with certain candidates on ballots, and it puts voters in a bind, where associating with political parties that match their views necessarily risks spoiling elections. The ban violates the bedrock guarantee of equal protection by uniquely harming minor and newer political parties, as well as the citizens whose interests those parties represent, while strengthening the Democratic and Republican parties—at the expense of all Wisconsinites. And the ban undermines free government by distorting our politics, narrowing electoral options, and perpetuating an artificial duopoly that strangles true representation.”

Wisconsin State Journal: Wisconsin lawsuit wants to allow candidates to be listed under multiple parties on ballots

Lee Rasch, the executive director of LeaderEthics, is one of five plaintiffs suing to bring back fusion voting. 

“The two parties are not working together effectively at all, in fact they are pulling farther and farther apart and the increased division is causing a breakdown of trust,” he said. “There has to be some kind of action to try to … bring about better representation than what we have right now.”

Wisconsin State Journal: Group sues to let candidates run under multiple parties

Existing anti-fusion laws are an “affront” to voters’ right to freely associate with the candidate and political party of their choosing — particularly with third-party candidates, who have been largely relegated to playing spoiler in state and national elections — and leaves voters “stuck with the two major parties,” attorneys note in the lawsuit.

“This creates perverse incentives that drive the parties further and further from the voters,” the lawsuit states. “Elections offering only a binary choice incentivize the two major parties to be at war with one another, each constantly catering to their most fervent and extreme supporters, reflexively rejecting policy compromises, increasingly alienating the public, and undermining the efficacy of our republic.”

Wisconsin State Journal: Fusion voting could revitalize Wisconsin politics | Dale Schultz and Dave Mahoney

Instead of working together around Wisconsin values and traditions which have made the state such a great place to call home, too many elected officials have become mired in a morass of divisions that erode trust and make it nearly impossible to tackle the issues that matter most to the people of Wisconsin. United Wisconsin and fusion voting would give voters who feel intensely dissatisfied with our rigid and unstable two-party system more electoral choices and empower ideas and voters who do not fit neatly into red or blue boxes.

Associated Press: “Same candidate, two parties: A Wisconsin lawsuit aims to bring back fusion voting” 

“Voters in Wisconsin could be seeing double on Election Day if the practice of fusion voting — which allows the same candidate to appear on the ballot under multiple party lines — makes a comeback in the battleground state.

A lawsuit filed Tuesday seeks to legalize the practice, saying it would empower independent voters and lesser-known political parties at a time of increasingly bitter partisanship between Republicans and Democrats. 

The lawsuit by the newly formed group United Wisconsin seeks a ruling affirming that minor parties can nominate whoever they like — even if that person was nominated by the Republican or Democratic parties. Under fusion voting, “John Doe, Democrat” could appear on the same ballot with “John Doe, Green Party.” All of the votes that candidate receives are combined, or fused, for their total.

United Wisconsin wants to become a fusion political party that will cross-nominate a major party candidate, said Dale Schultz, co-chair of the group and a former Republican Senate majority leader.

But first, he said, “we’d like to see the state courts affirm that we have a constitutional right to associate with whomever we want.” Schultz is one of the lawsuit’s five named plaintiffs, which include a former Democratic county sheriff and a retired judge who was also a Republican state lawmaker.

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