Formal complaint filed about Green Bay’s November election

GREEN BAY, Wis. (WBAY) – A formal complaint has been filed with the Wisconsin Election Commission (WEC), over how Green Bay handled the November presidential election. Thursday, the Amistad Project, which calls itself an election integrity watchdog, filed the complaint with the state’s elections agency. Former Brown County Clerk Sandy Juno and five Green Bay residents are filing a complaint as well, claiming an election integrity issue.

As we’ve reported, some Republican lawmakers have called on Green Bay’s Mayor Eric Genrich to resign, claiming “Democratic operatives” influenced November’s election.

The complaint obtained through public records requests that Green Bay Mayor’s office accepted a $1.6 million grant from the Center for Tech and Civic Life (CTCL), a non-profit voting organization backed largely by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg.

An attorney for the Amistad Project, Erick Kaardal, says this complaint is not a claim of voter fraud but instead argues grants from the organization violate federal election law. “The key document was the corporate conditions. So, you have a private corporation coming into your city of Green Bay and proposing to the common council conditions on the federal election,” said Kaardal.

“The CTCL created what I would call a ‘pay-to-play’ environment, involving third-party actors to administer and direct elections in Wisconsin’s five most populous municipalities,” said Sandy Juno.

Juno believes the city unlawfully gave consultant Michael Spitzer-Rubenstein authority over the election after former City Clerk Kris Tesla took a leave of absence.

”I felt that Spitzer-Rubenstein’s election activities were outside of those described to me by Administrator Wolfe,” Juno explained.

Last week, Meagan Wolfe, the Elections Commission Administrator, told lawmakers no formal complaints were made before the election.

“I don’t know that we ever received answers about what his particular role was or what his action was there, but we did ask for more evidence if anybody had anything of concern they wanted to bring to our attention. We solicited that. We did not receive any additional information,” Wolfe explained.

Action 2 News reached out to the mayor’s office but did not hear back. He’s previously said that nothing was done wrong regarding the election.

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