It's on. The Wisconsin Government Accountability Board has rejected challenges to the recall petitions submitted against four Republican state senators and ruled that recall elections must be held:
Recall elections must be held for four Republican state senators, the Government Accountability Board unanimously ruled Monday.
The panel, which runs state elections, also said it wanted to schedule elections for May 8. If more than one candidate from the same party runs, that date would become a primary and the general election would be held June 5.
Last year, Democrats defeated two Republican incumbents in recall elections, narrowing the GOP majority in the state senate to a single vote. Those victories have resulted in much of the Republican agenda
stalling, as centrist Republican Dale Schultz has taken
de facto control of the state senate.
Now, in addition to recalling Gov. Scott Walker, Democrats can take outright control of the chamber by winning just one more seat. Their chances are excellent, as three of the four recall elections will be held in districts more favorable to Democrats than all but one of the six districts where recalls were held back in August.
There is one hitch. Because the Government Accountability Board is still reviewing the recall petitions against Scott Walker, and because the GAB wants to schedule the recalls of Walker and the state senators for the same date, the elections have not been officially ordered. As such, under Wisconsin law, the Republicans facing recall can continue raising unlimited contributions while all Democrats must abide by campaign contribution limits. This will only change once the recalls are officially ordered, likely near the end of the month.
To fight back, we have added the four Democrats who are challenging the four Republican state senators to the Daily Kos Wisconsin recall fund Act Blue page. The Democrats are state Rep. Donna Seidel, former state Sen. John Lehman, former state Rep. Kristen Dexter, and Lori Compass, who actually organized the recall of the Republican she is challenging, Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald.
Please, contribute $6 to the Democrats running in the Wisconsin recall elections.
For more discussion of the ongoing fight in Wisconsin, see recent posts from noise of rain, Puddytat, and stcroixcheeshead.