City Clerk Under Investigation After Nearly 200 Ballots Were Left Uncounted in Wisconsin

‘We are the final arbiters of votes in the state of Wisconsin, and we need to know why those ballots weren’t included anywhere,’ the commission chair said.

Election officials count absentee ballots in Milwaukee on on Nov. 4, 2020. Scott Olson/Getty Images

Almost 200 absentee ballots were left uncounted in Madison, Wisconsin, after the 2024 general election, causing state election officials to launch an investigation on Jan. 2 to determine whether the city clerk broke state law.

The Wisconsin Elections Commission will investigate whether Madison City Clerk Maribeth Wetzel-Biehl flouted state laws or abused her discretion, after it voted unanimously to open a probe on Thursday. The commission is concerned that Wetzel-Biehl’s office did not notify it of the problem until the end of December, which is nearly a month and a half after the election and several weeks after Commission Chair Ann Jacobs certified the state election results on Nov. 29.