Engelbrecht also said the group is looking to roll out drop box monitoring in multiple states, and mentioned Michigan as a possible location, though most of his focus appears to be on Wisconsin.
In his interview with Wallnau, Engelbrecht added that he works with “three influential sheriffs” in Wisconsin, though he did not name them.
WIRED contacted two dozen sheriffs from Wisconsin’s largest county, but found none who would be part of the surveillance effort. Engelbrecht and Truth the Vote did not respond to multiple requests for comment from WIRED to name the sheriffs who agreed to be part of the program.
“True the Vote has contacted the Sheriff’s Office regarding ideas related to election integrity and possible violations of the law,” deputy inspector Patrick R. Esser, from the Waukesha County Sheriff’s Department, told WIRED. “True the Vote proposed the idea of ​​providing cameras to the sheriff’s office to monitor election precincts, however, the obstacles associated with that idea made it impractical.”
While most sheriff’s offices contacted by WIRED did not respond to requests for comment, a number, including offices in Buffalo County and Polk County, said they had never heard of the drop initiative. box. “I’m not aware of the plan and I’m not going to participate,” Sheriff Mike Osmond from Buffalo County told WIRED. “I am not sure if they are legal or not but there is no interest in implementing such a program.”
In his newsletter this week, Engelbrecht signaled that the group may not be successful in recruiting enough sheriffs, writing that they will provide cameras to “sheriffs if possible, to other individuals if necessary.”
It’s also not clear that sheriffs would have jurisdiction over drop boxes because they are county officials and elections are not run by county officials in Wisconsin.
“We’re a little different than some states,” said Ann Jacobs, chairwoman of the Wisconsin Elections Commission, which is responsible for overseeing state elections. “In Wisconsin our elections are actually run at the municipal level. So we have 1,850, approximately, municipal clerks running municipal elections.”
In the wake of the Supreme Court’s decision in July, the Wisconsin Electoral Commission put forth guidance for clerks on how to implement drop boxes. “The guidance does not prohibit livestreaming of ballot drop boxes, and there is no such prohibition in Wisconsin law,” Riley Vetterkind, the public information officer for the Wisconsin Electoral Commission told WIRED.
However, if such monitoring interferes with voting, that could result in criminal charges with penalties of up to six months in prison.
“It really depends on what they do with the information they gather, and my hope is that they don’t go out and attack voters, although I suspect that’s exactly what will happen,” Jacobs said.
The claims made to 2000 Mules conspiracy film centered on voters who put more than one ballot in the drop boxes. However, Jacobs points out that voters in Wisconsin are allowed to place more than one ballot in a drop box if they are doing so for a disabled or disabled family member, which can lead to tensions with the monitors. of the drop box in case of confusion about that allowance.
It is also unclear where these cameras will be located, as they will need to be permanently in place to provide 24-hour coverage. “What they can’t do is go and just attach a camera to, you know, a Milwaukee city library and point it at a drop box,” Jacobs said. “I suppose in some places, maybe they could figure it out, but I don’t think there’s many places that I can think of where that would work.”
