United Wisconsin v. WEC

Every political party should be free to nominate the candidates of their choice, even if those candidates are also nominated by one of the major political parties. That’s called fusion voting, but Wisconsin bans it.

This ban infringes on state constitutional rights to equal protection, freedom of association, speech and assembly, and maintenance of a free government – preventing voters from meaningful participation in the political process.

On behalf of United Wisconsin, a cross-partisan organization, along with Wisconsin voters from both sides of the aisle, we with co-counsel Gass Turek LLC filed suit in Dane County Circuit Court seeking to have the state’s anti-fusion laws declared unconstitutional under the Wisconsin State Constitution.

Fusion voting allows candidates to be cross-nominated by multiple parties, ensuring that they represent a broad spectrum of voters; votes are tallied separately by party and then added together to produce the final result. Fusion voting allows minor parties to organize around policy issues and influence the political process without playing a “spoiler” role in elections or encouraging voters to “waste” their ballots on candidates with little chance of winning.

Fusion voting was once used in every state in the nation including Wisconsin. It helped create political competition and highlight important issues. For instance, anti-slavery parties gained influence through fusion voting. Parties that utilized fusion met in Ripon 170 years ago to form the anti-slavery Republican Party. However, once the Republican Party got its footing, it sought to ban fusion voting to eliminate competition by other parties.

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.