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We get lots of newsroom emails. Usually we read them/pass them along/use them to start digging. But on Election Day, it was clear we needed to do something a little different. So we started treating the emails as data. 1/ https://fox6now.com/2020/04/08/milwaukee-election-officials-call-for-federal-investigation-into-missing-absentee-ballots/
We asked people who had requested absentee ballots but not yet received them to get in touch with us and tell us WHEN they requested those ballots. Within 24 hours, we had 145 emails. 2/
This is not a scientific poll, by any means. But by mapping out the info we got, we found nearly 2/3 of the of the people who got in touch with us had requested ballots 2+ weeks before the election. This wasn’t a case of last-minute requests not having enough time to arrive. 3/
Nearly half of the 145 people who emailed us had requested ballots during one week in particular (March 16-22). Several of those people provided screen shots showing online ballot statuses that said their ballots were mailed to them on March 22 and 23. 4/
Several of those voters say they called the state/city election commissions and were told ballots mailed around that time were “lost in the mail.” So we sent a bunch of questions to said election commissions. 5/
A couple hours later, State Sen. Dan Feyen sent a press release saying USPS found 3 bins of absentee ballots for Oshkosh/Appleton voters. A 1/2 hour after that, Wisc. Elections Commission said there had been reports of ballots lost in the mail in different parts of the state. 6/
We asked about ballots lost in Milwaukee. No one from the state elections commission seemed to have heard of that issue specifically. Right after that media call, we hopped on ANOTHER media call with Milwaukee Election Commission. 7/
That’s when Exec. Director Neil Albrecht announces he’s asking USPS to investigate what happened to ballots supposedly mailed around March 22, that same date that so many of our viewers gave us as the time they were told their ballots were mailed. 8/ https://fox6now.com/2020/04/08/milwaukee-election-officials-call-for-federal-investigation-into-missing-absentee-ballots/
Albrecht said he’s known about this issue for a few days now; he didn’t elaborate on why he chose today to ask USPS for an investigation. 9/
Should note that absentee ballots aren’t individually tracked the way packages are. Elections clerks from each municipality enter the information about when ballots are sent in varying ways. State says it’s eyeing improvements for fall election cycle. 10/
USPS spokesman says he doesn’t have any info for us right now. We’ll keep you posted. In the meantime, reach out to us if there’s an issue you think we should look into. DMs are open. You can also email theinvestigators@fox6now@com. 11/11 https://fox6now.com/2020/04/08/milwaukee-election-officials-call-for-federal-investigation-into-missing-absentee-ballots/
