Skip to content
Search

Latest Stories

Top Stories

Can the election be secured $1,200 at a time? Wisconsin's counting on it.

Town hall in Mellen, Wisconsin

Tiny Mellen (population 689) will get the same $1,200 for election security that Milwaukee will receive.

Wisconsin, which is expecting to again be among the hardest-fought presidential battlegrounds, is hoping an extremely modest amount of spending will boost the credibility and reliability of its 2020 balloting.

The state Elections Commission on Tuesday unanimously approved a $1.1 million program to help cities and towns beef up their election security. Using the federal money received so far, however, the panel will be able to give just $1,200 each to a bit more than half the state's 1,800 municipalities — regardless of size. So Milwaukee (population 600,000) would get the same as Mellen (population 689).

"It's really a meaningless dollar amount. It's a rounding error for some of their things," Commissioner Mark Thomsen told Wisconsin Public Radio, referring to the budget of the state's biggest city and his home town, Milwaukee. "So that may not be the best way we spend federal dollars on security."

Wisconsin's efforts to accomplish meaningful safeguards with minimal money are emblematic of what's happening across the country, where elections are run by some 8,000 different state and local entities and they're all worried the 2020 results could be tarnished by hacking.


The money is part of the $380 million appropriated by Congress a year ago for grants to the states to boost election security. The amount has been widely assailed as inadequate by state governments controlled by both Republicans and Democrats.

Sign up for The Fulcrum newsletter

And, after resisting entreaties for months, last week Majority Leader Mitch McConnell endorsed a Senate plan to deliver another $250 million in time to be spent before Election Day. The House has voted to spend $600 million, though, and the two figures will have to be reconciled as part of budget negotiations that won't climax much before Thanksgiving.

The money is to be spent by January on updating security software, creating computer firewalls or buying new computers in order to protect electronic voting system and voters' personal information. The priority will be getting money to low-tech, mostly rural communities. Clerks in 215 towns are using Windows 7 devices, for example, even though at the end of the year Microsoft will stop providing security updates for that software. About one-third of the communities have told the commission they don't have the cash to buy new gear.

The program comes two years after revelations that Russian hackers tried and failed to break into Wisconsin's voter registration system before the 2016 election. The commission says it has not found evidence the system has ever been compromised.

President Trump carried the state and its 10 electors by 23,000 votes three years ago, one of the biggest surprises of his upset win because it broke a string of seven straight wins in Wisconsin by the Democratic nominee.

Read More

Just the Facts: Trump Administration Pauses International Student Visas
woman wearing blue denim jacket holding book

Just the Facts: Trump Administration Pauses International Student Visas

The Fulcrum strives to approach news stories with an open mind and skepticism, striving to present our readers with a broad spectrum of viewpoints through diligent research and critical thinking. As best we can, we remove personal bias from our reporting and seek a variety of perspectives in both our news gathering and selection of opinion pieces. However, before our readers can analyze varying viewpoints, they must have the facts.

Has the Trump administration put a hold on issuing student visas for this coming fall?

The Trump administration has paused new student visa interviews as part of an effort to expand social media screening for applicants. The State Department has instructed U.S. embassies and consulates to stop scheduling new student and exchange visitor visa appointments until further guidance is issued. However, previously scheduled interviews will still proceed.

Keep ReadingShow less
Coalition of Nonprofits, Research Institutions Fight Against Proposed Cuts at CDC Injury Center

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Getty Images, sshepard

Coalition of Nonprofits, Research Institutions Fight Against Proposed Cuts at CDC Injury Center

WASHINGTON–Shayna Raphael started promoting infant safety 10 years ago after her daughter Claire passed away due to an unsafe sleeping environment at her daycare.

The Claire Bear Foundation, which Raphael created with her husband, teaches parents about unsafe products. But first, they need the data about which products endanger babies. They rely on a little-known agency at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the Injury Center. The center collects most of the data used to keep people safe from injuries and death.

Keep ReadingShow less