MADISON, Wis. — A judge on Tuesday an attempt rejected to revive the impeachment effort against the longest-serving speaker of the Wisconsin Assembly in state history, alleging signatures were improperly collected under legislative boundary lines that are now barred from use in elections.
Supporters of former President Donald Trump had targeted Republican Assembly Speaker Robin Vos for revocation after he refused to decertify President Joe Biden’s narrow victory in the state. Biden’s victory of about 21,000 votes has withstood two partial recounts, lawsuits, an independent audit and a review by a conservative law firm.
Fox further angered Trump supporters when he did not support a plan for impeachment Meagan Wolfe, the state’s top elections official.
Organizers of the Vos recall failed to submit enough signatures to trigger an election in their first attempt in May. The Wisconsin Elections Commission rejected last month a second attempt at recall via a bipartisan vote, which also failed to reach the required number of signatures.
Recall organizers appealed the decision Friday in Dane County Superior Court. On Tuesday, Dane County Superior Court Judge Stephen Ehlke ruled that the organizers’ attempt to force a vote under old legislative maps violated the order of the state Supreme Court unless these limits are adhered to.
Recall organizers had been collecting recall signatures from voters in the 63rd District, the district Vos was elected to represent in 2022. But in December, the Wisconsin Supreme Court banned the use of those boundary lines in the future.
The legislature approved new maps that placed Vos in a new 33rd electoral district.
The Election Commission had asked the Wisconsin Supreme Court to clarify which district boundaries would apply to the recall, but the court refused to speak out.
Recall organizers argued that the election commission should have accepted signatures collected after the 60-day petition filing period expired, but before the petition filing deadline.
But Ehlke did not respond to this at all, because he believed that the signatures were being collected in the old district.
“Simply put, this court will not order the WEC to do what the Wisconsin Supreme Court prohibits,” Ehlke wrote, referring to the election commission.
Vos and the recall organizers did not respond to requests for comment.