Mills: Other threats to the vote.

We’re heading into familiar territory in Wisconsin, with a full recount of the presidential election results now underway. The Jill Stein campaign held a massive fundraiser to cover the costs in three battleground states.

Nothing about this election has gone according to plan, and things have only gotten more interesting since Donald Trump won the presidency while losing the popular vote by the largest margin in history.

Since the cost of the recount (an astonishing $3.5 million in Wisconsin alone) is being covered by campaign donations, I’m all for this as an exercise in due diligence. I doubt it will change the ultimate outcome.

I also worry that the recount may be a distraction from more serious threats faced by our democratic process. There are far more problematic changes to election law and procedure that likely helped tip the scales.

First, the 2016 presidential election was the first without the full protections of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. The measure was passed in an effort to ensure full access to the right to vote without being denied on the basis of race or color. At least 12 states have recently passed restrictive voting laws and carved out exceptions to the VRA, and another six passed such laws prior to the 2012 election. The changes include hurdles to registration, cutbacks on early voting, and strict voter ID requirements that harm people of color.

In Wisconsin, we’ve seen many changes in the law over the last several years, resulting in, if not outright discrimination, certainly confusion that has led to disenfranchisement. For instance, the state had previously allowed absentee ballots to be counted so long as they were postmarked by the date of the election. That law was changed recently so that only those ballots received by election day can be counted, which led to thousands of ballots being tossed.

We now have voter ID requirements after a long back-and-forth battle meant that, though passed in 2011, the full force of the change wasn’t in effect until this year. Again, confusion and mistakes are fairly guaranteed to occur as a result of such uncertainty. It didn’t help that the Republican Legislature dragged its heels on funding the court-mandated public education effort that only finally got underway this summer, after the spring primaries.

Not all the news is bleak. Another recent change got rid of the limit on absentee voting hours statewide, leaving it up to each municipality to expand available times if there was a will and funding. That helped lead to record breaking early turnout statewide.

The Legislature in March passed a law that will let people register to vote online by this spring. That’s a great step that will help people who may be unable to travel to register.

The downside, because there always seems to be a catch, is that the same bill eliminated special registration deputies who have helped people sign up to vote in the past. Often, the people who most need that assistance are the ones who have a difficult time accessing and navigating online registration.

A recount is all well and good, especially given the unusual circumstances of this election. The fact that Trump has pitched such a fit over the prospect of it, trotting out easily debunked conspiracy theories that weirdly also support a recount, makes me all the more certain that we should follow through.

At the same time, I urge everyone to familiarize themselves with the dizzying array of changes to election and voting laws passed in recent years. Our energy would be better spent finding ways to make the process more free and open for everyone. Otherwise, we’re doomed to repeat this same mess while thinskinned con men take advantage of the disarray.