LIVE: What Wisconsin voters are saying and seeing on Election Day

Polls are open in Wisconsin and voters across the state are casting their ballots.

The Badger State is one of a handful of swing states that could decide the presidential race. 

Lines to vote and to register have been observed at several polling places around the state, and some people waiting outdoors are facing wet weather.

The National Weather Service is forecasting showers and possible thunderstorms in parts of the state from late in the morning through early evening. One Wisconsin clerk advised voters to try to avoid dripping water onto their ballots, as voting machines work best on dry ballots.

Wisconsin’s top elections official Meagan Wolfe said many of the state’s municipalities have tried to minimize potential outdoor lines by providing enough polling places. Still, she said voters may face outdoor lines.

“I’d tell folks to pack an umbrella or to make sure you’ve got a jacket with a hood,” she said.

1:45 PM: Milwaukee officials project results early Wednesday morning

The leader of the Milwaukee Election Commission expects vote results for the city to come in early Wednesday morning. Paulina Gutiérrez, executive director of the commission, said she is projecting results will be in by about 2 a.m. or 3 a.m.

“We are headed to a late night, of course,” she said.

There are 180 polling places across Milwaukee. Gutiérrez said as of noon, there had been 31,500 votes cast at 96 of those polling locations. The other locations have not been able to report results yet, likely because they’re busy, Gutiérrez said. She also said many voters are registering to vote at the polls Tuesday.

As of 8:53 a.m. Tuesday, 106,750 absentee ballots had been returned to Milwaukee’s central count facility. During the 2020 presidential race, 168,000 absentee ballots were cast in the city, 61,363 through in-person absentee votes.

Gutiérrez said around 300 poll workers had registered to work at the central count facility. Some were working in the morning, and others have the night shift. She also said she wasn’t aware of any issues with election observers across the city so far.

“Things are going pretty well at the polling locations — what we’re seeing is long lines and a lot of activity,” Gutiérrez said.

In the city’s Washington Heights neighborhood, chief election inspector Tom Shanahan arrived at the Neeskara Elementary School polling place at 5:45 a.m. to prepare his site for voters. By 7 a.m. the line was to the street.

This is Shanahan’s 16th year working as an election inspector. He predicts this election will be the busiest in history. He said his polling place usually sees about 700 voters, but he believes about 1,000 would cast votes before the day is done Tuesday.

Milwaukee resident Samantha Gilbert said she couldn’t deny still feeling a little conflicted about her vote because of the tumultuous events going on in the world and country.

“But I think it’s important to come out and to place our vote, not necessarily for the person who deserves or earns our vote, but for the person that I feel we have a better chance of bringing our issues to the ballot and having our voices heard and listened to,” Gilbert said.

Milwaukee Mayor Cavalier Johnson also spoke to the media at the central count facility. He said poll workers at the site are working to ensure a “thorough, secure process.”

1:30 PM: Madison voters say they’re nervous, anxious and ‘nauseously optimistic’

In swing state Wisconsin, where polling showed the race evenly tied going into election day and where Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump and their surrogates have been campaigning relentlessly, voters speaking to reporters at the polls were quick to bring up their worries about the possible outcome of the race.

Milena McFeeters said she noticed more election observers than in the past at Madison’s Olbrich Botanical Gardens polling place

“I think there’s a lot of anxiety because there’s no clear winner at this point,” McFeeters said.

She said there are many important issues in this election, but with so many campaign stops in Wisconsin over the past few weeks, she’ll be glad when it’s over.

“I think this is probably one of the more consequential elections of my lifetime so I came out to support Kamala Harris,” Alice Schmidt said as she stopped in to vote during a break from work.
Schmidt said she made her decision because she believes “in correcting the imbalance in wealth and power in this country.”

She said living in a swing state felt like both “a privilege and a burden,” and said she was nervous about the outcome.

Hilary Gerstein stopped to take a photo with her elementary school-aged daughter after voting. “It’s your civic duty to take a voting selfie,” Gerstein joked.

Despite the lighthearted moment, Gerstein said she is worried about the ‘potential downfall of democracy’ if her preferred candidate doesn’t win.

“It will be dicey, and it’s unclear what would happen. And it would be nice to elect somebody who is stable and competent to run a country and then I wouldn’t have to pay attention to elections for a little awhile, and that would be really nice,” Gerstein said.

She said was feeling “nauseously optimistic” about the outcome.

12:10 PM: Dozens of election observers watch Milwaukee’s central count, RNC backs off claims they’re being restricted 

At Milwaukee’s central county facility at the Baird Center downtown, election workers were processing absentee ballots under the eye of dozens of election observers

Ann Jacobs, chair of the Wisconsin Elections Commission, arrived at the facility around 7 a.m. as an election observer. She said counting there got underway around 9 a.m.

“So far, it’s delightfully boring,” Jacobs said.

“Processing absentee ballots is a dull experience — it involves opening, and envelopes and marking things and unfolding them — it’s good that it’s sort of quiet and tedious here and that’s exactly what we want to see,” Jacobs said.

Jacobs said she took a “general headcount” of the number of the election observers at the facility when the day got started. She estimated around 50 of them were with the Republican Party and around 15 were with the Democratic Party.

The Republican National Committee has walked back claims that elections observers are being restricted. The RNC filed a lawsuit Monday claiming that the Wisconsin Elections Commission allowed election site managers to illegally limit the number of poll watchers during in-person absentee voting.

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports that a lawyer for the committee said during a Tuesday motion hearing that committee officials toured Milwaukee’s central count location and see no more issues.

Circuit Court Judge Michael J. Hanrahan said he found the timing of the suit, filed the day before the election, to be somewhat troubling. He did not rule on the merits of the case, so polling place business will not change on Election Day. A status hearing on the case was scheduled for Nov. 15.

In a morning press briefing, Wolfe said she wouldn’t comment on the ongoing litigation directly, but said Wisconsin Elections Commission manuals lay out the policies related to elections observers.

“I really fully expect all of our local jurisdictions to be working today towards having observers (as) part of that process, and trying to allow as many people as they can, without causing a disturbance to the voting process,” she said.

11:40 AM: United in marriage, divided in politics

In Superior, married couple John and Miranda Lynch came to their polling place together, although they cast votes on opposite sides of the political aisle.

Miranda, 44, is voting for Harris and her husband John, 48, is voting for Trump.
The Lynch’s situation isn’t unusual.

A recent NPR poll shows a 34-point gender gap in the race, with more women supporting Harris and more men supporting Trump.

In Wisconsin, that gap is slightly smaller according to the most recent Marquette University Law School poll. The survey, released Oct. 30, shows men in Wisconsin prefer Trump by 12 points, while women prefer Harris by 14.

In Superior, Miranda Lynch said she and her husband respect each other and agree to disagree. But she said she has largely kept her support for Harris to herself, saying many people in her social circle are Republicans and she worries some of her friends may cut ties with her for her political views.

“It seems like a lot of people take things more personal and it makes people afraid to speak their thoughts and opinions,” she said. “I suppose in my case that’s part of the reason I kept pretty quiet.”

9:30 AM: Voters in the crucial Fox Valley focused on reproductive rights, inflation

In Oshkosh, the line of people waiting to vote at a church on the city’s south side Tuesday morning extended outside the building. Oshkosh is the county seat of Winnebago county, in one of the most closely-watched regions of the state.

Resident Kay Dobberke Brauer spoke to WPR while on the phone with her daughter, who was headed back to Wisconsin from a work trip in Alabama.

“She got to the airport last night to fly out to Baltimore. The flight was canceled. She flew to Dallas. That flight didn’t get out until midnight,” Dobberke Brauer said. “(She) got into Chicago at midnight, got on the train this morning from Chicago to Milwaukee. And she’s driving up now, and should be here in an hour.”

Her daughter, Lauren Brauer, said she was moving heaven and earth to get home to vote because she cares about reproductive rights.

“I’m a big Harris fan because I’m just terrified of another Trump presidency,” Lauren Brauer said.

Explore WPR’s candidate guide for the Nov. 5 election in Wisconsin

Gary Schmude of Oshkosh said he’s concerned the most about inflation. He said he would “probably” vote for Trump, but said he wishes there were other candidates.

“God, for the last five, six elections, I wish we had different candidates,” he said. “This country really needs to figure out why we can’t find somebody better.”

Dan Kussman of Oshkosh said he doesn’t identify as a Republican or a Democrat. He didn’t share who he was voting for or the top issues, but stressed the importance of voting.

“People have died in our country for the right to vote,” he said. So when you don’t go cast a ballot, you don’t have any reason to complain (about) the way things are. This is an important election year, and I think the country is pretty divided. Everyone’s gotta do their part.”

9 AM: Superior polling places have more workers this year

Trace Topping, a chief election inspector in Superior, said a line of people was waiting to vote at the city’s government center. WPR observed more than two dozen people waiting to cast their ballot.

“I haven’t seen that in the last four times, I’ve done this,” Topping said.

Topping said the city has more poll workers this election, including 10 at the government center polling location. New this year, a plainclothes Superior police officer will also be present at each of the city’s polling locations.

“In the last several elections, there haven’t been any kind of issues like that where we’ve needed any sort of police involvement or help, but it’s just, I think, more to ease the electors and the people that are coming in,” Topping said.

Superior resident Ben Griffith, 61, said he was thinking of the economy and the nation’s southern border when he cast his vote for former Republican President Donald Trump, saying he would fight for the average Joe.

“I am looking for for just someone or an administration, who cares about the American people. I don’t see that with this administration, and I don’t like the way the country is heading,” Griffith said, adding he feels the economy was booming under Trump.

Abigail Bourque, 21, of Superior is voting in her first election. She said humanitarian and reproductive rights are on her mind as she casts her vote for Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris.

“I feel like the fact that this is even having to be called back into the discussion — the Roe v. Wade (decision) — is kind of ridiculous,” Bourque said. “I’m hoping, with a new president, hopefully we can get back on track for safeguarding reproductive rights and human rights because it’s just
fundamental that everybody has bodily autonomy.”

All eyes are on swing state Wisconsin

 Statewide races in Wisconsin are often decided by razor-thin margins. In 2020, President Joe Biden won the state by less than a percentage point. 

Republican former President Donald Trump and Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris have been barnstorming Wisconsin attempting to rally undecided and unmotivated voters. They held simultaneous rallies in the state on Wednesday and again Friday. 

The latest Marquette University Law School Poll showed the two candidates in a dead heat, with Harris leading Trump by just 1 percentage point among likely Wisconsin voters.

Also on the ballot is the race for a U.S. Senate seat in which Democratic incumbent Tammy Baldwin is facing Republican banking executive Eric Hovde. Last week’s Marquette Poll showed this race tightening, with Baldwin leading Hovde by just two percentage points among registered voters. 

Wisconsin voters will also weigh in on races for Congress, the state legislature, a statewide proposal and numerous local referendums. 

As of Monday, 1,510,773 absentee ballots were returned, according to the Wisconsin Elections Commission. That includes 949,157 that were filled out in-person. Officials say ballots may not be counted until the early morning hours on Wednesday due to high rates of absentee and in-person early voting.

To find your polling place and what’s on your ballot, visit myvote.wi.gov. You can register to vote at your polling place with proof of residence. Polls will be open until 8 p.m.

Editor’s note: Danielle Kaeding in Superior, Joe Schulz in Oshkosh, Evan Casey, Deneen Smith and Corri Hess in Milwaukee, and Bridgit Bowden and Anna Marie Yanny in Madison contributed to this story.