Recall signatures expected Thursday against 6th Republican; deadlines pass for 2 more Democrats
By Tom Tolan of the Journal Sentinel
April 26, 2011 |(185) Comments
Recall signatures are expected to be filed in Madison this week against a sixth Republican state senator, according to a representative of the recall campaign and its Facebook page.
Meanwhile, recall campaigns against two Democrats missed Tuesday deadlines to file signatures -- though one of them missed narrowly and could take advantage of a later deadline in another campaign against the same senator.
Deb Stover, a Democratic Party member from Green Bay and one of the original organizers of the campaign to recall Sen. Robert Cowles (R-Green Bay), confirmed what was reported on Facebook: that the group had raised enough signatures to force Cowles into an election and planned to file them Thursday with the Government Accountability Board.
Stover couldn't say how many signatures the group has collected. But the GAB says 15,960 valid signatures are needed to force Cowles into an election, and the recall campaigns against five other Republicans and three Democrats have each collected thousands more signatures than are needed to force a vote. People posting on the Facebook page say the campaign reached its goal over the weekend.
In all, eight Republican and eight Democratic state senators are targeted for recalls in the bitter fighting over Gov. Scott Walker's budget initiatives. The Republicans are targeted for voting to seriously limit public employee bargaining, the Democrats for leaving the state for three weeks to prevent that vote from taking place.
The recall campaigns against two of the Democrats failed to meet a signature deadline Monday, and two other campaigns, against Democrats Spencer Coggs of Milwaukee and Mark Miller of Monona, missed deadlines Tuesday afternoon, according to GAB attorny Michael Haas.
Jeff Horn, a leader in the Miller recall, said the campaign missed the 20,352 signatures needed by less than 300 names, despite collecting a record 450 at a golf course in Monona on Tuesday.
But there’s a second campaign against Miller, organized by the American Recall Coalition out of Utah, with a May 4 deadline for signatures. Horn said he’ll explore whether he could take advantage of that and file before then.
In any case, after the deadlines pass and the Cowles signatures are filed, that will leave three, or maybe four, active recall campaigns that haven't filed signatures yet -- the ones against Republican Sens. Mary Lazich of New Berlin and Glenn Grothman of West Bend, where signatures are due Monday; the one against Democratic Sen. Julie Lassa of Stevens Point, in which signatures are due May 16; and possibly the second campaign against Miller.
http://www.jsonline.com/blogs/news/120708839.html
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