Only voters can close the loophole allowing private funding for the ballot-counters.

Who should fund the government offices responsible for counting our ballots? If the obvious answer is “taxpayers,” you’re probably not an elected Democrat.

On April 2, Wisconsinites have the chance to permanently ban unaccountable private funding for election offices by voting YES on Question 1 and YES on Question 2, joining 28 states in sealing a crater-sized loophole that’s been undermining election integrity since mid-2020.

That was when one partisan billionaire, Mark Zuckerberg, attempted to privatize the presidential election by pouring $350 million into government election offices—beginning with Wisconsin’s 5 biggest Democrat-controlled cities, Milwaukee among them. Far from shoring up election budgets, this was an unprecedented bid to buy influence over the legally nonpartisan administrators who count our ballots, which is why over half the states swiftly banned the practice after the election, with support from Democrats in Pennsylvania and Virginia.

Like most Americans, they correctly understood that funding for government operations should come from taxpayers, not special interests. We shouldn’t sell election administration to the highest bidder.

“In Congress, I have a solution to ban private money from our election administration,” Rep. Bryan Steil (R–WI) told Restoration News via email. “I introduced the Americans’ Confidence in Elections Act, which bans private donations made directly to local election offices. But we have a unique opportunity in Wisconsin to ban private money in our elections when we head to the voting booths on April 2nd. 

“That’s why I’m encouraging everyone to vote YES on Amendment Questions 1 and 2,” he added.

“Zuck bucks gave unfair privileges to Democrat cities like Milwaukee over rural counties with strained elections budgets,” Rep. Janel Brandtjen (R–Menomonee Falls) explained to Restoration News. “Of course we want people to vote, but not because they’re pressured to. It’s not the duty of taxpayers to pay government to tell people to vote. That’s up to candidates and committees to get people to the polls.”

(RELATED: The Left’s Ridiculous Disinformation on Tainted Zuck Bucks)

Yet in Wisconsin, Democrat Gov. Tony Evers vetoed 2 bills from the legislature which would’ve banned these “Zuck bucks,” making him the only governor in our nation to effectively endorse privatizing elections not once, but twice.

And right on cue, a private group recently announced it was granting nearly $800,000 to Milwaukee’s elections department in March 2024. It’s a direct repeat of the 2020 Zuck bucks scandal—and almost certainly would’ve been illegal had Evers done his job and banned the practice years ago.

Just as in 2020, this $800,000 flows through a tax-exempt, private 501(c)(3) nonprofit. By law, these nonprofits don’t have to disclose their donors and as charities may receive contributions from foreign sources.

For decades, that was not a problem. Then the Left discovered it could weaponize charitable groups for political gain—and even use it to fund election operations, something no state had ever thought to ban because no one had done it.

That means, in Wisconsin, there’s nothing stopping a Chinese, Russian, or Iranian from funneling money through a left-wing nonprofit into an elections department. Do we really want the Kremlin or Beijing influencing the way we run elections? Do we really want to hook local budgets on private money?

That’s why it’s critical that Wisconsinites vote YES on 1 & 2 on April 2 to ban private funding for elections—permanently. Where Democrats failed, voters can prevail.

(RELATED: Democrats Agree: Time for Congress to Ban Zuck Bucks For Good)

Zuck Bucks Now, Zuck Bucks Forever?

Restoration News was the first to trace that grantor, Cities Forward, back to the multi-billion-dollar Arabella “dark money” network, the largest Democrat political machine in America. While Cities Forward doesn’t report its donors, it received a $750,000 grant from George Soros’ Open Society Foundations to support the project in 2022, when it was still part of the Arabella machine.

Should Milwaukee elections really be funded by the Left’s top mega-donor?

Cities Forward’s spokesman is Sam Oliker-Friedland, an ex-Obama administration voting rights litigator who also works for a pair of Arabella elections groups: the Center for Secure and Modern Elections and Institute for Responsive Government.

Not coincidentally, the institute is an ally of the original Zuck bucks spreader, the Center for Tech and Civic Life (CTCL), which today runs the misnamed Alliance for Election Excellence with the institute as a founding member. The alliance was formed in 2021 as a way to circumvent the 28 state bans on Zuck bucks by offering “scholarship” money in exchange for information on and influence over local election operations.

CTCL head Tiana Epps-Johnson is on the institute’s board. So is Jennifer Morrell, an elections consultant for eBay founder Pierre Omidyar’s Democracy Fund, a group that happens to have an ex-staffer—Trevor Ostbye—in charge of Cities Forward.

If that sounds convoluted or downright incestuous, well, welcome to the activist Left, where there are no coincidences.

The Wisconsin primary is on April 2. Find your polling place here.

(READ MORE: Milwaukee Takes Arabella “Dark Money” to Count Your Ballots in Zuck Bucks Scandal Repeat)