By james art On the first day of in-person early voting in Wisconsin, former President Barack Obama is scheduled to join Democratic vice presidential candidate Tim Waltz in Madison to encourage supporters to turn in their ballots.
The two are scheduled to address thousands at the Alliant Energy Center in Madison, where Vice President Kamala Harris held a rally last month.
Madison and surrounding Dane County are Democratic strongholds that Harris’ campaign will need to go big in to win battleground state Wisconsin, where the last two presidential races have been decided by less than a percentage point.
Obama has regularly visited Wisconsin to campaign for his fellow Democrats since leaving office. The former president has done particularly well here in his own elections, winning the 2008 race by about 14 points and the 2012 election by about 7 points.
While Democrats have embraced early voting for years, former President Donald Trump has argued without evidence that absentee voting was a tool for voter fraud in 2020. But this year, the opening of absentee voting is central to both parties’ campaign strategies.
At an event in Dodge County earlier this month, Trump encouraged voters to send in their absentee ballots “as soon as they can.” And earlier this week, his running mate, U.S. Sen. JD Vance of Ohio, visited Waukesha to get out early voting.
Speaking to reporters Monday, Wisconsin Republicans highlighted the visit as part of their party’s push to capitalize on early voting.
“If you haven’t voted yet, start making a plan,” said Wisconsin State Treasurer John Labor. “Go and vote tomorrow. Vote next day next day. Try to do it as early as possible.”
“Then you can sit at home and watch the votes come in and have a party because I think we’re going to win this,” he added.
The early voting process differs by location in Wisconsin, and voters still have time to register and vote in the two weeks before Election Day on November 5.
As of Monday, more than 17 million Americans had already cast early ballots, according to the New York Times.
As of Tuesday, a running count maintained by the Wisconsin Elections Commission showed that about 360,000 absentee ballots had already been returned in Wisconsin.
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