Brown County Democrats falsely flag Green Bay candidates with Big Lie
GREEN BAY – The Democratic Party of Brown County is claiming two Green Bay City Council members seeking re-election support the idea that the 2020 presidential election was stolen, a theory peddled by former President Donald Trump and some of his supporters.
The Democrats’ local voters guide, unveiled Wednesday, includes two red-flag images next to the names of council members Brian Johnson and Mark Steuer, with one flag indicating they have “known affiliations with the Republican Party” and the two flags suggesting they have demonstrated support of the so-called “Big Lie” of a fraudulent election.
Both incumbents have openly stated they believe in the legitimacy of the 2020 presidential elections and consider themselves politically moderate.
Johnson and Steuer, who represent Districts 9 and 10 respectively, say the accusations have no basis in reality.
“People are trying to simplify the very complex discussions we’ve had at City Council about some of our election challenges,” Johnson said. “By their very nature, partisan politics like to put people in buckets — either you’re left or you’re right, and, at the local level, there’s just so much more nuance to issues than that.”
In its voters guide, the Democratic Party of Brown County recommends voting for Johnson and Steuer’s opponents, Tarl Knight and Eric Kuzma respectively. Seven incumbents for Green Bay City Council, including Johnson and Steuer, face challengers in the April 5 election.
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The county Democrats based their claims on the outcome of a City Council resolution last May expressing confidence in how Green Bay ran its 2020 elections. Five City Council members, including Johnson, abstained from the vote. Steuer voted against the resolution but said he did so more because of how Green Bay conducted its elections in April 2020 than the following November.
“It seemed to me that the resolution was saying that the elections were perfect and nothing went wrong,” Steuer, chair of the Protection & Policy meeting, said. “I was harkening back to April 2020 … The pandemic caused craziness. A lot of the older folks that work in the polls were afraid to come in because of that situation. We really were scrambling.”
In response to the long lines of voters snaking for city blocks and safety issues presented in April’s elections, Steuer even voted in support of the city accepting a grant from the Center for Tech and Civic Life. That’s the nonprofit funded by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and his wife, Priscilla Chan, which has become a target for Republicans who believe the private grants were designed to sway the election toward Biden.
Renée Gasch, chair of the Democratic Party of Brown County, said Johnson and Steuer’s decisions not to support a vote of confidence in the 2020 elections demonstrated “actions (that) sow doubt in election results and leave room for lies about the election administration to spread.”
The Democratic Party assigned double red flags to candidates in three of the nine elections in the greater Green Bay area, for Green Bay City Council, De Pere City Council and Brown County Board.
Of the 15 candidates the party identified as demonstrating support for the “Big Lie,” the Green Bay Press-Gazette has confirmed those ideas were shared by four candidates: De Pere City Council incumbent candidate Kelly Ruh, County Board District 7 candidate Leanne Cramer, County Board District 8 candidate Kimber Rollin and Green Bay City Council District 11 candidate Melinda Eck.
Both Johnson and Steuer believe that Joe Biden beat Donald Trump by nearly 21,000 votes in Wisconsin’s presidential election. Recounts and court rulings confirmed Biden’s win. A legislative audit and a study by a conservative group found no evidence of significant fraud in Green Bay or anywhere.
“I do believe Biden won, whether I voted for him or not. There were many different court cases, recounts and everything like that,” Steuer said. “I rely on the courts and I trust the courts on it.”
Johnson said whatever issue he has with elections is isolated to local action, and is not a reflection of the federal level. On multiple platforms, he has stated his belief that Biden legitimately won the election, even in front of conservative audiences.
Neither Johnson nor Steuer says the Democratic Party of Brown County reached out to determine the truth behind these claims.
What’s in a resolution?
Gasch, of the Democratic Party, said that even an abstention vote like Johnson’s demonstrated his lack of support for the poll workers who had come under fire for their role in the November 2020 elections.
“Actions speak louder than words, and if you’re not prepared to defend poll workers when they’re being attacked,” Gasch said, “that’s cause for concern for us.”
She argued, too, that council members must be held to a greater standard around shutting down what she called conspiracy theories. She believes the vote of confidence last May should have been unanimous.
But the resolution itself — proposed in May 2021 — came ahead of the Wisconsin Elections Commission’s full investigation of how five of its largest cities, including Green Bay, conducted themselves during the presidential election. It would take another six months for the bipartisan commission to dismiss complaints.
The resolution also was proposed two weeks after a report published in April 2021, from former City Attorney Vanessa Chavez, that found the city properly handled the 2020 elections despite complaints.
Johnson, at the time of his vote, said that he didn’t believe malfeasance was at play in the 2020 elections. He told the City Council at the time that he abstained because he didn’t want to perpetuate the “false comparisons” of the resolution, which he said turned council member votes either for or against the city of Green Bay, depending on how they voted.
“We have open complaints yet with the Wisconsin Elections Commission that have not been properly adjudicated,” Johnson told his colleagues at City Council on May 4, 2021. “By passing this today, we’re basically saying that their complaints don’t matter.”
Steuer, the only council member who voted against the resolution in May, said that he was looking forward to seeing Mayor Eric Genrich and the former city attorney, Chavez, testify in Madison before he’d be comfortable drawing any conclusions.
“In my heart of hearts, I feel what we did with the elections was fine,” Steuer told City Council on May 4, 2021. “People are looking for full confidence right now, and I’ll look forward to the hearing in Madison. I’ll watch that very closely.”
The 2021 election resolution stated that the “August and November elections administered by the City of Green Bay were properly executed in an accurate, safe, and secure manner, and hereby rejects allegations to the contrary.”
The problem with declaratory resolutions, Steuer said, is that, beyond offering a feel-good statement, they don’t hold much water.
“They’re not ordinances and it’s not something that requires further inspection. It’s more or less stating a position of the city,” Steuer said. “And for me, I felt good about parts of it, but I didn’t feel good about all of it.”
For Johnson, the resolution was ineffective in quelling the worries some residents of Green Bay held over what happened with the 2020 elections.
“Passing a resolution doesn’t pacify the people in our community who have those concerned feelings. They’re never going to see that resolution. What pacifies those feelings is action,” Johnson said.
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Natalie Eilbert is a government watchdog reporter for the Green Bay Press-Gazette. You can reach her at [email protected] or view her Twitter profile at @natalie_eilbert.
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