Latest Stories By Eric Litke

Facing an unprecedented influx of absentee ballots during a presidential election in the middle of a pandemic, the Madison clerk came up with a novel idea. Instead of making voters come to them, they’d go to the voters. “It was an invention of necessity,” said Madison City Attorney Michael Haas. “City Clerk Maribeth Witzel-Behl thought […]

President Joe Biden chose a town hall event in Milwaukee for his first major appearance as president outside the nation’s capital. We took a closer look at a number of key statements he made while speaking for a little over an hour topics including COVID-19, racial justice and stimulus funds. “Kids don’t get … COVID […]

Even with the hindsight of 2020, Act 10 stands out as one of the most unique and polarizing moments in Wisconsin history. Ten years ago this month, tens of thousands of protesters packed the State Capitol daily, pushing back against then-Gov. Scott Walker’s plan to limit union power as a fix to government fiscal woes. […]

The first half of Gov. Tony Evers’ term wasn’t what anyone expected. Evers, a Democrat, not only operated in a divided government with Republicans controlling both legislative chambers, he was tasked with responding to a coronavirus pandemic that has claimed the lives of more than 5,000 state residents. But neither of those hurdles erased the […]

The debate over police use of force and social justice became a deeply local issue in August when a pair of shootings made Kenosha the epicenter of this national discussion. It began Aug. 23, 2020, when a Kenosha police officer fired seven shots at 29-year-old Jacob Blake from behind at close range. Blake, who was […]

For all that 2020 was, there is one thing it clearly wasn’t: The Year of the Agreed-Upon Fact. Perhaps never in modern history has the notion of objective truth come under such relentless assault, particularly online. It was a year where the reach of social media far exceeded its grasp on reality. In short, it […]

A razor-thin margin, a slow vote count and a presidential election hanging in the balance have created the perfect storm for misinformation in Wisconsin. The morning after the election, social media generated an avalanche of claims about Wisconsin voting totals, timing and turnout. Much of it isn’t true. We’re separating fact from fiction on some […]

A stark partisan split in how Wisconsinites vote will add some unique twists to an already bizarre election cycle in this battleground state. Wisconsin drew national headlines for the April presidential primary, where a lack of poll workers left voters standing in line for hours in the state’s largest cities. Milwaukee had just five polling […]

In a Fox News segment built around new Kenosha shooting video from Kyle Rittenhouse’s legal defense team, TV personality Tucker Carlson provided a lengthy narration on what has happened in the southeastern Wisconsin city. But viewers were repeatedly misled. Kenosha has been central to the national dialogue on police, race relations and protests since 29-year-old […]

Editor’s note: This story has been updated to correctly quote what Biden said about taxes for the top 0.1% of income earners. Biden claimed that group got a tax cut of $1.35 trillion, which the story accurately noted is wrong. But the figure was incorrectly transcribed in the quote. In his first in-person appearance in […]

Updated as of Sept. 4, 2020 A pair of controversial shootings in Kenosha unleashed an avalanche of reaction. From news conferences to social media, opinions and factual claims were plentiful. It began Aug. 23, 2020, when a Kenosha police officer shot 29-year-old Jacob Blake seven times in the back. Blake survived but is paralyzed from […]

As the largely virtual Democratic National Convention launched from Milwaukee on August 17, 2020, President Donald Trump made his second stop of the summer in Wisconsin. In an appearance in Oshkosh, he ran through many of his favorite talking points, mocking the “fake news” while touting his record on the economy, the coronavirus pandemic and […]