Hillary Clinton’s top campaign lawyer filed a motion on behalf of a liberal Wisconsin group seeking to suspend the state’s voter identification law on Election Day, the latest development in a string of lawsuits that began after liberal billionaire George Soros threw millions behind anti-voter ID efforts.
The motion, filed this week in the U.S. District Court in the Western District of Wisconsin, was submitted on behalf of the One Wisconsin Institute, the "education" arm of One Wisconsin Now, a liberal group that bills itself as a "progressive information hub for allied organizations and tens of thousands of activists across Wisconsin."
The group said that the state may have violated a law about free ID cards. U.S. District Court Judge James Peterson will consider the request on October 12, according to The Cap Times.
One Wisconsin Now keeps information about its donors under wraps, despite launching investigations into conservative donor activity in Wisconsin.
The Washington Free Beacon has matched up three foundations that have donated to One Wisconsin Now, including the Massachusetts-based Proteus Action League, the Greater Wisconsin Committee, and the American Federation of State County and Municipal Employees, the largest trade union of public employees headquartered in Washington, D.C.
Marc Elias, a partner at the Washington D.C.-based law firm Perkins Coie, originally filed the lawsuit against Wisconsin’s voter ID law on behalf of the One Wisconsin Institute in 2015. Elias is Hillary Clinton’s top campaign lawyer and has led the push challenging voter ID laws in numerous states. Elias is working on the challenges in his capacity as an attorney at Perkins Coie and separately of the Clinton campaign, although the Clinton campaign has publicly backed the effort.
Elias submitted the first in a series of lawsuits on May 8, 2015 in Ohio on behalf of the Ohio Organizing Collaborative, a statewide coalition of more than 20 organizations including labor unions and policy groups.
The Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation later opened an inquiry into the Ohio Organizing Collaborative after a board of elections determined that 25 to 30 voter registration applications submitted by the group appeared to be fraudulent. A source close to Elias told the Free Beacon at the time that he was no longer involved with the group.
A second lawsuit was filed in Wisconsin on June 1, 2015, weeks after the Ohio lawsuit. On June 11, 2015 a third lawsuit was filed in Virginia—a challenge that was ultimately dismissed by a federal court. Similar lawsuits followed in other states.
The voter ID challenges have been fueled by millions of dollars from liberal billionaire George Soros.
The Free Beacon discovered in August that Soros hopes to enlarge the electorate by 10 million voters by 2018. Soros is the largest donor to the Immigrant Voters Win PAC, which aims to register 400,000 new Hispanic voters before the November elections.
Scot Ross, the executive director of One Wisconsin Now and One Wisconsin Institute, did not return a request for comment. Marc Elias also did not respond to inquiries.