A Republican candidate running for the Illinois state legislature has switched the state where she voted between Illinois and Wisconsin in the past few years.
The candidate, Kathy Myalls (pictured, left), voted in a primary election in Illinois and three months after that voted in Wisconsin’s recall election aimed at recalling Wisconsin Republican Gov. Scott Walker (pictured right), according to the Chicago Sun-Times. Myalls also voted in Wisconsin in the 2012 presidential election. The following spring she came back to Illinois to vote there.
Myalls was asked about her vote in the Walker recall in an interview with the Sun-Times.
“No. I don’t think I did,” Myalls told the Chicago newspaper. “I don’t think they cancelled my registration in Fontana. And that may be what you’re seeing. They didn’t automatically cancel it.”
An analysis of voting records by the Sun-Times shows that Myalls has been registered to vote from Wilmette, Illinois starting from 2005 to today. Myalls admitted to the Sun-Times that she was registered to vote at a second house in Fontana, Wisconsin since 1996. Myalls voted in elections in both Wisconsin and Illinois in 2008 and 2012, according to the Sun-Times.
A spokeswoman for the Cook County, Illinois clerk said this was an “improper” situation and that Myalls’ registration would have been cancelled if the multiple registrations were known.
But the spokeswoman, Courtney Greve, did not say that the situation broke the law. Rather, that the law gets murky here. Records don’t show that Myalls voted in two locations in the same election — which is illegal, the Sun-Times noted.
“My voting registration in WI was based on a house we own and have lived in during that time period,” Myalls said in an email to the Sun-Times. “I am now only registered to vote in IL and I no longer vote in WI.”
Myalls’ history of voting in Illinois and Wisconsin may also hurt her chances of winning her current race. According to the Illinois constitution, a person can serve in the General Assembly if she has lived in the district she’s hoping to represent for two years prior to the election. The candidate must also be at least 21 and a U.S. citizen. Myall voted in the 2012 presidential election on Nov. 6, falling a tad short of that two-year minimum.
Illinois Republicans maintain that Myalls is eligible to serve in the 17th district, which she is running for.
Ken Menzel, the deputy general counsel for the Illinois State Board of Elections, said that the time to challenge Myalls candidacy has passed and if Myalls wins in November, the General Assembly can challenge whether to seat her.
“You’re supposed to be registered and voting from the place where you’re actually residing,” Menzel told the Sun-Times. “You’re kind of picking your one true home.”
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