Wisconsin online voter registration re-opened until March 30 for April primary

MADISON -- Wisconsin residents who need to register to vote for the April 7 Spring Election can now use MyVote.WI.gov to register online until March 30, according to the Wisconsin Elections Commission.

Voters must be registered before they can request an absentee ballot, so reopening online registration was ordered by a federal court in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

“We strongly urge anyone who wishes to vote in the April 7 election to take action now online,” said Meagan Wolfe, Wisconsin’s chief elections official. “Anyone who isn’t currently registered and wants to vote absentee for April 7 must act immediately.”

The absolute deadline for most voters to request an absentee ballot is Thursday, April 2, but Wolfe said voters should not wait until then due to the high volume of requests and potential mail delivery issues. The USPS is recommending giving yourself at least a week to return your ballot by mail.

“We want everyone who is eligible and who wants to vote to be able to do so safely,” Wolfe said. If your name or address has changed since you registered, you need to register with your current information. You can check your registration status at myvote.wi.gov, click on “My Voter Info.”

The reopening of online voter registration follows a federal court order on Friday and several days of intense work by the WEC to change and test the MyVote Wisconsin website’s code, Wolfe said. Online registration was restored early Wednesday morning, followed by several hours of monitoring before this announcement. Because of the expedited timeframe for implementing and testing this change, there is the potential for slowness or outages if there is heavy traffic to the system.