Potential Candidates Expressing Interest in Waukesha County Clerk Seat

Kathy Nickolaus may face a primary opponent if she seeks re-election in 2012. 

Keith Best, who is in charge of public relations with the Republican Party of Waukesha County, said in a comment on Patch that not all area Republicans are happy with her performance.

"Nickolaus will be primaried," Best wrote in the comment. "Once again the voters will decide."

Nickolaus made national news this spring when she failed to release the City of Brookfield's results from the hotly contested state Supreme Court race between David Prosser and JoAnne Kloppenburg.

The mistake led to a state investigation into what happened on the April 6 election night. The Government Accountability Board . 

When contacted by Patch about his comment, Best said the Republican Party of Waukesha County is not looking for a candidate to run against Nickolaus, but that some Republican candidates may be interested.

“I believe from my understanding that there are some candidates who have decided to run for that position on their own,” Best said.

Best would not identify the people who were considering running for the county clerk’s seat.

“I am going to leave it up to them for when they want to announce,” Best said.

Meanwhile, Victor Weers, the chairman of the Waukesha County Democratic Party, told TMJ4 that the party plans to have a candidate to run against Nickolaus.

Staff in the Waukesha County Clerk’s office said Friday that no one has filed any paperwork with the office with the intent to run for Waukesha County clerk.

Nickolaus, in a June 2, 2011, article that appeared in The Freeman, said she would seek re-election and that she expects there to be opponents in the election.

“But I’ll work to build that confidence and trust from the electorate before I get to my re-election campaign,” Nickolaus told the Waukesha newspaper.

Nickolaus failed to release the on election night for the hotly contested race between incumbent Justice David Prosser Jr. and challenger JoAnne Kloppenburg. Adding the city's 14,315 votes two days later flipped the winner from Kloppenburg to Prosser in a race that became enveloped in the controversial clampdown on public employee collective bargaining rights.

Kloppenburg declared victory by 204 votes on election night. But when the City of Brookfield’s votes were included in the tally, incumbent Prosser won with more than 7,000 votes over Kloppenburg. The votes were confirmed after a lengthy recount process in Waukesha County.