Sarah Godlewski Wisconsin Secretary of State (Photo/Karen Stokes)
By Karen Stokes
In March, Wisconsin Secretary of State Sarah Godlewski marks one year in office, a period defined by service to the people of Wisconsin.
“I never thought that I would be sitting here as Secretary of State. I think what really inspired me was honestly an opportunity to know about change so I got involved through the state’s Treasurers Amendment in politics. They were trying to cut the office and I thought that seemed really suspicious they’re trying to completely remove this office from the Constitution and this was back in 2018,” Godlewski said. “I was asking people what are we going to do to make sure we have a fiscal watchdog for the state. They said there’s nothing you can do, it’s gonna happen. I ended up finding a committee to save the state Treasurer’s office. It was bi-partisan.”
After winning the Amendment, the next question was who’s gonna run for the office?
After securing victory with the Amendment, the next consideration was who would take up the mantle for the office. Godlewski then had a pivotal conversation with her grandmother.
“My grandma was part of the first group of women that served during World War 2 and she said, “Sarah, don’t ask for permission, ask for forgiveness. You’re a political nobody from no man’s land Wisconsin. If you really care and think that this office can make a difference just go run for it.”
That ‘political nobody’ ran on home ownership, access to capital, and economic security and won.
Godlewski felt there were three priorities on her agenda as Secretary of State.
“The first is that we want to make sure services are as accessible as possible. If you wanted to get a document signed by my office you had to either come in person or use snail mail and so we’re transitioning our office and modernizing it. It’s gonna be like Amazon so you can actually request things online and check on status online because you’re busy and you don’t have time to keep checking in with the Secretary of State so we want to make it as easy and accessible as possible. We’re also putting all of our records online so information can be as transparent but then the other big piece is that we’re working on strengthening and defending our democracy. You know when fake electors turn in falsified documents to my office, there needs to be accountability. We want to make sure we have opportunities for civic engagement and civic education. We’re seeing for example, people don’t want to be clerks because of threats and harassment and we have to make sure we’re standing up to these bullies but we’re also educating the next generation to want to serve in public life,” Godlewski said.
“The third piece is economic security,” she said. “I chair a $1.4 billion trust fund for public schools. We’re helping to make sure that we continue to provide strong distributions for public schools but also by making sure we invest in Wisconsin, right here at home. A lot of my colleagues across the country actually use their international scope of work to help promote their state and so we’re doing a lot of economic security work in kind of promoting Wisconsin overseas that can help with good paying jobs back home.”
On Wednesday, Godlewski participated in Girls Day at City Hall, an event held in March to coincide with Women’s History Month. This celebration aims to empower high school and middle school-aged girls by providing them with the opportunity to learn from and be inspired by female leaders in politics.
“I went to something very similar when I was a little girl in Western Wisconsin, and I was all excited to be offered an opportunity to go to something like this and I remember sharing with boys in my high school that I was going to this and they looked at me and said, “ I don’t know why, it’s not like girls can run for office to win,” Godlewski recalled.
“This was in 1998 and I was so upset and I looked at them and said, “That’s not true.”
“I ran back home and when I looked at all of our federal representatives were men at that time. All of our attorney generals, governors, Secretary of State and treasurer were all men and it was like maybe women can’t run for office and win, maybe we can’t serve. Seeing is really believing and I think we know that if we’re not at the table, we’re on the menu and we need young girls.
We need their voice, we need them to be engaged because they’re going to be fighting for things like affordable childcare, education, affordable housing, things that we deal with every single day and so to me what I’m really excited about to share my story and let them know that even as a political nobody, if this is something you want to do, you can run and you can win and your voice matters and we need you,” Godlewski said.