Officials in Wisconsin link at least 7 coronavirus cases to in-person voting during the April 7 election

• Officials in Wisconsin have traced at least seven positive cases of COVID-19 to in-person voting held during the April 7 election.
• Milwaukee's health commissioner Jeanette Kowalik said six of the cases involved voters who cast ballots in-person on election day, while one case was a poll worker who was infected.
• Due to a major shortage of poll workers, Milwaukee, a city of over 500,000 people, which usually has 180 open polling locations, operated with just five on election day, creating hours-long lines to vote.
• Democratic Gov. Tony Evers made multiple last minute attempts to move to an all-mail election or postpone it all together, all of which were blocked either by Republicans in the state legislature or by courts.
• Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

Officials in Wisconsin have traced at least seven positive cases of COVID-19 back to in-person voting held during the April 7 election, Milwaukee's health commissioner Jeanette Kowalik announced on Monday.

Kowalik said that six of the cases involved voters who cast ballots in-person on election day, while one case was a poll worker who was infected. The cases were linked to the election through contact tracing methods, officials said.

As dozens of states have postponed their presidential primaries to May or June, Wisconsin's election proceeded as scheduled, despite the governor telling Wisconsinites to stay at home after officials in the state legislature refused to act to postpone the election and rejected the Governor's request to send every voter an absentee ballot.

For weeks leading up to the election, both Gov. Tony Evers and Republican leaders planned to hold the election as scheduled. But as COVID-19 cases steadily rose and the state told citizens to stay at home, Evers made multiple 11th-hour attempts to move to an all-mail election or postpone it all together, which Republicans in the legislature blocked.

After a federal judge ruled against several plaintiffs attempting to delay the election on April 2 but extended the deadline to mail in absentee ballots to April 13, Gov. Tony Evers made a last-minute attempt to postpone in-person voting to June and hold the election mostly by mail with an executive order on April 6.

Wisconsin Assembly Speaker Robin Vos and the Republican Majority Leader of the state Senate immediately challenged the order in Wisconsin's majority-conservative State Supreme Court, which sided against Evers and blocked his attempt to delay the election.

And in a separate court case, the US Supreme Court ruled 5-4 to overturn a decision from a federal appeals court judge that extended absentee voting to April 13, ruling that voters had to have their ballots postmarked by election day.

As of the morning of election day, the Wisconsin Elections Commission reported that over 400,000 absentee ballots sent out to voters had not been returned, with an additional 9,400 voters who requested ballots but did not receive them in time.

The Supreme Court's decision effectively left voters who had not yet received their absentee ballot with a difficult choice: either risk their health to wait in long lines to vote in person or not vote at all.

Some smaller cities and suburban areas had drive-through and curbside voting to help keep voters safe and prevent them from waiting in line. However, it wasn't an option for thousands of voters in big cities like Milwaukee and Waukesha, some of which had to close down dozens of polling locations due to understaffing as many poll workers stayed home.

Milwaukee, a city of over 500,000 people, which usually has 180 open polling locations, operated with just five on Tuesday, creating hours-long lines to vote in many neighborhoods.

Dramatic photos and videos of in-person voting in Milwaukee and Waukesha that day showed voters, armed with varying levels of protecting equipment gear like masks and gloves, attempting to stay six feet apart while waiting in line for hours.

Now, as multiple groups start filing lawsuits accusing Wisconsin officials of engaging in voter suppression, the state's Elections Commission is dealing with the fallout, including determining whether to count hundreds of absentee ballots that had illegible or no postmark.

The Associated Press contributed reporting.