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Politics
WISCONSIN SUPREME COURT CANDIDATES OFTEN SPEAK OUT ON HOT TOPICS. ONLY ONE FACES
IMPEACHMENT THREAT
1 of 4 |
FILE - Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Janet Protasiewicz, who is being targeted
for possible impeachment by Republican lawmakers because of donations she
received from the Democratic Party and comments she made during her campaign,
attends her first hearing as a justice Thursday, Sept. 7, 2023, in Madison, Wis.
(AP Photo/Morry Gash, File)
Read More
2 of 4 |
FILE - Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Brian Hagedorn is seen during a public
hearing Thursday, Sept. 7, 2023, in Madison, Wis. (AP Photo/Morry Gash, File)
Read More
3 of 4 |
FILE - Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Rebecca Grassl Bradley is seen during a
public hearing Thursday, Sept. 7, 2023, in Madison, Wis. (AP Photo/Morry Gash,
File)
Read More
4 of 4 |
FILE - Former Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Michael Gableman, an investigator
hired by Republicans to look into former President Donald Trump’s 2020 loss in
the battleground state, who refused to answer questions from Circuit Court Judge
Frank Remington, leaves the stand, Friday, June 10, 2022, at the Dane County
Courthouse in Madison, Wis. (Amber Arnold/Wisconsin State Journal via AP, File)
Read More
Wisconsin Supreme Court candidates often speak out on hot topics. Only one faces
impeachment threat
1 of 4 |
FILE - Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Janet Protasiewicz, who is being targeted
for possible impeachment by Republican lawmakers because of donations she
received from the Democratic Party and comments she made during her campaign,
attends her first hearing as a justice Thursday, Sept. 7, 2023, in Madison, Wis.
(AP Photo/Morry Gash, File)
Read More
1 of 4
FILE - Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Janet Protasiewicz, who is being targeted
for possible impeachment by Republican lawmakers because of donations she
received from the Democratic Party and comments she made during her campaign,
attends her first hearing as a justice Thursday, Sept. 7, 2023, in Madison, Wis.
(AP Photo/Morry Gash, File)
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2 of 4 |
FILE - Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Brian Hagedorn is seen during a public
hearing Thursday, Sept. 7, 2023, in Madison, Wis. (AP Photo/Morry Gash, File)
Read More
2 of 4
FILE - Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Brian Hagedorn is seen during a public
hearing Thursday, Sept. 7, 2023, in Madison, Wis. (AP Photo/Morry Gash, File)
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3 of 4 |
FILE - Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Rebecca Grassl Bradley is seen during a
public hearing Thursday, Sept. 7, 2023, in Madison, Wis. (AP Photo/Morry Gash,
File)
Read More
3 of 4
FILE - Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Rebecca Grassl Bradley is seen during a
public hearing Thursday, Sept. 7, 2023, in Madison, Wis. (AP Photo/Morry Gash,
File)
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4 of 4 |
FILE - Former Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Michael Gableman, an investigator
hired by Republicans to look into former President Donald Trump’s 2020 loss in
the battleground state, who refused to answer questions from Circuit Court Judge
Frank Remington, leaves the stand, Friday, June 10, 2022, at the Dane County
Courthouse in Madison, Wis. (Amber Arnold/Wisconsin State Journal via AP, File)
Read More
4 of 4
FILE - Former Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Michael Gableman, an investigator
hired by Republicans to look into former President Donald Trump’s 2020 loss in
the battleground state, who refused to answer questions from Circuit Court Judge
Frank Remington, leaves the stand, Friday, June 10, 2022, at the Dane County
Courthouse in Madison, Wis. (Amber Arnold/Wisconsin State Journal via AP, File)
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By CHRISTINE FERNANDO and HARM VENHUIZEN
Updated [hour]:[minute] [AMPM] [timezone], [monthFull] [day], [year] Updated
9:59 AM HST, September 11, 2023
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MADISON, Wis. (AP) — The Wisconsin Supreme Court justice who Republicans are
threatening to impeach over comments she made on the campaign trail about
abortion and redistricting isn’t the first member of the court to offer public
opinions about major issues of the day.
One conservative justice frequently spoke out in favor of gun rights during her
campaign, even producing a political mailer showing her brandishing a shotgun
and wearing a hat promoting the NRA. Another had previously called Planned
Parenthood, a frequent litigant in abortion cases, a “wicked organization.”
And a former conservative justice faced a barrage of criticism after a campaign
filled with misleading information about crime that raised questions about
whether he could be impartial in cases involving criminal defendants.
An Associated Press review of previous campaigns and public statements by
Wisconsin Supreme Court candidates reveals that both conservatives and liberals
have weighed in on topics that could come before the court, sometimes in
strikingly strong language. Despite that record, this is the first time
Republicans who have controlled the state Legislature for a dozen years have
proposed impeaching a justice.
Other news
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Senate committee recommends firing Wisconsin’s top elections official in process
Democrats dispute
GOP threat to impeach a Wisconsin Supreme Court justice is driven by fear of
losing legislative edge
They are threatening to remove Justice Janet Protasiewicz, who was elected
earlier this year with a strong statewide majority, if she does not recuse
herself from a redistricting case that could cost Republicans their outsized
majorities in the Legislature. Her election flipped control of the court to a
4-3 liberal tilt after 15 years of a conservative majority.
“It’s self-serving, selective outrage,” Jay Heck, director of Common Cause of
Wisconsin, a nonpartisan government watchdog group, said of impeachment. “Where
was their outrage and their demands for recusal when conservatives in the past
have weighed in about their values?”
On Monday, a former candidate for Supreme Court representing two Protasiewicz
voters asked the Wisconsin Supreme Court to order the Legislature not to move
ahead with impeachment proceedings. The lawsuit argues impeachment is not
warranted and would be unconstitutional.
The state’s judicial code prohibits justices and judicial candidates from making
promises or commitments to ruling a certain way on any issue, and Protasiewicz
adhered to that during her campaign. Earlier this year, the state commission
that investigates complaints against judges dismissed ones it had received
related to her comments on redistricting.
Trying to campaign for office while not appearing to prejudge any future case
has been an increasingly difficult line for judicial candidates to walk. That is
especially true in more recent years as state supreme court races have become
highly politicized and attract millions of dollars in campaign cash.
The Wisconsin high court is officially nonpartisan, but both liberal and
conservative candidates have tried to signal to their base supporters how they
view some of the hottest topics of the day. Sometimes their comments have raised
alarms and questions about whether they could remain impartial in certain cases.
During her 2016 campaign, conservative Justice Rebecca Bradley called herself “a
strong supporter of the Constitution, including the Second Amendment” when
speaking on radio shows about her endorsement by the National Rifle Association.
In mailers, she posed with a shotgun, orange hunting vest and baseball cap with
the NRA logo in an implicit appeal to gun-owners.
Bradley has since invoked the Second Amendment in court, including during a
dissent to a 2021 decision that upheld the conviction of a Madison man who was
intoxicated while carrying a firearm through his apartment and arguing with his
roommates.
She also came under fire for columns she wrote in the 1990’s for Marquette
University’s student newspaper that bashed gay people, feminism and abortion
rights. One column compared abortion to murder, the Holocaust and slavery. In
another, she wrote she had no sympathy for AIDS patients.
Conservative Justice Brian Hagedorn drew criticism for his comments on abortion
and homosexuality. In blog posts beginning in 2005, Hagedorn compared
homosexuality to bestiality, called Planned Parenthood a “wicked organization”
that was more devoted “to killing babies than to helping women,” and wrote that
“Christianity is the correct religion.”
The blog posts do not appear to continue during the time he was campaigning for
a state Supreme Court seat in 2019, but he criticized the outcry over his
comments as an attack on his Catholic faith and refused to recuse himself in
related cases.
A former conservative justice, Michael Gableman, faced an ethics investigation
by the state Judicial Commission over an ad campaign that attacked his opponent
as being soft on crime during his 2008 run for a high court seat. One television
commercial in particular that accused Gableman’s opponent of freeing a convicted
child molester who assaulted another child was widely criticized by watchdog
groups for its negativity and inaccuracies.
“He had made a lot of statements during his campaign that were perceived as very
anti-criminal defendant,” said Chad Oldfather, a professor at Marquette
University Law School.
The Judicial Commission action against him was dismissed after the state Supreme
Court deadlocked 3-3 on whether to discipline him. After winning the seat,
Gableman rejected calls to recuse himself from criminal cases.
Experts acknowledged that Protasiewicz was more vocal about her opinions while
on the campaign trail than candidates in most previous elections. Republican
lawmakers say she went a step further than previous candidates by centering her
campaign around her positions on hot-button issues.
Her win, by 11 percentage points, boosted hopes among Democrats that the court
would overturn the state’s 1849 abortion ban and throw out legislative maps that
have helped Republicans maintain control of the Legislature, even as Democrats
have won all but one statewide executive office.
“What Justice Protasiewicz did was clearly not the norm and is clearly outside
of what is and was expected out of races for the Supreme Court,” said former
state Republican Party Chair Brandon Scholz, who has run several judicial
campaigns in the state.
Protasiewicz could have found ways to talk about existing laws and the court’s
role in interpreting them, Scholz said, but instead she voiced her own political
opinions.
Two lawsuits challenging the gerrymandered maps as unconstitutional were filed
the first week after Protasiewicz was seated, though the court has yet to decide
whether it will take either case.
In 2017, the state Supreme Court — then with a conservative majority — quashed
an effort to strengthen recusal standards following a petition from a group of
54 retired jurists, citing freedom of speech.
“I want to emphasize the irony that it was the Republican Party that pushed to
allow judges to make clear their broad positions on these kinds of controversial
issues,” said Herbert Kritzer, a law professor at the University of Minnesota
who previously taught at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
In a campaign the year after the court’s recusal decision, Madison attorney Tim
Burns labeled himself a Democrat and openly shared his political opinions. While
his approach to running for a seat on the Supreme Court was uncharacteristic and
ultimately unsuccessful, Burns said voters should be informed of what judges
think about the issues that affect them.
Burns filed a lawsuit Monday with the Supreme Court arguing that proceeding with
impeachment would violate the constitutional rights of voters who cast their
ballots for Protasiewicz. It also argues that the reasons stated by lawmakers
for why they are considering impeachment don’t meet the constitutional standard
for taking that action. The Wisconsin Constitution limits impeachment only to
those who have engaged in corrupt conduct in office or committed crimes.
The lawsuit asks that the court order the Legislature not to proceed with
impeachment against any justices without a ruling by a majority of the court
that the constitutional standards for impeachment have been met.
Charles Franklin, a law professor and director of the Marquette Law School Poll,
said the issue arises from an inherent contradiction in state supreme courts:
They are meant to be nonpartisan, but also require candidates to campaign in
politicized elections.
“How does a candidate communicate to voters who they are and why they should be
supported by the voters?” Franklin said. “We’re in an era where candidates are
struggling to find ways to be explicitly clear about their values and positions,
while still trying to stay clear of that notion that they have prejudged cases.”
___
Researcher Jennifer Farrar in New York contributed to this story.
___
The Associated Press receives support from several private foundations to
enhance its explanatory coverage of elections and democracy. See more about AP’s
democracy initiative here. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
HARM VENHUIZEN
Statehouse reporter and Report for America corps member
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