schimel, brad a g

025 musk backed

2016 recount, RAGA JCN

ramp down green ramp up ~ fed

hive of scum and villany

see john doe

see crawford

uihline hendricks

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an 3 25

Fresh from spending nearly $300 million to influence the 2024 elections, the richest person in the world has set his sights squarely on Wisconsin. Elon Musk is apparently not content with taking a chainsaw to the lives of thousands of hard-working federal employees engaged in providing health care to rural American children and veterans, with slashing Medicaid for millions of our most vulnerable citizens, with cutting projects seeking desperately needed cures for cancer, Ebola and other deadly diseases and with eviscerating foreign assistance that thousands of people all over the world rely on for survival. Musk is now also carpet bombing Wisconsin with millions of dollars for negative ads and cash infusions to influence the outcome of the upcoming April 1 election to fill an open seat on the Wisconsin Supreme Court.

After 30 years of distinguished service, the Court’s most senior justice, Ann Walsh Bradley announced her retirement last year. Now, with the fast-approaching election to determine her successor in just a matter of days, voters will decide the ideological composition of the majority on the court and therefore the future direction of Wisconsin and quite possibly the nation.

In January, when Musk announced he was invading our state, he falsely proclaimed on Twitter: “Very important to vote Republican for the Wisconsin Supreme Court to prevent voting fraud.” He’s wrong on all counts. In the first place, candidates for the Wisconsin Supreme Court don’t run for election with party labels. Our judicial elections are nonpartisan – at least they are supposed to be. Secondly, voting fraud does not occur in our state because we have long had strong safeguards in place to prevent it. Voting fraud is a complete and total non-issue in Wisconsin and a distraction from real and serious attacks on democracy such as ongoing voter suppression proposals and laws that already make it more difficult to vote here than previously.

But the unelected Musk, whose craving for national attention and power rivals that of his partner Donald Trump, has a direct financial interest in a matter that could end up before the state’s high court. Wisconsin is one of nearly half the states in the nation that prohibit auto manufacturers from being able to directly sell their vehicles to the public because it would provide those manufacturers with a competitive advantage over independent dealers. Musk’s car company, Tesla, has sought and been refused an exemption to the law by state courts, most recently in December. A sympathetic Wisconsin Supreme Court influenced by Musk’s heavy spending in the current election – already well over $12 million and rising — is in his crosshairs as well as enhanced overall political influence and power beyond our state.

In a campaign that is already the most expensive judicial election anywhere in the nation in U.S. history, Musk may end up as the single largest campaign spender through his “Building America’s Future” Super PAC and other avenues to influence the outcome in Wisconsin with his limitless out-of-state millions. How much will he spend? No one knows. But it is very important that Wisconsinites know that Musk has quickly emerged as the single most dominant source of campaign cash and political influence in this election and in our state.

It will be up to Wisconsinites to decide if they approve or not of this unelected richest person in the world buying control of our highest court while at the same time continuing his unprecedented destruction of so many vital national services and safeguards Wisconsinites depend on.

The voters of Wisconsin can prevail over Musk and his millions by turning out in force – by returning their absentee ballots in time to be counted, or by showing up and voting early in person or at their polling place on the first day of April – Election Day. At the ballot box, each of us still has more voice and control over our destiny than even the richest person in the world who can’t vote here and who knows and cares little or nothing about Wisconsin other than as a place for him to sell more Teslas and ruin more lives.

On the evening of March 6 Musk’s multimillion dollar Space X Starship exploded in the skies over the coast of Florida shortly after it was launched. Thank goodness no lives were lost but it was nonetheless a spectacular failure. The April 1 Wisconsin Supreme Court election could be another spectacular failure for Musk and his gargantuan bankroll. It is entirely in the hands of Wisconsin voters to decide.

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an 2 25

Wisconsinites voted for Donald Trump by a narrow margin in November. Does that mean a majority of voters here want to cancel farmers’ federal contracts, shut down Head Start centers across the state and turn loose Elon Musk to feed federal agencies into the woodchipper while hoovering up private citizens’ financial information?

The new Trump era is putting Republican nihilism to the test. In our closely divided swing state, the first official indication of whether Trump voters are developing buyers’ remorse will come, fittingly, on April Fool’s Day.

In the Wisconsin Supreme Court race, candidate Brad Schimel has received Elon Musk’s endorsement and is benefitting from a huge ad buy by Musk’s political action committee. And while some Republicans have expressed qualmsabout Trump and Musk’s assertions that they have unchecked power to ride roughshod over judges and the U.S. Constitution, Schimel has, notably, sided with Trump and Musk against the courts.

Last month, Schimel took to Vicki McKenna’s rightwing talk radio show to denounce the prosecution and sentencing of the Jan. 6 rioters who stormed the U.S. Capitol after Trump lost in 2020, saying juries in Washington, D.C., were too liberal to deliver a fair verdict. Recently, on the same talk radio program, he criticized federal judges for blocking the ransacking of federal agencies by Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), accusing the judges of “acting corruptly” by daring to issue temporary restraining orders.

The race between Schimel and Democratic-backed candidate Susan Crawford will determine the ideological balance of the Court and, it seems, whether a majority of justices believe in the integrity of the court system at all.

Also on the April 1 ballot is the race for state schools superintendent, which pits a lobbyist for the private school voucher industry against a defender of public schools — an existential choice as the growth of schools vouchers is on track to bankrupt our state’s public school system and enrollment caps on voucher programs are set to come off next year.

The ideological struggle over the future of our state was on stark display this week as Gov. Tony Evers presented his budget plan — an expansive vision that uses the state surplus to boost funding for K-12 schools and the University of Wisconsin, health care, clean water and rural infrastructure, and leaves a cushion to help protect communities against what Evers called the “needless chaos caused by the federal government” under Trump.

In a familiar ritual, Republican legislators immediately shot down Evers’ plan, denounced it as “reckless spending” and promised to throw it in the trash and replace it with a stripped-down alternative based on austerity and tax cuts.

“Wisconsin voted for Donald Trump and his agenda to cut spending and find inefficiency in government,” Assembly Speaker Robin Vos declared.

But did they?

It’s not clear that most Wisconsinites wanted what Trump and Musk are delivering — cuts to health care and veterans’ services, the claw-back of infrastructure projects, mass firings at the park service and the chaotic suspension of promised federal funds for child care and other essential services in Wisconsin.

For generations, Republicans have complained about “red tape” and “big government” and promised “freedom” and lower taxes to constituents who liked the sound of all that. Under Trump, we are seeing anti-government ideology reach its full, unchecked fruition. Trump’s No. 1 private donor, the richest man in the world, is laughing all the way to the bank. He’s using his access to trillions of dollars in taxpayer funds to cancel food programs for poor children and to bolster federal contracts that enrich himself.

This, in the end, is what privatization is all about — taking the collective wealth of millions of people who contribute to maintaining a decent, healthy society and concentrating it in the hands of one very rich, self-interested man.

The long-term, existential struggle between private wealth and the public good in Wisconsin includes the fight over whether to fund public schools or give away money to subsidize the tuition of private school families. It includes whether to be the second-to-last state to finally offer 12 months of postpartum Medicaid coverage to new mothers — something even our Republican legislators support, minus Vos. The two sides of our divided government are locked in a battle over whether our universities, public parks, infrastructure, clean water and affordable housing are a boondoggle or something we ought to protect.

Given what’s happening to our country, Wisconsinites will have to think hard about which side they’re on.

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===

AN 2 25

Elon Musk is weighing in on a consequential state election, Politico reported Wednesday. A group that Musk funded in the past has poured at least $1.5 million into the Supreme Court race in Wisconsin, and he is posting about the race on social media. The group, Building America’s Future, is set to run ads later this week.

The spending is “a sign that even as Musk races to overhaul Washington, his influence extends beyond it,” write Politico’s Jessica Piper and Liz Crampton.

“Very important to vote Republican for the Wisconsin Supreme Court to prevent voting fraud!” Musk posted on his website, X, last month. This was in reference to the court’s ruling to allow drop boxes for absentee ballots in the 2024 election.

The race is between Democrat-backed Susan Crawford and GOP-backed Brad Schimel, although it is ultimately a nonpartisan election. The results will decide whether the majority of the Wisconsin Supreme Court is conservative or liberal.

“The high-stakes Wisconsin bellwether race will be the biggest test yet for both parties — and for Musk, who spent millions of dollars to help Trump win the election and is now looking to influence politics in the states,” Piper and Crampton write.

“It feels like a very clear sign that he knows what we know, which is that this is the most important election of the new Trump era,” said Yasmin Radjy, executive director of Swing Left, a progressive group.

“Susan Crawford has nationalized this race on her own, but we can’t control what happens outside of our campaign,” Schimel campaign spokesperson Jacob Fischer told Politico.

Musk gave to Building America’s Future in 2022, according to the Wall Street Journal.

“Last year, the group was a major backer of several Republican-aligned super PACs, including two groups — Duty for America and Future Coalition PAC — that aimed to boost Trump with minority voters. It also helped fund a third super PAC, Stand For Us PAC, that spent in down-ballot Republican primaries,” Piper and Crampton write.

The Wisconsin race is important because Democrats in the state legislature drew new maps, so the makeup of the state Supreme Court could influence upcoming 2026 elections in the U.S. House.

In a statement, the Crawford campaign called Schimel “extreme.”

“In D.C., Elon Musk has taken control of Americans’ private financial information and cut funding for hungry kids. Now, Musk is trying to buy off Brad Schimel and take over control of the Wisconsin Supreme Court so that Schimel can rubber-stamp an extreme agenda of banning abortion and cozying up to corporations,” they said.

But Schimel, a former attorney general, suggested he will not be influenced.

"Ultimately, the only answer to (the outside spending) is that the individual running for office — and frankly, this applies to all offices for the judicial or legislative or executive branch — you can't be for sale," Schimel said at a forum Tuesday. "People want to support you. It should be they're supporting you because they like the things that you stand for, not because they're buying some result."

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CMD Wins Reversal of Restrictive DOJ Public Records Policy

By ExposedByCMD Editors (Press Release) — Group obtains more than 3,000 records relating to former Attorney General Schimel’s war on the Affordable Care Act.

Judges Protest State Subsidy for a Political Event

The Federalist Society is a considered by many to be a highly partisan political operation. The Federalist Society’s Executive Vice President, Leonard Leo, played a leading role in the nomination of Justice Neil Gorsuch and other far-right Trump court picks, and Leo has long been involved in the Judicial Crisis Network, a dark money group that spent millions on TV ads backing the Gorsuch nomination.

But on April 25, 2018, State Appeals Court Judge Brian Hagedorn sent out an email to judges encouraging them to attend the Federalist Society conference. The email indicated that mileage and meals would be reimbursed by the state and that two judicial education credits would be awarded for attendance. The program also indicated that continuing legal education credits would also be awarded to lawyers who attended.

Fifteen Wisconsin judges wrote to Hagedorn and the Judicial Education Committee in protest.

The letter, obtained by the Center for Media and Democracy (CMD), states:

We find it highly inappropriate that the Office of State Courts is spending money on this event. We object that a single appellate judge – apparently a member of the Federalist Society – would broadcast this “invitation” to the bench on state email thus adding subtle pressure on circuit judges to attend. Finally, during an election year, we do not believe it is appropriate for the judicial branch to be underwriting attendance at a private event where the Attorney General, who is on the ballot in a politically partisan race, is the keynote speaker.

Schimel is a member of the Federalist Society and a dark money operation associated with the group aided Schimel’s campaign in 2014. The Federalist Society’s Leonard Leo was listed as a director of the Rule of Law Project, which spent $200,000 in support of Schimel late in the 2014 race, prompting a federal complaint by the watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. Schimel also received $2,000 from Leo personally.

Hagedorn was Governor Scott Walker’s chief legal counsel from 2011-2015 when CMD was forced to sue Walker for records related to his controversial changes to the “Wisconsin Idea.” Walker had to be represented by his legal staff after Schimel decided not to defend the governor in the case. CMD ultimately won that suit, proving that the controversial changes were not a “drafting error” as claimed, but originated in Walker’s office.

Hagedorn was a Federalist Society member in college and interned at the Alliance Defense Fund, an organization founded by leaders of the Christian Right. Today, it is called the Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), and members of this group were also at the event. Hagedorn is also reportedly planning a run for the Wisconsin Supreme Court against long-time Justice Shirley Abrahamson.

“The independence of the judiciary has been under especially heavy attack over the last decade from many sources,” the judges wrote. “The last thing the Office of State Courts should be doing is contributing to the problem by politicizing our judicial training.”

CMD confirmed with the Wisconsin Court System that the judges did in fact receive taxpayer money to attend, but was not given the details as to what exactly was covered.

Schimel Campaigns, Embraces Anti-LGBT Hate Group

The judges’ concerns about the political nature of the state-subsidized event proved to be justified.

To large applause, keynote speaker Brad Schimel took the mic in front of the backdrop of Lake Monona to promote his work over the last three and a half years and to thank attendees for their involvement in the Federalist Society.

Schimel kicked off his presentation by reminding the audience that “it is an election year.” He then catalogued his accomplishments in a campaign-like speech:

Act 10 still fighting, two months ago another lawsuit filed against Act 10, voter ID of course still fighting, Right to Work,still fighting sort of, mostly won on that one. The redistricting thing, we thought we’d have a decision in February and now we don’t know but quite a battle and I’m very proud of the team. They really shined at the United States Supreme Court.

That Supreme Court case was Gil vs. Whitford. The U.S. Federal Court for the Western District of Wisconsin decided that Wisconsin Republicans had engaged in such egregious, hyper-partisan gerrymandering after the 2010 census that new maps must be drawn. The case is now pending before the U.S. Supreme Court and Schimel has spent hundreds of thousands in taxpayer money hiring outside lawyers to help with that case.

Schimel also discussed the “regulatory certainty” he helped to create while in office that led to companies like Foxconn, the Taiwanese electronics company, setting up business in the state. Previously, Schimel boasted of being the “bag man”for Governor Walker’s efforts to stifle regulations from multiple agencies at the Republican Attorneys General Association conference in January, according to a report by Maplight.

Notably, Schimel’s opponent in the November 2018 race, attorney Josh Kaul, was not invited to speak, his office reports.

Schimel concluded by recognizing his “friend from the Alliance Defending Freedom” in the room and stating that his time spent at the ADF’s conference last year was “some of the best time I ever spent.” One Wisconsin Now, a liberal advocacy group, pointed out that the conference was at a luxury resort in California and is demanding information about that trip.

“Brad Schimel needs to come clean on why, in his official capacity as Attorney General of the state of Wisconsin, he took over $4,100 for first class travel and accommodations to appear before a hate group,” said Executive Director Scot Ross, who wants Schimel’s office make his remarks publicly available.

Alliance Defending Freedom Participates in State-Supported Conference

The Arizona-based Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) group applauded by Schimel has been labeled a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), which monitors neo-Nazi and other extremist groups.

SPLC reports that the ADF has “supported the recriminalization of homosexuality in the U.S. and criminalization abroad; has defended state-sanctioned sterilization of trans people abroad; has linked homosexuality to pedophilia and claims that a ‘homosexual agenda’ will destroy Christianity and society.”

Jordan Lorence, Senior Counsel at ADF, attempted to make the case that Christianity is under attack in America and defended businesses that want to discriminate against LGBT people for religious reasons in his discussion of ADF’s lawsuit pending before the U.S. Supreme Court Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission. The case involves a cake maker who refused to make a wedding cake for a gay couple.

Republicans Make the Best Judicial Appointments

The Federalist Society event’s partisan nature was evident in panel discussions as well. The main takeaway in the panel “State and Federal Judicial Selection” was clearly that Republicans choose better judges. Carrie Severino, Chief Counsel and Policy Director for the Judicial Crisis Network, praised Trump over and over for his judicial nominations and blamed the Democrats for not confirming his nominees.

Severino, of course, made no mention of the fact that GOP Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell orchestrated a two-year slowdown of judicial confirmations before Trump took office that left him with more than 100 seats to fill, or his unprecedented refusal to hold a confirmation vote on President Obama’s nomination of Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court.

The Judicial Crisis Network received over $6.7 million from the mysterious Wellspring Committee in 2014 and funneled that money into judicial campaigns and elections and other activities.

Walker’s Chief Legal Counsel Katie Ignatowski was given ample time on the panel to let lawyers and judges in the room know what they need to do to get a judicial appointment or nomination from the governor, including to “be in organizations like the Federalist Society.” Around 25 percent of seated judges in Wisconsin have been appointed by Walker, Ignatowski noted.

Seventh Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals Judge Diane Sykes, Wisconsin Supreme Court Judges Rebecca Bradley and Daniel Kelly, and Trump’s highly controversial nominee for the Seventh Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, Michael Brennan, were all in attendance at the inaugural event.

The Federalist Society has received millions in funding from right-wing foundations, including the Milwaukee-based Bradley Foundation, the Koch family foundations, the John M. Olin Foundation, Sarah Scaife Foundation, Searle Freedom Trust, among others.

The program for the event is embedded belo

https://www.exposedbycmd.org/2018/05/10/judges-object-state-funds-federalist-society-brad-schimel-hate-group

WISC2 downstairs backup

Conservative activist James O'Keefe ripped into Wisconsin's Republican attorney general on Thursday, contending he had skimped on an investigation into potential voter fraud and hinting he may turn his undercover cameras on the state's top cop.

O'Keefe said Attorney General Brad Schimel's office had closed out the investigationwithout seeing additional footage that his group, Project Veritas Action, had offered to provide investigators. A Schimel aide never responded to the offer, O'Keefe said in a statement.

O'Keefe made his name in 2009 with videos that brought down the community organizing group ACORN. He later agreed to pay a $100,000 settlement to an ACORN employee and in 2010 pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor as part of another undercover operation.

O'Keefe has performed most of his sting operations on liberals, but at times has gone after conservatives, including former Wisconsin Senate President Mike Ellis (R-Neenah). In a released Thursday, O'Keefe suggested Schimel could be one of his next targets.

"If the state of Wisconsin is not going to do their job, then, then, we should — you should be investigated," O'Keefe said into the camera. "We should investigate you and you should lose your job."

Schimel spokesman Johnny Koremenos did not respond to requests for comment.

O'Keefe's statements on Thursday were a response to how Schimel reacted to a series of videos O'Keefe released leading up to last year's presidential election that O'Keefe claims reveal a voter fraud scheme and other crimes. At the time, Schimel's office released a statement saying the video showed “apparent violations of the law."

But the head of Schimel's criminal litigation division, Roy Korte, closed down an investigation into the matter in January, concluding O'Keefe's videos showed only vague and hypothetical talk. Korte's memo did not become public until this week, when it was released to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel in response to an open records request it filed months ago.

Korte's memo said investigators received additional videos that had not been publicly released from O'Keefe's group but that they did not provide any evidence of voter fraud or other crimes. But in his written statement, O'Keefe said the state had not accepted all of the available additional footage.

A Veritas attorney offered to give Schimel's senior counsel at the time, Paul Connell, additional footage if he would agree to allow Veritas to blur out the face of someone with Veritas, O'Keefe wrote. Connell is now Schimel's top deputy.

"No one from your department responded to that offer, a clear indication that there was not a serious interest in conducting a thorough investigation," O'Keefe wrote.

“Our general opinion of the discussion our attorney had with Mr. Connell is that Mr. Connell was generally uninterested. Mr. Korte’s memo reinforces that opinion.”

No one from the Department of Justice interviewed the undercover Veritas workers, O'Keefe said. Schimel's spokesman has not said if other interviews were conducted as part of the investigation.

In his memo, Korte wrote that some of the videos appeared to be shot in a Wisconsin bar, but that it was unclear where others were filmed.

O'Keefe said key footage was recorded at the Milwaukee bar Garfield's 502 and criticized Korte for saying some locations were unknown.

"Any two-bit investigator worth their salt looking at a bunch of videos inside an establishment in Milwaukee would deduce that it’s in Milwaukee," O'Keefe said in the video he released Thursday. "C’mon, attorney general, you’re showing your cards here. You didn’t watch the tapes and you don’t care to investigate. This is about politics."

O'Keefe took to Twitter on Thursday to criticize Schimel and his team, at one point posting Korte's phone number and email address.

Schimel is also taking heat from Democrats over how he handled the investigation because his office suggested before the election that laws were broken but then quietly reached the opposite conclusion after voters went to the polls.

O’Keefe produced videos of ACORN in 2009 that led to the dismantling of the group. They also resulted in O’Keefe agreeing to pay a $100,000 legal settlement to a former ACORN employee.

In 2010, O'Keefe pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor for unlawfully entering federal property when he and people disguised as telephone workers entered the office of then-U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu of Louisiana.

DISON, Wis. — Records obtained from the Wisconsin Department of Justice show, in the last four years of Republican control at the Department, taxpayers have footed the bill for more than $50,000 in promotional swag. The records also suggest under Brad Schimel, the department has minted two other sets of coins beyond the outrageous $10,000 in “Kick Ass Every Day” coins revealed previously.

“Brad Schimel has minted more commemorative coins than he has had backlogged rape kits tested,” said Scot Ross, One Wisconsin Now. “At the same time he’s begging taxpayers for more money, the Republicans have spent $50,000 that we know on swag for shameless self-promotion.”

According to records released to One Wisconsin Now, after a long series of delays by Schimel’s Department of Justice, taxpayers were socked with at least $52,907 in promotional merchandise costs between July 2013 to June 2017 that went for items like, “Pocket Notebooks,” “Backpacks” and “Travel Tumblers” for “Top-Cop” and “Non Top-Cop.”

Records obtained by One Wisconsin Now are below:

wyo asst ross jumps ship to schimel PA

https://www.linkedin.com/in/dave-ross-3b85697a

ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION | FEWER FINES SOUGHT FROM POLLUTERS

Environmental law unit shrinks some more under Brad Schimel

STEVEN VERBURG sverburg@madison.com, 608-252-6118 Jul 12, 2016

M.P. KING -- State Journal

Wisconsin Attorney General Brad Schimel on Monday announced he has replaced the head of his environmental protection unit. The unit has continued to shrink, becoming the smallest it has been since 1989. Above, Schimel speaks during the 26th Annual Wisconsin Law Enforcement Memorial Ceremony at the State Capitol on May 20.

The Wisconsin Department of Justice environmental protection unit has shrunk to its smallest size in 25 years as state environmental regulators seek fewer fines from polluters.

Six attorneys were assigned to work in the unit last year compared to 10 as recently as 2008.

A Department of Justice spokesman said he couldn’t explain the trend, but attorneys who have worked closely with the unit said it may be a symptom of the dwindling number of pollution cases the state Department of Natural Resources has referred for legal action.

The DNR sent between 105 and 179 violations to environmental protection unit lawyers annually between 1989 and 2009, according to data compiled by DOJ, but the number has topped 100 only once since then.

Last year, total fines against polluters dropped to their lowest point since at least 1994, falling below $1 million for only the second time during that period, the data show.

“It is very apparent that there are very few major violations being referred to the Department of Justice,” said Carl Sinderbrand, a Madison lawyer who once worked in the environmental protection unit and has since represented the DNR and private groups in regulatory lawsuits and served as mediator in pollution cases the DOJ filed against companies.

Sinderbrand and other critics said the DOJ’s environmental unit may be losing resources to department battles in national conservative causes.

Since Republican Attorney General Brad Schimel took over in 2015, the agency has gone to court in Washington, D.C., to support abortion restrictions that had implications for Wisconsin law, and to oppose new clean air and water regulations Schimel said are excessive.

In the past, the state didn’t aggressively fight federal pollution controls, and the experts in the DOJ environmental protection unit took leading roles in such questions, said George Meyer, a former DNR secretary who now directs the Wisconsin Wildlife Federation.

“I’m getting the sense that the environmental protection unit is getting cut out of these issues,” Meyer said.

Schimel has hired attorneys from around the country — including several with strong reputations among conservative groups such as the Federalist Society— for a new Solicitor General’s Office and a Special Litigation and Appeals Unit, which are taking a greater role in environmental matters, Sinderbrand said.

Schimel turned to lawyers from the special litigation group to draft his controversial formal opinion that prompted the DNR to issue high-capacity well permits without considering their cumulative effect on lakes, streams and groundwater, said Sinderbrand, who has represented the DNR and private landowners in cases involving wells.

When Midwest Environmental Advocates has challenged state environmental permits it sees as endangering water quality, DOJ lawyers from outside the environmental unit now defend the permits.

“Now those cases are being given to the new special litigation unit,” said Sarah Geers, a lawyer with the nonprofit environmental law center. “So they are taking it out of the environmental protection unit attorneys’ hands, which is sort of interesting just because those attorneys have some expertise in state environmental laws that the special litigation unit lawyers don’t.”

Schimel spokesman Johnny Koremenos said he wasn’t sure which DOJ lawyer drafted the wells opinion, but he said several attorneys made contributions.

Attorneys with the special litigation and solicitor general offices work so interchangeably and so closely with other DOJ units that it would be difficult to specify the extent to which they may have assumed responsibility for any environmental protection unit duties, Koremenos said.

Numbers provided by the DOJ and DNR show that the DNR has been referring fewer pollution violations to DOJ lawyers for court action and fines.

The DNR has experienced staffing losses and high job vacancy rates that the state Legislative Audit Bureau has linked to deficient environmental regulation.

Top DNR officials say they work hard to resolve pollution violations informally without fines. Koremenos said the fines don’t tell the whole story, because when the DOJ goes to court it also ensures that polluters comply with the law.

“As a proud supporter of Wisconsin’s sporting heritage and an avid outdoorsman, Attorney General Schimel takes his prosecutorial role seriously and ensures all referrals received by the Wisconsin Department of Justice from the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources are thoroughly reviewed and DOJ attorneys work diligently to do what’s best for Wisconsin,” Koremenos said in a statement.

Data supplied by DOJ indicate that during most of the 1990s, the environmental protection unit had 12 lawyers.

In Schimel’s first year, the number dropped to six. Three of those positions were left vacant after attorneys retired and departed for other reasons from December to May 30, Koremenos said. Two of the positions have been filled and a third replacement is being sought, Koremenos said.

Wisconsin Attorney General Brad Schimel announced Monday that he has demoted the longtime head of the Department of Justice environmental protection unit.

Thomas Dawson, who once worked as a state intervenor for environmental protection, now is an assistant attorney general in the unit he directed since 2003, DOJ spokesman Johnny Koremenos said.

After Schimel appointed a new director, Dawson announced he will retire in January,Koremenos said. Dawson said he wasn’t authorized to discuss the changes.

Schimel named Assistant Attorney General David P. Ross as director of the environmental unit. Ross has extensive experience in positions dealing with environmental regulations as a private attorney in Washington, D.C., and as a public employee for the state of Wyoming.

Leaders of conservation groups said Ross had big shoes to fill.

“It would be hard to find anybody with a better knowledge of environmental laws in Wisconsin or a better record of upholding them than Tom,” said Keith Reopelle, a senior policy director at Clean Wisconsin. “It’s pretty difficult to view this as anything but a continuing softening of that office of environmental protection.”

Schimel, a Republican who took office in 2015, has faced criticism from conservationists and Democrats for his environmental stances and what they see as excessive partisanship.

This year, he issued a formal opinion that had the effect of rolling back state powers to protect water from high-capacity wells.

At Schimel’s urging, the Republican-controlled Legislature last year created a new five-lawyer office at DOJ to defend state laws from court challenges and to fight the federal government on issues such as climate change and water pollution.

Meanwhile, the environmental protection unit’s staff this year shrunk to its smallest size in 25 years, continuing a long-term trend as state regulators sought fewer fines from polluters.

In announcing Dawson’s replacement, Schimel said DOJ cares about environmental protection.

“The Department of Justice takes seriously its role in environmental enforcement and the addition of Dave Ross to my leadership team will offer a new management perspective, and two decades of environmental litigation and consulting experience,” Schimel said in a statement. “As I’ve said before, we are ‘stocking the pond’ at DOJ with some of the very best legal minds in the country, and Dave Ross is certainly no exception.”

Ross’ LinkedIn profile indicates he joined DOJ several months ago after working two years for Wyoming’s attorney general as a senior assistant attorney general in the water and natural resources division enforcing laws and defending regulators.

An Appleton native and 1994 UW-Madison graduate, Ross received his law degree and a master’s in environmental law with honors from Vermont Law School in 2001.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/dave-ross-3b85697a

Working for a series of law firms, mostly in Washington, D.C., Ross helped developers, businesses and trade associations determine how to comply with environmental regula- tions.

Rossdefended major homebuilders accused of violating storm water regulations, and represented clients involved in litigation over the Clean Air Actand over water quality standards for Florida, the Chesapeake Bay and the Mississippi River Basin, according to his profile.

Schimel’s announcement noted that Ross had represented green energy developers and investors. Ross’ LinkedIn profile indicated he defended a permit allowing a wind-energy facility to impact endangered species habitat, performed environmental due diligence for wind energy investors, and evaluated offshore wind developments for the federal government.

Unit shrank

Last year, Schimel had six attorneys assigned to the DOJ environmental protection unit compared to 10 as recently as 2008, according to data the department released showing a decrease over 25 years.

Koremenos said in July he couldn’t explain the decrease, but outside attorneys who have worked closely with the unit said it may be a symptom of the dwindling number of pollution cases the state Department of Natural Resources has referred for legal action.

The DNR sent between 105 and 179 violations to environmental protection unit lawyers annually between 1989 and 2009, according to the DOJ data, but the number has exceeded 100 only once since then.

Fines hit low point

Last year, fines against polluters fell to their lowest point since at least 1994, dropping below $1 million for only the second time in that period, the data show.

Dawson joined DOJ in 1976 and held the position of public intervenor, an assistant attorney general position that was abolished in the 1995 state budget.

Public intervenors advocated for public rights related to natural resources in court, in agency rule-making and in legislative hearings.

State intervenors lobbied agency administrators and legislators, and sought agreement among industry and other groups.

Dawson worked in DOJ’s civil litigation unit until 1997, when he took a three-year leave to head the Wisconsin Strategic Pesticide Information Project, a nonprofit formed to enact legislation aimed at tracking pesticide sales and use.

He teaches environmental law at UW Law School and the UW-Madison Environmental Toxicology Center.

Republican Attorney General Brad Schimel has established a new office dedicated to defending the state’s most controversial laws from court challenges and fighting President Barack Obama on climate change, water pollution and bathroom access.

With the creation a year ago of the Office of Solicitor General, Wisconsin has joined roughly 40 other states with specialized appeals court lawyers who have a higher probability of winning appellate cases.

But critics view the five-lawyer office as money wasted on far-right legal battles most voters don’t support.

“It’s a mini right-wing law firm in the attorney general’s office,” said state Rep. Chris Taylor, a Madison Democrat and member of the Legislature’s finance committee who opposed adding the office’s five attorneys to Schimel’s Department of Justice budget.

Of the 35 cases the new office was involved in, about one-third list the state as defendant. Those include a challenge that overturned a state law restricting abortion rights last month, and pending Constitutional tests of a voter identification requirement and limits on labor unions.

The office is also handling several appeals of criminal convictions. Most of its caseload, however, is made up of Schimel’s challenges to federal policy in such areas as immigration, health care, transgender access to bathrooms, andpollution controls.

Schimel declined interview requests, but spokesman Johnny Koremenos responded to criticism by saying there was nothing partisan about an attorney general’s duty to defend state laws when interest groups try to overturn them.

And when the solicitor general’s office joined lawsuits in Texas, Ohio and Washington, D.C., courts, the aim was to protect Wisconsin residents from overreach by the Obama administration, Koremenos said.

“Attorney General Schimel’s interest in joining multistate lawsuits that protect the powers constitutionally delegated to the states is also the people’s interest,” Koremenos said. “There’s nothing frivolous about protecting and preserving the rule of law.”

Wisconsin is lead counsel in most of the federal cases, while in others it filed supporting briefs. In still others — including three filed in Texas opposing transgender access to bathrooms, an Affordable Care Act fee and immigration policy — Wisconsin supplied affidavits and other information, Koremenos said.

Multistate legal actions aren’t new. Since the 1970s, states have joined forces to win settlements against targets including the tobacco and pharmaceutical industries. With increasing frequency, states have also fought federal mandates.

Increasing use of solicitors general

Beginning in the 1980s and 1990s, more state attorneys general of both parties began hiring lawyers to be solicitors general, said Jim Tierney, a former Maine attorney general and lecturer at Harvard and Columbia law schools who has helped several states set up solicitor offices.

Each office operates differently, but in general they all benefit from experience working in appeals courts, which differ from lower courts, Tierney said. Appellate law may require deeper research on legal precedent and theory. In lower courts, there may be more emphasis on facts and plain statutory language.

A solicitor general can also help weed out appeals that don’t have much chance of success, and can ensure that arguments it makes in one appeal don’t contradict those in another.

In 2014, UW-Madison political science professor Ryan Owens analyzed decades of U.S. Supreme Court cases involving state governments and found that having a solicitor general was one of the strongest predictors of success.

States with solicitors prevailed in about 60 percent of cases compared to 40 percent for others.

But Madison attorney Carl Sinderbrand said his concern was with how Schimel was using the office. Sinderbrand, who was a state assistant attorney general from 1979 to 1990, recalled when one of his assignments was to keep an eye on federal officials who were looking for sites to store nuclear waste.

Sinderbrand said Schimel’s use of the solicitor general’s office was misguided because it went beyond the usual level of partisanship he has seen in other attorneys general of both parties.

“This is hyper partisanship,” said Sinderbrand, who has since represented state agencies, fought against them in court, and been hired as an arbitrator for department lawsuits. “And that’s damaging, because the attorney general should be out there as the people’s lawyer, not his party’s lawyer.”

Conservationists have said Schimel’s aggressive opposition to federal pollution regulations raised concerns especially in light of his reduction of a department unit responsible for enforcing environmental laws.

Taylor, the Democratic state legislator, pointed to materials distributed by the American Legislative Exchange Council, or ALEC, calling on states to file lawsuits to block the Obama administration’s Clean Power Plan. The U.S. Supreme Court has stayed the air pollution rule while court challenges from 26 states are being heard.

Reconsidering courts

The state lawsuits come as conservatives rethink their commitment to lawmaking by legislators instead of the courts. For many years they stood on the sidelines as non-governmental groups went to court to force stricter enforcement of laws, such as those protecting air and water quality, Owens said.

“They didn’t get involved in the courts and they got their butts kicked,” Owens said.

Over time, court rulings contributed to growth in the power of federal agencies, said Rick Esenberg, president and CEO of the conservative Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty, or WILL.

This month, WILL announced the formation of a group, the Center for Competitive Federalism, to file lawsuits and issue policy statements nationally against federal regulation.

For his solicitor general’s office, Schimel recruited highly touted lawyers with conservative bona fides.

In December, he appointed Misha Tseytlin to lead the office. Tseytlin had been general counsel for West Virginia as it fought federal limits on burning coal. Tseytlin is a member of the conservative Federalist Society who served as law clerk for U.S. Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy.

In April, Ryan Walsh was hired as chief deputy solicitor general. Walsh clerked for U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, one of the court’s most conservative justices before he died in February. Walsh worked for a time at the Jones Day law firm in Washington, D.C., which has a reputation for hiring former Supreme Court clerks. The National Law Journal reported in 2015 the firm was paying them $300,000 bonuses on top of six-figure salaries.

“Attorney General Schimel was able to recruit legal talent unrivaled by most states, including two former U.S. Supreme Court clerks and two former U.S. Court of Appeals clerks, to serve in this newly established unit at DOJ,” Koremenos said. “Very few other states, if any, have more than one former U.S. Supreme clerk in their solicitor general’s office.”

Tseytlin’s Wisconsin salary was about $135,000, while Walsh made $125,528.

“The state of Wisconsin is getting an outstanding deal for the attorneys in the solicitor general’s office,” Koremenos said. “The state is paying these specialized attorneys a fraction of what they would be paid in a private law firm.”

Two other attorneys with federal appellate experience — Daniel Lennington and Luke Berg — also work in the unit. Recent law school graduate Amy Miller filled the fifth position.

Peg Lautenschlager, a Democratic attorney general from 2003 to 2006, has criticized the solicitor general’s office for the way it defended the state abortion law, but she said having an appeals court specialist makes sense. During her term, she reassigned an experienced staff lawyer as solicitor general to oversee appeals.

Republicans grumbled, and in 2006, GOP attorney general candidate J.B. Van Hollen promised to eliminate the position, and he did so after winning the election, Lautenschlager said. Van Hollen didn’t respond to phone and email messages.

Schimel: Staff lawyers spread thin

During his 2014 campaign for his first term as attorney general, Schimel called for creation of the office.

Last year, he told state lawmakers that his staff lawyers were spread too thin on appeals cases and that millions of dollars were being spent on outside lawyers.

Justice department spending on outside attorneys rose four-fold to an average of $1.3 million annually after 2011, when Republican Gov. Scott Walker and GOP lawmakers took over and enacted measures like a rollback of union rights that drew many court challenges.

In 2015, Walker and the Legislature added the solicitor general’s office to the budget, funding it for two years with about $1 million from settlements the department collects in investigations and prosecutions of Medicaid fraud, environmental violations and other wrongdoing.

Since the office was formed, the department has spent nothing on outside attorneys, Koremenos said.

State Assembly Speaker Robin Vos, R-Rochester, was pleased, a spokewoman said.

“The Office of Solicitor General has been effective in countering the multiple overreaches by the federal government,” said spokeswoman Kit Beyer. “We are fortunate to have such a high level of expertise in the office, which eliminates the need for outside counsel and is a cost savings.”

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brad_Schimel

Brad Schimel (born February 18, 1965) is an American prosecutor and the Wisconsin Attorney General, serving since January 5, 2015. The former District Attorney of Waukesha County, Wisconsin and a Republican, Schimel was elected Attorney General on November 4, 2014and took office on January 5, 2015, succeeding fellow Republican J. B. Van Hollen.

Background

[hide]

Schimel earned his Juris Doctor at the University of Wisconsin Law School (1990). He is a graduate of Mukwonago High School and holds a B.A. in political science from the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee (1987). He began his career as a prosecutor in 1990 when he joined the Waukesha County District Attorney’s office. In, 2006 Schimel was elected Waukesha County District Attorney.^[citation ^needed]

In 2011, Schimel was appointed to serve on the Wisconsin Judicial Council and the Wisconsin Crime Victim Council. He is currently serves as Secretary.^{[clarification} ^needed] He is a founding member of the Waukesha County Victim Impact Panel for intoxicated drivers and President of the Preventing Alcohol-Related Crashes (PARC) Task Force, 2004-2011.^[citation ^needed]

Schimel is an instructor in the Law Enforcement and Criminal Justice Department at Waukesha County Technical College and is a former adjunct instructor at Concordia University Wisconsin.^[citation ^needed]

Attorney General of Wisconsin:{:(style="margin-right:0.25em"):}:[edit:{]}:

On October 7, 2013, Van Hollen announced he would not seek reelection in 2014 for a third term as state attorney general.^[1] Van Hollen endorsed Schimel as his replacement.^[2]

In the November 4, 2014 general election, Schimel defeated opponent Susan Happ. Schimel said his priorities wereupholding the Constitution,stopping heroin use, fighting internet crimes against children and putting an end to violence against women.^[3]

gerrymander red map:

http://www.alternet.org/civil-liberties/wisconsin-redistricting-lawsuit-could-reverberate-nationally

After a century as a trailblazer for progressive democracy reforms, Wisconsin has become what one local union leader ruefully calls “a kind of laboratory for oligarchs to implement their political and economic agenda.”

This assessment, delivered by David Poklinkoski, president of International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 2304, captures Wisconsin Democrats’ dim view of the brazenly partisan redistricting plan masterminded by GOP Governor Scott Walker.

But the redistricting plan, so central in empowering Walker and his legislative allies to roll back social reforms in Wisconsin, is now the target of a federal lawsuit. First heard by federal judges in May, the suit is now before an appeals court that is expected to rule this summer. That ruling could reverberate in other states around the country with heavily GOP-tilted electoral maps. While a few Democratic-controlled state governments have district maps that favor their party, the 2010 Republican electoral sweep set off a nationally-coordinated and harshly partisan round of redistricting in states where both the governor and legislative majorities were Republican.

Now, Republican-imposed plans in a number of other states—including Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia, North Carolina, Florida, and Texas—stand to be affected by Wisconsin’s redistricting ruling, which will be handed down by the U.S. Seventh Court of Appeals. Such redistricting experts as Michael Li, chief counsel on the issue for the Brennan Center for Justice, predict the case could eventually land before the Supreme Court. The death of conservative Justice Antonin has altered the ideological balance on the now evenly divided court, and Li says Justice Anthony Kennedy has shown a strong interest in the case.

“The Wisconsin lawsuit is the most significant gerrymandering challenge in 30 years,” says Li. “This lawsuit could be a rare opportunity to contest unfair redistricting. It comes at a time when both the Supreme Court and the public are aware of the dysfunctionality of our legislative bodies.”

In Wisconsin, the redistricting plan imposed in 2011 was conceived in tight secrecy behind a private law firm’s closed doors as part of a large-scale national Republican strategy to block Democrats from power through the careful manipulation of state legislative district lines. The plan exaggerates actual GOP electoral strength and marginalizes Democratic voters, critics say. Indeed, it takes partisan gerrymandering to new heights, transforming what would otherwise be majority votes for Democrats into overwhelming Republican victories.

The Republican-rigged electoral map has been crucial in enabling Walker and the state’s GOP-controlled legislature to gut labor laws, weaken environmental protections, bestow new tax breaks on corporations, attack women’s reproductive rights, and reduce funding for the University of Wisconsin and public education in general.

Known as***Whitford v. Nichol***, the suit was brought by 12 Democratic plaintiffs who argue that the plan unfairly discounts the values of votes cast by Democrats. The Wisconsin Attorney General’s office has defended the map on the grounds that it is not a “gerrymander,” typically defined as a set of district lines with illogical and strangely-shaped borders, and drawn for ideological advantage.

But the state’s district map exemplifies the extremes to which Republicans have taken the political practice of gerrymandering districts for maximum political advantage. The result has been an indirect form of voter disenfranchisement.The plaintiffs charged that the redistricting violated their right to equal protection under the 14th Amendment. Further, as they asserted in their brief: “Extreme partisan gerrymandering is also contrary to core democratic values because it enables a political party to win more legislative districts—and thus more legislative power—than is warranted by that party’s popular support.”

Refracted through the lens of redistricting, electoral outcomes in Wisconsin fail to reflect voters’ intent, the suit alleges. “By distorting the relationship between votes and assembly seats, it causes policies to be enacted that do not accurately reflect the public will,” the plaintiffs asserted. “In the end, a political minority is able to rule the majority and to entrench itself in power by periodically manipulating election boundaries."

The Republicans’ heavily disproportionate share of legislative seats has represented a particularly blatant trampling of the popular will, critics say. For example, in Wisconsin’s 2012 Assembly races, Democratic candidates gathered 1.4 million votes to the Republicans’ 1.2 million. Yet the Republicans walked away with 60 state Assembly seats, while the Democrats were left with just 39. In 2014, Walker won re-election as governor with 52 percent of the vote, but Republicans won 63 of 99 Assembly seats, while the number Democrat-held seats shrank to 36.

The dramatic gap between Republicans’ actual share of the electorate and their vastly higher level of representation threatens democratic representation, the plan’s critics say.

In his closing statement May 27 to the judges in defending the GOP electoral map, Wisconsin Assistant Attorney General Brian Keenan insisted that this is what democracy looks like. “This is actually democracy,” Keenan stated. “The Republicans won the 2010 election. The Constitution gives them the right to [draw district lines].”

But the plaintiffs countered that the plan subverts democracy. “When a minority party stays in power, even though they garner fewer votes, then the health of our democracy depends on our courts to fix the problem,” declared Earle Peter, an attorney for the plaintiffs, at a news conference. “We have one of the worst partisan gerrymanders in modern political history.”

In drawing their controversial Wisconsin map, state Republicans ignored the successful model used in neighboring Iowa for the past 35 years. That state uses a nonpartisan state agency to adjust districts to keep pace with population shifts reflected in the Census held every 10 years.

But back in Wisconsin, the GOP super-majority created by the map has pushed through a conservative agenda that arguably does not enjoy strong public support. Even the right-of-center Milwaukee Journal Sentinel in 2015 noted in an editorial the close linkage between the GOP-drawn map and Walker’s successful enactment of legislation that severely weakened unions: Wisconsin’s new “right-to-work” law “is a reminder of the role redistricting has played in forging the party’s ironclad legislative majorities.”

The heavily-tilted Wisconsin redistricting has its roots in a national effort known as REDMAP(the Redistricting Majority) project, launched shortly after Obama’s 2008 election by the the Republican State Leadership Committee, a tax-exempt political group that backs GOP state legislative candidates.Led by former Republican National Committee chairman Ed Gillespie and supported by GOP operative Karl Rove, REDMAP coordinated a national effort to provide sophisticated technical support to Republicans drawing district lines at the state level. The project was designed to both magnify Republican representation in state legislatures and to carve up U.S. House districts in such a way as to give the Republicans a pronounced edge.

In developing their redistricting plan, Wisconsin Republicans received assistance from such friendly experts as University of Oklahoma political science professor Ronald Keith Gaddie. In testimony videotaped for the Seventh District judges considering the case, Gaddie explained that he had provided detailed data based on sophisticated mathematical formulae so that Republicans could shape districts to strengthen their hold on the legislature. Gaddie called the redistricting plan approved in 2011 “a map that makes an assertive move towards a Republican advantage.”

Gaddie’s work, like the entire redistricting process, was conducted without any public scrutiny. The immensely significant electoral map was crafted entirely behind closed doors at the Republican-linked law firm of Michael Best & Friedrich. The process of developing the plan, which cost state taxpayers about $2 million, was so secretive that Republican legislators were required to sign a pledge of confidentiality before being permitted to look at the map. And even then, the GOP legislators were allowed only to see the maps for their individual districts.

No members of the general public, news media, or Democratic legislators, were permitted to review the redistricting plan until days before it was rushed through the legislature with only one hearing by the Republicans in charge. The shroud of secrecy continued to envelop the districting plan when the redistricting plan was firstchallenged in 2011 by a lawsuit brought by the AFL-CIO, the Fair Elections Project, and Latino rights group Voces del la Frontera. In 2012, the three-judge panel considering that suit fined the Michael Best firm nearly $17,500 and warned its lawyers to stop “the sort of disinformation, foot-dragging, and obfuscation now being engaged in.”

In 2013, the judges again found that “fraud, misrepresentation, or misconduct” had likely taken place, and ordered a post-trial investigation into thousands of missing records. Ultimately, however, the federal judges in that lawsuit ordered only limited changes, to protect two primarily Latino districts covered by the Voting Rights Act. However, the judges’ ruling excoriated the Republicans’ redistricting process, and stated that “the people of Wisconsin deserve better” than this “peculiarly furtive process adopted by the majority party.”

Five years later,political scientists are testifying in the current lawsuitthat Republicans employed strategies known as “cracking” and “packing” to diminish the number of seats that Democratic candidates could plausibly win, and throwing their legislative representation out of whack with their share of the popular vote. “Cracking” refers to breaking up concentrations of Democratic votes and diluting Democratic strength by parceling them out in small pieces to larger GOP bastions to virtually guarantee that Republicans win election. “Packing” is the process of concentrating as many Democratic voters as possible into a limited number of districts, so that their votes affect the outcomes of only a limited number of races.

The success of the Republican plan can be measured in what the plaintiffs’ lawyer and University of Chicago Law Professor Nicholas Stephanopoulos labeled, in remarks to the judges, the “efficiency gap.” This is the percentage of votes that effectively do not count when districts are so thoroughly dominated by one party. In almost 800 state legislative elections that Stephanopoulos has studied over the last 40 years, the average “efficiency gap” has actually been zero, suggesting that neither party gained an advantage from redistricting.

But the “efficiency gap” in Wisconsin after the state’s 2011 redistricting plan went into effect was a full 13 percent in favor of the Republicans in 2012 and 10 percent in 2014, according to research by Stephanopoulos.

“The 2012 figure is the 28th worst score in modern American history, out of nearly 800 total plans,” Stephanopoulos testified.

Defying precedent, the Republican-drawn electoral map splits up 58 of the state’s 72 counties, points out Matt Rothschild, director of the clean-government group Wisconsin Democracy Campaign.

But Democrats aren’t the only ones complaining about Wisconsin’s electoral map. While filed by Democrats, the lawsuit is backed by several former Republican legislators who have denounced the redistricting plan. The GOP ex-legislators argue that the imbalanced redistricting has made incumbent Republican lawmakers more vulnerable than ever to pressure from big-money campaign contributors. Since the lawmakers no longer have to pay attention to a diverse constituency, special-interest donors expect that legislators will automatically deliver on legislation that serves their narrow agendas, says Rothschild, of the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign.

“The majority of our legislators have been relegated to nothing more than pawns awaiting bills written by special interests themselves, and told how and what to do,” former Republican state Senator Dale Schultz told the Wisconsin State Journal.

The Wisconsin case illustrates one of the ways Republicans engage in voter disenfranchisement, voting rights advocates say. While progressives have focused heavily on the proliferation of “voter suppression” laws in Republican-controlled legislatures, redistricting has given the GOP yet another, if subtler, means to block the popular will and negate voting rights.

“Their [the plaintiffs’] right to vote is fundamental,” thundered the Campaign Legal Center’s Gerry Hebert, one of the lawyers representing the plaintiffs, in his closing arguments before the court. “It's our voice in the government. It's the only voice many of us have. It's not right to target people and harm them because of their voting history. What did they do? They had the nerve to participate in the political process and go to the polls.

Roger Bybee is a Milwaukee-based freelance writer whose work has appeared in numerous national publications, including Z magazine, theProgressive, American Prospect and Foreign Policy in Focus. His e-mail address iswinterbybee@gmail.com.

In his closing statement May 27 to the judges in defending the GOP electoral map,Wisconsin Assistant Attorney General Brian Keenan

foley & lardner 2006- https://www.facebook.com/brian.keenan.311

insisted that this is what democracy looks like. “This is actually democracy,” Keenan stated. “The Republicans won the 2010 election. The Constitution gives them the right to [draw district lines].”

newsbuster bs shepard

...g ahead to the last section of Gerstein's article, "Testing when abortion clinic regulations go too far," notice how heavy emphasis was placed on criticisms of abortion-clinic regulation by a federal judge who ruled previously against them. Also note that there's nothing quoted from a parallel case in another circuit which upheld similar restrictions (emphasis mine):

Two of the latest tactics in the abortion wars could wind up before the justices this term: requirements that doctors performing abortions have admitting privileges at nearby hospitals and that abortion clinics meet standards for hospitals or surgical centers.

An appeals court has upheld most such limits in Texas, but in June the Supreme Court voted, 5-4, to block key parts of the law until the justices decide whether to weigh in. Petitions to take up that case and a similar law in Mississippi are already pending at the Supreme Court.

Supporters of the laws say they are designed to protect women's health, but abortion providers and abortion rights advocates say the laws would force many clinics to close and penalize poor women who could not afford travel to distant clinics.

A similar Wisconsin law led to combative oral arguments in front of the 7th Circuit last week. Judge Richard Posner suggested the law was a transparent effort to prevent abortions, not aid women.

“Governor Walker, before he withdrew from the presidential competition, said he thought abortion should be forbidden even if the mother dies as a result, " Judge Richard Posner said to a lawyer for the state, in remarks first reported by the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel. "Is that kind of official Wisconsin policy?

“That perhaps is Governor Walker’s personal view, but it’s not a state policy,” Assistant Attorney General Brian Keenan replied. Keenan insisted requiring doctors to have admitting privileges was a reasonable precaution to aid women

“The admitting privileges would benefit the continuity of care for the woman when she goes to that hospital,” he said.

Posner said the fact that the law was intended to kick in one business day after it was passed made clear the authors' intentions. “That statute can’t be justified in terms of women’s health,” the judge said.

The key findings of the report include:

Republican Attorneys General and their national organizing arm, the Republican Attorneys General Association, have received a sum total of more than $4.7 Million from polluters and energy interests.

The Republican Attorneys General Association has taken $1.9 Million from polluter and energy interests.

Individual Republican Attorneys General have received a total of $2.8 Million from polluter and energy interests.

Louisiana Attorney General’s office close ties behind the scenes with Koch lobbyists Hunton & Williams.

Wisconsin Attorney General’s office coordinating with the Koch-funded Heartland Institute to publish an anti-Clean Power Plan oped.

North Dakota Attorney General’s office holding “confidential” conference calls with coal the North American Coal Corporation as well as coal industry interests to discuss the Clean Power Plan.

ColoradoAttorney General’s office seeking out anti-Clean Power Plan interests from lobbyists.

Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWinespeaking about the Clean Power Plan at an Ohio Coal Association “closed press event” to allow him to “speak freely” as well as receiving anti-Clean Power Plan emails at a personal email address, which he forwarded to senior members of his staff at their government email address.

//Raga

By Matt Corley

May 12, 2016

The Judicial Crisis Network (JCN) is making news these days as the main conservative group seeking to block President Obama’s ability to seat a replacement on the Supreme Court for late Justice Antonin Scalia. The nonprofit group, which does not disclose its donors, is spending millions on ads attacking nominee Merrick Garland and pressuring Republican senators to hold the line against even holding a hearing on his nomination.

Though it is much better known for its focus on the judiciary, JCN has also long-cared about electing conservative attorney generals who can be “key leaders in the battle for limited, constitutional government.” Since 2014, JCN has contributed at least $2.445 million to the Republican Attorneys General Association (RAGA), which is dedicated to “electing Republicans to the Office of State Attorney General.” In 2014, the group also directly intervened in attorneys general races, running ads in Republican attorney general primaries in Nebraska and Arkansas.

JCN also has sought to influence the slate of state attorneys general by working with other groups to run issue ads in attorney general elections, particularly Republican primaries. Between July 2013 and June 2014, for instance, JCN gave $250,000 to a nonprofit called the American Dream Initiative (ADI), which went on to spend at least $532,000 torun ads attacking then-Texas attorney general candidate Ken Paxton’s ethics just days before a runoff election in the 2014 Republican primary. JCN’s funding covered nearly half of ADI’s expenses for the year. JCN also reported on its most recent tax form giving $1.35 million to the American Future Fund, a notorious dark money nonprofit that ran ads alongside JCN in Arkansas’ 2014 Republican attorney general primary. Another group, the Rule of Law Project, got $100,000 from JCN in 2014 and ran nearly $190,000 worth of ads boosting the Republican nominee for attorney general in Wisconsin while attacking the Democratic nominee.

Wisconsin AG Candidate Brad Schimel has said he wants to sue the EPA to stop new rules limiting coal fired emissions, citing "federal overreach."

Now those who want him to do that are pouring on cash. With polls showing Schimel and his challenger Susan Happ neck and neck, new ads have popped up in Wisconsin from a mystery group called the "Rule of Law Project".

The ads specifically laud Schimel for asserting that he would sue the EPA over the emissions standards.

The ad buy is likely to be large, $180,000 in Green Bay alone.

The ads credit an unknown group called "The Rule of Law Project." The gentleman listed on the ad buy as the group's treasurer is Adam J. White. Mr. White an attorney for the law firm of Boyden Gray and Associates, whose chief counsel is former White House counsel to George H.W. Bush and C. Boyden Gray. The address on the ad buy is the same address as Boyden Gray and Associates.

A key founder of the Federalist Society and a current board member, C. Boyden Gray is the chief architect of the 30 year attack on regulations protecting public health and the environment. As science shows increasingly alarming signs that catastrophic climate change is around the corner, Gray's firm represents clients like First Energy Corp., one of America's top polluters according to a UMass Amherst study.

As our Sourcewatch profile documents, Gray has long been tied to the Koch Brothers' anti-regulatory crusades going back decades to when Gray served as the Co-Chairman for Citizens for a Sound Economy which would later split to become Freedomworks and Americans for Prosperity. Citizens for a Sound Economy (CSE) was a powerful industry-funded think tank, promoting deregulation of all stripes

While on the board for Citizens for Sound Economy, Gray worked with Charles and David Koch. He continues to serve on the board of FreedomWorks and continues to represent the fossil fuel industry in cases against the EPA. Including a failed effort to represented several states challenging EPA's greenhouse gas permits in the Supreme Court.

ALEC Has Urged State AGs to Sue the EPA

And naturally ALEC has a role in all this too. Schimel is taking a leaf right out of the American Legislative Exchange Council playbook. As CMD research director Nick Surgey uncovered, ALEC -- bankrolled by big fossil fuel interests like Koch Industries and Peabody coal -- have been coordinating efforts to get state AGs to sue the federal government over the emissions standards.

"Alec has become quite well known and notorious for promoting model legislation. This is different," Surgey told the Guardian. "Alec is engaging much more broadly in the campaign against the EPA regulations, and they are doing so by asking their members to advocate for the coal industry with attorney generals. That is very unusual for them."

Unfortunately for Mr. Gray and the Kochs, limiting carbon pollution is actually quite popular with the American public. Two polls this year found that 70 percent of Americans approve of establishing carbon pollution limits.

- See more at: http://www.prwatch.org/news/2014/10/12649/dirty-energy-barons-go-bat-wi-ag-candidate-schimel#sthash.VJCt04O6.dpuf

http://www.prwatch.org/news/2015/12/12995/brad-schimels-dirty-power-play

As world leaders meet in Paris in an urgent effort to reach an international accord to prevent catastrophic climate change, the Wisconsin Attorney General is working on a plan to undercut President Obama's ability to deliver on any such agreement.

Earlier this year, with the blessing of Governor Scott Walker, Wisconsin Attorney General Brad Schimel signed onto a lawsuit aimed at stopping the Obama Administration's Clean Power Plan (CPP), the first national standards for limiting dirty carbon emissions from coal-fired power plants.

The lawsuit is spearheaded by Murray Energy, the largest privately-held coal company in America, and the West Virginia Attorney General, who argue that the new rules are a costly overreach by the federal government.

But the American public has a different view. With 6.8 million kids suffering from asthma, the public is increasingly aware of the health impacts of burning dirty fuels and strongly supports alternatives. Polling shows 60% of voters support the CPP, while just 31% oppose it. 70% of voters want their states to cooperate with these federal efforts (including 58% of Republicans), while just 17% do not. 75% of Americans know that climate change is already having a severe impact, including 58% of Republicans.

While Schimel says he is protecting Wisconsin businesses and rate payers, the lawsuits are a strategy in a national playbook written by the fossil fuel industry and anti-government ideologues like the Koch's Americans for Prosperity and the Koch-funded American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC). In addition to urging the AGs to sue, ALEC is pushing one cookie-cutter "model" bill designed to block implementation of the power plan and another to allow industry to bankroll the state litigation. Apparently, ALEC is worried that state taxpayers might get riled when they learn about their AG's efforts to attack the CPP.

Schimel's decision to go to bat for polluters comes as no surprise. While running for office in 2014, Schimel said he would sue and was promptly backed by a mysterious group called the "Rule of Law Project." CMD traced the group to the law firm of C. Boyden Gray. A key founder of the Federalist Society and former White House Counsel, Gray is the chief architect of the 40-year attack on regulations protecting public health and the environment. Gray's firm has been representing big business and utility coalition in the fight against the CPP.

Now Schimel is bringing in a compatriot of Gray's straight out of coal country. He announced that Misha Tseytlin was to serve as Wisconsin's first "Solicitor General" with a $1 million dollar budget.

Tseytlin is a key player in the national game plan to derail the effort to rein in carbon emissions. Tseytlin may not have yet taken the Wisconsin bar, but he is listed as General Counsel on the West Virginia lawsuit challenging the CPP. He also battled an EPA rule which restored Clean Water Act protections to wetlands and streams. In private practice, he worked for Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher, a major law firm representing energy clients like Chevron in its fight against a $19 billion dollar judgement for polluting the Ecuadorian rainforest. Tseytlin is a "proud member" of the Koch-funded Federalist Society.

For Schimel and Tseytlin apparently, clean air and clean water are not something to celebrate, but a regulatory burden for polluters.

Schimel argues that the CPP will hit Wisconsin harder because it is more reliant than other states on coal, but the argument relies on smoke and mirrors say utility and energy experts.

"Wisconsin is in a relatively good position to meet CPP standards compared to states like West Virginia and North Dakota," said Keith Reopelle Senior Policy Director for Wisconsin Environment. "But we would be in an even better position had the state revisited renewable portfolio standards or invested more in energy efficiency as neighboring states have done."

Wisconsin utilities have met renewable portfolio standards two years ahead of schedule, but no effort has gone into expanding them and setting new targets.

Schimel also argues that the CPP will cost the state $13 billion, but that number is bunk, reports Reopelle, who says that was based on incorrect assumptions regarding the proposed rule and never adjusted for the final published rule.

Schimel once voted to bar state employees from talking about and working on climate change. Now heclaims "this is not about pollution" and carbon "isn't the traditional thing that most people think about as pollution." This leaves Reopelle shaking his head. "Carbon dioxide is certainly a pollutant, accumulating in our atmosphere and causing global warming," he said. It was found to be a pollutant actionable under the Clean Air Act by the U.S. Supreme Court in 2007.

"The Clean Power Plan is a commonsense approach that will reduce carbon pollution, lower health risks, and create countless clean energy jobs in Wisconsin," says Kerry Schumann of the Wisconsin League of Conservation Voters. The administration is "wasting taxpayer dollars and valuable time by joining this suit."

Even though nations in Paris are closer to an accord to rein in carbon pollution than ever before, it is likely to be non-binding and well short of what is needed to prevent super droughts, rising seas, and mass extinctions.

Schimel and the other AGs are hoping that they can blow enough smoke to convince negotiators that the Obama administration cannot deliver on any climate commitment. But in doing so they find themselves on the wrong side of public opinion, the law, and of history.

- See more at: http://www.prwatch.org/news/2015/12/12995/brad-schimels-dirty-power-play#sthash.Byr5sGZu.dpuf

http://www.alternet.org/environment/mayor-bloomberg-defending-obama-goes-after-state-attorneys-general-protecting-polluters

Michael Bloomberg has not been shy about using his vast personal wealth (estimated at $40.9 billion) on political spending [3]. Last year the former New York City mayor announced plans to spend $50 million building a national grassroots movement to curb gun violence. It's a significant amount, especially considering the fact that the National Rifle Association spends only $20 million [4] on political activities each year.

Now the perennial putative presidential candidate has set his sights on a new target: carbon emissions. Last month, he announced his plans [5] to run a series of political television ads attacking the attorneys general of four states — Florida, Michigan, Missouri and Wisconsin — who are suing the Obama administration over new regulations aimed at reducing emissions [6] from power plants. The attorneys general claim the rules will drive up energy costs and destroy coal industry jobs. Notably, the four states have been presidential battlegrounds.

Two of the Bloomberg ads describe the attorneys general as bending to special interests and taking donations from “polluters.” The ad airing in Michigan accuses Attorney General Bill Schuette of “putting polluters and his campaign contributors ahead [5] of protecting Michigan families.” The Florida ad describes Pam Bondi, a Republican, as “an attorney general for polluters, not for us [5].”

“These four attorneys general are trying to stop the president from doing something that I think is terribly important,” Bloomberg told [5] the New York Times. “I want the public to know what they’re doing.”

The regulations, part of the EPA’s Clean Power Plan [7] (CPP), which was introduced in August, are a central element of Obama’s Climate Action Plan [8], which aims to fulfill the president’s 2009 pledge to reduce the nation’s overall greenhouse gas emissions 17 percent [8] below 2005 levels by 2020. To meet that goal, the CPP sets state-by-state targets to cut carbon emissions from the energy sector 32 percent [9] from 2005 levels by 2030.

The White House asserts that by setting the goals of CPP and allowing states to create tailored plans to meet them, there will be huge benefits for public health, the national economy and savings for average Americans. Specifically, the White House says it will create tens of thousands of jobs, lower the costs of renewable energy and save consumers $155 billion between 2020 and 2030. The CPP will also:

Prevent up to 3,600 premature deaths
Prevent 1,700 non-fatal heart attacks
Prevent 90,000 asthma attacks in children
Prevent 300,000 missed workdays and school days
Save Americans nearly $85 a year on energy bills
Save enough energy to power 30 million homes
Lead to 30 percent more renewable energy generation

Still, the CPP has met with fierce, primarily Republican opposition, with conservative critics saying it represents an unconstitutional federal overreach, will drive up energy bills and reduce the electric grid’s reliability. The EPA has firmly dismissed these claims. Janet McCabe, acting assistant administrator of the agency’s Office of Air and Radiation, said the plan is “based on a sound legal and technical foundation," adding that it "really puts states in the driver's seat [10]."

The four attorneys general who are the targets of Bloomberg's ads are fighting back. According to the New York Times, Wisconsin Attorney General Brad D. Schimel said in an email statement that Bloomberg is an “out-of-touch billionaire.” And in a statement, Florida attorney general Pam Bondi described Bloomberg as a “billionaire bully [11]”:

Florida has a great and conscientious track record of improving its air quality and protecting its environment … Now a billionaire bully is attacking Florida, and 26 other states, for having the audacity of defending their citizens against the EPA’s heavy-handed and unlawful regulations. This bully wants to defend the federal government; we want to protect the people we serve.

In her announcement [12] about the lawsuit, Bondi claimed the EPA rule sets an "unrealistic" timeframe to cut carbon emissions by 2030 and would "require the use of costly and unproven technologies."

Twenty states are challenging the EPA rule in addition to the four targeted by Bloomberg: West Virginia, Texas, Alabama, Arkansas, Colorado, Georgia, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Montana, Nebraska, New Jersey, Ohio, South Carolina, South Dakota, Utah, Wyoming, the Arizona Corporation Commission, and the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality.

Environmental concerns are not new for Bloomberg. During his tenure as mayor of New York, 2002 to 2013, he became known as one of the most environmentally minded big city mayors in the country, introducing in 2007 PLaNYC [13], an aggressive program to overhaul the city’s environmental sustainability by 2030 that tackled 10 specific areas: housing and neighborhoods, parks and public spaces, brownfields, waterways, water supply, transportation, energy, air quality, solid waste, and climate change. According to NYC.gov [14], “Over 97% of the 127 initiatives in PlaNYC were launched within one year of its release and almost two-thirds of its 2009 milestones were achieved or mostly achieved.”

A main benefactor of the Sierra Club's Beyond Coal [15] campaign, Bloomberg has been a longtime opponent of coal, characterizing it as a naturally dying industry. In an August op-ed, he wrote [16]:

The overblown political rhetoric about the plan tends to obscure the market reality that the coal industry has been in steady decline for a decade, partly as a result of the natural gas boom, but mostly because consumers are demanding cleaner air and action on climate change … King Coal is dying of natural causes: Market forces, technological advances, and public demands for clean air and climate action have combined to make alternative sources of energy more financially attractive. The price of new wind power, for example, is lower than that of coal in most parts of the country.

Maggie Haberman of the New York Times said that Bloomberg’s new ads “amount to a defense [5] of the White House over its Clean Power Plan.”

Whether this defense will work remains to be seen. But one thing is for certain: Coal is on the decline and fewer Americans are dying because of it. “A decade ago, coal pollution was killing 13,000 people a year,” Bloomberg wrote in his op-ed. “Today, the number is down to 7,500, which means that more than 5,000 Americans are living longer, healthier lives each year thanks to cleaner power [16].”

Reynard Loki is AlterNet's environment and food editor. Follow him on Twitter @reynardloki [17]. Email him at reynard@alternet.org [18].

Governor Walker, a front-runner candidate [48] for the 2016 GOP presidential ticket, also has submitted a public comment opposing the Clean Power Plan [49]. So too did the Public Service Commission and the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources [50], the latter of which is now also mulling over dissolving its science bureau [51].

Schimel, upon taking office, chose Andrew Cook to serve as Deputy Attorney General [52]. Cook formerly served as a lobbyist [53] for the Madison-based firm The Hamilton Consulting Group [54] and also headed up the Madison branch [55] of the Koch Brothers [56]-tied Federalist Society [57].

According to lobbying disclosure forms, Cook's former industry clients have included the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity (ACCCE) [58], Koch Industries [59], Marathon Petroleum [60], Xcel Energy [61]and Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce [62]. Cook also formerly worked as a staff attorney [63] at the Koch-tied Pacific Legal Foundation [64].

And as The New York Times revealed in a December 2014 investigation, the corporate-funded Republican Attorneys General Association :{(RAGA):(style="background-color:#ffff66;"):}: [65] has worked in concert with coal mining and coal utility companies [66]to stave off Obama's Clean Power Plan.

RAGA (and Koch Industries) was one of Schimel's biggest campaign donors [67] in his 2014 Attorney General electoral race and hosted a fundraiser for him at its summer 2014 meeting [68], where Schimel also spoke.

“527 reports to the IRS also showed [RAGA] gave $300,000 to Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce, the state’s largest business group, which recently began airing television ads in support of GOPattorney general candidate Brad Schimel,” an October 2014 Wisconsin Democracy Campaign blog post explained [69].

Gaylord Nelson served as the founder of Earth Day and is the namesake for both the University of Wisconsin-Madison's Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies [12], as well as Gaylord Nelson State Park [13].

Tia Nelson, when she testified in front of congress, sat as co-chair of former Wisconsin Democratic Governor Jim Doyle's global warming task force. The task force — announced during Doyle's 2007 State of the State address [14] — published a report in July 2008 titled, “Wisconsin’s Strategy for Reducing Global Warming [15].”

That report was derided by environmentalists [16] for coming out in support of lifting the state's nuclear energy moratorium [17] and by corporate interests [18] and climate change deniers like State Policy Network [19] (SPN) “stink tank [20]” members Wisconsin Public Research Institute (WPRI) [21] and the Beacon Hill Institute [22], which co-authored a November 2009 report titled, “The Economics of Climate Change Proposals in Wisconsin [23].”

In audio of the discussion [24] preceding the 2-1 vote obtained by DeSmogBlog via an open records request, much of the 17-minute deliberation centered around the GOP Wisconsin treasurer Matt Adamczyk [25] peppering Nelson with questions about her time spent serving on the task force.

The ALEC Connection

As DeSmogBlog has previously reported, State Policy Network was a creation of [26] the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) [27], according to a document we found in the Tobacco Archives [28]. Perhaps it's no surprise, then, that ALEC — at least indirectly — acts as a character in this story as well.

One of the outspoken critics of the Doyle global warming task force back in 2009 was Mike Huebsch, who penned a December 2009 article titled, “Global Warming Legislation Unveiled after Months of Secret Meetings [29].” During Republican Governor Scott Walker's first term, Huebsch headed up Walker's Department of Administration, and in February he was named a commissioner for Wisconsin's Public Service Commission [30].

According to documents obtained by the Center for Media and Democracy (CMD), Huebsch served as the former state co-chairman of ALEC [31] back when he was a state representative. Other documents obtained by Common Cause show Huebsch also was a member of ALEC's Energy, Environment and Agriculture Task Force [32].

“From 2008 to 2010, Huebsch received over $5,000 in 'scholarships' from ALEC member corporations, and oversaw the distribution of over $78,000 in corporate-funded scholarships to state legislators,” a CMD report further details [33].

Also, before becoming state treasurer, Adamczyk worked as a staffer [34] for Wisconsin Republican Sen. Leah Vukmir [35], who according to CMD's research is an active ALEC member [36].

Clean Power Plan

In an April 8 press release, Scot Ross [37], executive director for One Wisconsin Now [38], pointed to another important connection at-play: Wisconsin [39]Attorney General Brad Schimel [39], who cast the deciding vote that banned doing any climate change- or global warming-related work while on the job at the Wisconsin Board of Commissioners of Public Lands.

“We’ve seen enough of Matt Adamczyk and his antics to not be surprised by his lack of intellectual heft,” said Ross, referring to February 2015 New York Times profile of Adamczyk [40]. “But you have to wonder what’s behind…Schimel’s support for a science denier’s gag order on a state employee.”

A possible answer to Ross' question is that it is part-and-parcel of his office's ongoing lawsuit, filed in concert with coal industry giant Murray Energy [41] (owned by climate change denier Robert “Bob” Murray [42]), against President Obama's proposed Clean Power Plan [43] regulating coal-fired power plants.

On March 25, Schimel signed off on a Motion to Intervene[44]in the ongoing lawsuit in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia spearheaded by Murray Energy back in June 2014 [45].

[46]

Image Credit: U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia [44]

That Motion to Intervene was granted by the Court [47] on April 8.

And as The New York Times revealed in a December 2014 investigation, the corporate-funded Republican Attorneys General Association (RAGA) [65] has worked in concert with coal mining and coal utility companies [66]to stave off Obama's Clean Power Plan.

RAGA (and Koch Industries) was one of Schimel's biggest campaign donors [67] in his 2014 Attorney General electoral race and hosted a fundraiser for him at its summer 2014 meeting [68], where Schimel also spoke.

“Stop Climate Censorship”

A petition published by Forecast the Facts has called on Gov. Walker to oppose climate censorship [70] in Wisconsin. But it appears unlikely to happen, given the pile of money that brought the people implementing the policy to where they are to begin with.

“The polluters and climate change deniers bought Brad Schimel and the Attorney General's office,” Ross said in an email to DeSmogBlog. “While they may have spent relatively little to buy a cheap politician, the price Wisconsin will pay as result of his actions will be enormous for years to come.”

Photo Credit: scott conner [71] | Shutterstock [72]

Tags:

Climate [73]

global warming [74]

Gov. Jim Doyle [75]

Gov. Doyle [76]

Governor Doyle [77]

Gov. James Doyle [78]

James Doyle Global Warming Task Force [79]

Wisconsin Global Warming Task Force [80]

Jim Doyle Global Warming Task Force [81]

Governor Walker [82]

Governor Scott Walker [83]

Gov. Walker [84]

Wisconsin Watch [85]

Wisconsin Petro State [86]

Wisconsin Dairy State [87]

State Treasurer Matt Adamczyk [88]

Wisconsin’s Board of Commissioners of Public Lands [89]

Wisconsin’s Board of Commissioners [90]

Matt Adamczyk [91]

Bob Murray [92]

Doug LaFollette [93]

Robert Murray [42]

Attorney General Brad Schimel [94]

climate change [95]

wisconsin [96]

Brad Schimel [97]

Scot Ross [98]

murray energy [41]

coal [99]

Obama Clean Power Plan [100]

Clean Power Plan [101]

Obama Climate Action Plan [102]

climate action plan [103]

climate denial [104]

climate skepticism [105]

wisconsin open records act [106]

tia nelson [107]

gaylord nelson [108]

U.S. Sen. Gaylord Nelson (D-WI) [109]

Governor Gaylord Nelson [110]

Gaylord Nelson State Park [111]

Gaylord Nelson Institute [112]

Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies [113]

UW-Madison [114]

university of wisconsin [115]

University of Wisconsin-Madison [116]

One Wisconsin Now [117]

Source URL: http://www.desmogblog.com/2015/04/10/wisconsin-climate-change-gag-order-industy-tied-broader-attack

Links:

[1] http://bcpl.wisconsin.gov/category.asp?linkcatid=2830&linkid=1442&locid=145

[2] http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-04-08/for-some-wisconsin-state-workers-climate-change-isn-t-something-you-can-talk-about

[3] http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/apr/07/wisconsin-republicans-climate-change

[4] http://www.motherjones.com/blue-marble/2015/04/another-state-agency-just-banned-words-climate-change

[5] http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/wisconsin-ban-climate-change-public-lands

[6] http://www.desmogblog.com/2014/07/08/dairyland-petrostate-wisconsin-oil-rail-routes-published-first-time

[7] http://democrats.energycommerce.house.gov/sites/default/files/documents/Testimony-Tia-Nelson-FC-ACES-2009-4-24.pdf

[8] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaylord_Nelson

[9] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Clean_Energy_and_Security_Act

[10] http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Waxman-Markey_Climate_Bill

[11] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oR3ELe4qPAU

[12] http://www.nelson.wisc.edu/

[13] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Governor_Nelson_State_Park

[14] http://web.archive.org/web/20070212235424/http://www.wisgov.state.wi.us/journal_media_detail.asp?locid=19&prid=2504

[15] http://web.archive.org/web/20081114002623/http://dnr.wi.gov/environmentprotect/gtfgw/documents/Final_Report.pdf

[16] http://www.wisdc.org/pr090308.php

[17] http://www.prwatch.org/news/2009/03/8291/wisconsins-balance-power-campaign-repeal-nuclear-moratorium

[18] http://www.michaelbest.com/files/upload/Business-Opposition-Letter.pdf

[19] http://www.desmogblog.com/directory/vocabulary/7681

[20] http://stinktanks.org/

[21] http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Wisconsin_Policy_Research_Institute

[22] http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/dec/05/state-conservative-groups-assault-education-health-tax

[23] http://www.wpri.org/WPRI/Reports/2009/The-Economics-of-Climate-Change-Proposals-in-Wisconsin.htm

[24] http://www.desmogblog.com/sites/beta.desmogblog.com/files/TeleconferenceRecording.mp3

[25] http://www.statetreasury.wisconsin.gov/section.asp?linkid=1380&locid=155

[26] http://www.desmogblog.com/2013/12/09/stink-tanks-historical-records-reveal-state-policy-network-created-alec

[27] http://www.desmogblog.com/directory/vocabulary/6907

[28] http://desmogblog.com/sites/beta.desmogblog.com/files/Special%20Report%20-%20Burgeoning%20Conservative%20Think%20Tanks.pdf

[29] http://www.couleeconservatives.com/environment/mike-huebsch-writes-global-warming-legislation-unveiled-after-months-secret-meetings

[30] http://fox6now.com/2015/02/16/governor-walker-shifting-staff-michael-huebsch-moves-from-doa-to-public-service-commission/

[31] http://alecexposed.org/w/images/7/72/ALEC_State_Chairmen_Exposed.pdf

[32] http://www.commoncause.org/issues/more-democracy-reforms/alec/whistleblower-complaint/original-complaint/National_ALEC_Exhibit_4_EEA_2010_SNPS.pdf

[33] http://alecexposed.org/w/images/c/cd/ALEC_Exposed_in_Wisconsin.pdf

[34] http://patch.com/wisconsin/brookfield-wi/brookfield-republican-matt-adamczyk-running-for-state-assembly

[35] http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Leah_Vukmir

[36] http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Wisconsin_ALEC_Politicians

[37] http://www.onewisconsinnow.org/about/

[38] http://www.onewisconsinnow.org

[39] http://www.doj.state.wi.us/ag/biography

[40] http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/02/us/wisconsins-treasurer-wants-to-cut-needless-workers-starting-with-himself.html?_r=1

[41] http://www.desmogblog.com/directory/vocabulary/1187

[42] http://www.desmogblog.com/directory/vocabulary/14243

[43] http://www2.epa.gov/carbon-pollution-standards/clean-power-plan-proposed-rule

[44] http://www.desmogblog.com/sites/beta.desmogblog.com/files/Wisconsin%20Motion%20to%20Intervene.pdf

[45] http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2014/06/19/3450752/murray-energy-sues-epa-coal/

[46] http://www.desmogblog.com/sites/beta.desmogblog.com/files/Wisconsin Motion to Intervene.pdf

[47] http://www.desmogblog.com/sites/beta.desmogblog.com/files/Wisconsin%20Granted%20Motion%20to%20Intervene_0.pdf

[48] http://host.madison.com/news/local/govt-and-politics/election-matters/scott-walker-s-time-the-governor-is-running-for-president/article_8e01cc24-7062-5b3a-8083-f8fe3f2d9862.html

[49] http://www.desmogblog.com/sites/beta.desmogblog.com/files/Walker%20Opposes%20Clean%20Power%20Plan.pdf

[50] http://www.desmogblog.com/sites/beta.desmogblog.com/files/PSC%2C%20DNR%20Oppose%20Clean%20Power%20Plan.pdf

[51] http://wisconsinwatch.org/2015/04/wisconsin-dnr-mulls-dissolving-science-bureau/

[52] http://www.doj.state.wi.us/media-center/2014-news-releases/november-25-2014

[53] http://www.hamilton-consulting.com/andrew-cook

[54] http://www.hamilton-consulting.com

[55] https://www.fed-soc.org/experts/detail/andrew-c-cook

[56] http://desmogblog.com/directory/vocabulary/5187

[57] http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Federalist_Society_for_Law_and_Public_Policy_Studies

[58] https://lobbying.wi.gov/Who/PrincipalInformation/2013REG/Information/5620?tab=Lobbyists

[59] https://lobbying.wi.gov/Who/PrincipalInformation/2009REG/Information/3681?tab=Lobbyists

[60] https://lobbying.wi.gov/Who/PrincipalInformation/2013REG/Information/5712?tab=Lobbyists

[61] https://lobbying.wi.gov/Who/PrincipalInformation/2013REG/Information/5611?tab=Lobbyists

[62] https://lobbying.wi.gov/Who/PrincipalInformation/2013REG/Information/5779?tab=Lobbyists

[63] http://www.desmogblog.com/sites/beta.desmogblog.com/files/Andrew%20Cook%20-%20LinkedIn.pdf

[64] http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Pacific_Legal_Foundation

[65] http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/10/28/us/1-RAGA-as-a-Money-Machine.html

[66] http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/07/us/politics/energy-firms-in-secretive-alliance-with-attorneys-general.html

[67] http://wisdc.org/index.php?module=wisdc.websiteforms&cmd=campaigncontributions&office=AG&candidate=104385&year=2014&from=2013-01-01&to=2014-10-20&qty=100&p=12&pac_qty=100

[68] http://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/1339571/1-raga.pdf

[69] http://blog.wisdc.org/2014/10/ultrawealthy-pump-38-million-in-90-days.html

[70] http://act.forecastthefacts.org/sign/censorship_wisconsin/?source=twitter

[71] http://www.shutterstock.com/gallery-2526547p1.html

[72] http://www.shutterstock.com/cat.mhtml?lang=en&language=en&ref_site=photo&search_source=search_form&version=llv1&anyorall=all&safesearch=1&use_local_boost=1&search_tracking_id=Q50pScb0t1DYxKagjSoecg&searchterm=gag&show_color_wheel=1&orient=&commercial_ok=&media_type=images&search_cat=&searchtermx=&photographer_name=&people_gender=&people_age=&people_ethnicity=&people_number=&color=&page=1&inline=240954550

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[101] http://www.desmogblog.com/directory/vocabulary/19055

[102] http://www.desmogblog.com/directory/vocabulary/13016

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[104] http://www.desmogblog.com/directory/vocabulary/3062

[105] http://www.desmogblog.com/directory/vocabulary/7453

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[118] http://www.desmogblog.com/2015/04/10/wisconsin-climate-change-gag-order-industy-tied-broader-attack