Wisconsin GOP Assembly leader backs off threat to impeach Supreme Court judge over redistricting

Posted on December 21, 2023 by Charles Jay

Almost immediately after Janet Protasiewicz was elected to Wisconsin’s Supreme Court last April, flipping it to a liberal majority, Republican leaders threatened to impeach her if she didn’t recuse herself from a case challenging the state’s heavily gerrymandered electoral maps. This was because after being seated on the court in August, Protasiewicz refused to recuse herself from the Democratic-backed lawsuit seeking to throw out Republican-drawn electoral maps, drawing even more impeachment threats from Republicans.

Protasiewicz’s victory had resulted in a 4-3 liberal majority on the court, ending a 15-year period in which conservative justices held control. But now faced with intense backlash, Robin Vos, the Republican leader of Wisconsin’s Assembly who threatened possible impeachment of Protasiewicz in August, has pivoted and now says that such a move is “super unlikely,” The Associated Press reported.

The AP wrote:

When asked in an interview Wednesday if he would move to impeach Protasiewicz if she orders new maps to be drawn, Vos said, “I think it’s very unlikely.”

“It’s one of the tools that we have in our toolbox that we could use at any time,” Vos said of impeachment. “Is it going to be used? I think it’s super unlikely.”

However, Vos refused to rule it out.

“We don’t know what could happen, right?” he said. “There could be a scandal where something occurs. I don’t know.”

Wisconsin’s Democratic Party Chair Ben Wikler posted this reaction on X, formerly known as Twitter:

The Wisconsin GOP has made official what’s long been clear: they’ve pulled back the impeachment threat. Why did this happen? Because you rose up in outrage and made clear that such an abuse of the constitution would be politically catastrophic—for them. https://t.co/f20bV6dd9c
— Ben Wikler (@benwikler) December 21, 2023

In September, Wikler announced that the state Democratic Party was launching a $4 million effort to to pressure Republicans to back down from impeaching Protasiewicz. At the time he said the Republicans were “holding a political nuclear football” and engaging in “political extortion.”

According to Associated Press analysis, Wisconsin’s Assembly districts rank among the most gerrymandered in the U.S., with Republicans routinely winning far more seats than would be expected based on their average share of the vote in statewide elections. Joe Biden flipped Wisconsin in the 2020 presidential election, defeating Donald Trump by a narrow margin of 49.6% to 48.9%, a difference of 20,000 votes. In April 2023, with abortion rights a key issue, Protasiewicz defeated Republican Dan Kelly by 55.5% to 45.5%, a margin of nearly 200,000 votes.

Yet, as the AP pointed out, the legislative electoral maps drawn by the Republican-controlled Legislature in 2011 cemented the party’s majorities. Republicans now control the Assembly by a 64-35 margin, and hold a 22-11 supermajority in the Senate. Last year, the GOP approved maps that were similar to the existing ones.

In October, the state Supreme Court agreed to hear the legal challenge to the Republican-drawn maps. Election lawyer Marc Elias’ group, Democracy Docket, wrote on its website:

The petitioners in Clarke v. Wisconsin Elections Commission allege that the Wisconsin state Assembly and Senate maps are extreme partisan gerrymanders that unduly favor Republicans in violation of the state constitution.

The petition notes that for the past two decades, Wisconsin’s legislative plans have been among the most gerrymandered in the country: “In 2012, Republicans won 48.6% of the statewide vote, which yielded a remarkable 60 assembly seats. … When Democrats received roughly the same vote share, they carried 36 assembly seats. … From the 2012 through the 2020 elections, Republicans never fell below 60 seats—winning up to 64, or nearly two-thirds of the seats. In 2018, Republicans won 63 seats with just 44.8% of the vote.”

Last month, the state Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the redistricting lawsuit and is expected to issue its decision by early 2024. The plaintiffs are asking that all 132 state lawmakers be required to stand for election in 2024 under newly redrawn maps. Under current law, all Wisconsin Assembly members and about half the state Senate are up for election next year.

The wheels came off the Republicans’ threat to impeach Protasiewicz in October. That’s when two of three former conservative Wisconsin Supreme Court justices asked by Vos to investigate the possibility of impeachment told the Assembly leader it was not warranted. Former Justice David Prosser wrote to Vos:

“To sum up my views, there should be no effort to impeach Justice Protasiewicz on anything we know now. Impeachment is so serious, severe, and rare that it should not be considered unless the subject has committed a crime, or the subject has committed indisputable ‘corrupt conduct’ while ‘in office.’”

Article VII of the Wisconsin Constitution reserves impeachment for “corrupt conduct in office, or for crimes and misdemeanors.”

The Republicans’ threats to Protasiewicz were based on political statements that she made while campaigning for the seat in which she referred to the legislative maps as “rigged.” Republicans claimed that this constituted a predetermination of how she would rule on a case challenging the maps. In early October, Protasiewicz rejected calls from Republican justices to recuse herself from redistricting cases. The AP reported:

Protasiewicz said that while stating her opinion about the maps during the campaign, she never made a promise or pledge about how she would rule on the cases.

“I will set aside my opinions and decide cases based on the law,” she wrote. “There will surely be many cases in which I reach results that I personally dislike. That is what it means to be a judge.”

Democracy Docket also said that Republican lawmakers also took issue with the financial contributions made by the Democratic Party of Wisconsin to her campaign. However, Jay Heck, director of the nonpartisan group Common Cause of Wisconsin called the Republicans’ “selected outrage” hypocritical because all but one of the seven sitting justices had accepted contributions from a political party.

The prospect of actually removing Protasiewicz from the court also became a less attractive option. That’s because if she were impeached by the Assembly and convicted by the Senate, Democratic Gov. Tony Evers would now get to name her replacement rather than have to call a special election, which would have been required if she had been removed prior to Dec. 1, the AP reported.

And it’s good news for abortion rights activists that Protasiewicz remains in place to keep the liberal 4-3 majority intact. On Tuesday, a Republican district attorney appealed a court ruling that determined that an 1849 Wisconsin law does not ban abortions, the AP reported. That decision cleared the way for abortions to resume in the state. The appeal filed by Sheboygan County District Attorney Joel Urmanski is likely to ultimately be decided by the state Supreme Court. And Protasiewicz is a supporter of abortion rights.

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Wisconsin GOP Assembly leader backs off threat to impeach Supreme Court judge over redistricting

Posted on December 21, 2023 by Charles Jay

The AP wrote:

When asked in an interview Wednesday if he would move to impeach Protasiewicz if she orders new maps to be drawn, Vos said, “I think it’s very unlikely.”

“It’s one of the tools that we have in our toolbox that we could use at any time,” Vos said of impeachment. “Is it going to be used? I think it’s super unlikely.”

However, Vos refused to rule it out.

“We don’t know what could happen, right?” he said. “There could be a scandal where something occurs. I don’t know.”

Wisconsin’s Democratic Party Chair Ben Wikler posted this reaction on X, formerly known as Twitter:

The Wisconsin GOP has made official what’s long been clear: they’ve pulled back the impeachment threat. Why did this happen? Because you rose up in outrage and made clear that such an abuse of the constitution would be politically catastrophic—for them. https://t.co/f20bV6dd9c
— Ben Wikler (@benwikler) December 21, 2023

In October, the state Supreme Court agreed to hear the legal challenge to the Republican-drawn maps. Election lawyer Marc Elias’ group, Democracy Docket, wrote on its website:

The petitioners in Clarke v. Wisconsin Elections Commission allege that the Wisconsin state Assembly and Senate maps are extreme partisan gerrymanders that unduly favor Republicans in violation of the state constitution.

The petition notes that for the past two decades, Wisconsin’s legislative plans have been among the most gerrymandered in the country: “In 2012, Republicans won 48.6% of the statewide vote, which yielded a remarkable 60 assembly seats. … When Democrats received roughly the same vote share, they carried 36 assembly seats. … From the 2012 through the 2020 elections, Republicans never fell below 60 seats—winning up to 64, or nearly two-thirds of the seats. In 2018, Republicans won 63 seats with just 44.8% of the vote.”

“To sum up my views, there should be no effort to impeach Justice Protasiewicz on anything we know now. Impeachment is so serious, severe, and rare that it should not be considered unless the subject has committed a crime, or the subject has committed indisputable ‘corrupt conduct’ while ‘in office.’”

Article VII of the Wisconsin Constitution reserves impeachment for “corrupt conduct in office, or for crimes and misdemeanors.”

Protasiewicz said that while stating her opinion about the maps during the campaign, she never made a promise or pledge about how she would rule on the cases.

“I will set aside my opinions and decide cases based on the law,” she wrote. “There will surely be many cases in which I reach results that I personally dislike. That is what it means to be a judge.”

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Wisconsin Republican leader won’t back down from impeachment threat against Supreme Court justice

Posted on October 13, 2023 by Associated Press

The Republican leader of Wisconsin’s Assembly refused to back down Thursday from possibly impeaching a newly elected liberal state Supreme Court justice over her refusal to step aside in a redistricting case, even after two former conservative justices advised him against the unprecedented move.

Assembly Speaker Robin Vos originally threatened to impeach Justice Janet Protasiewicz if she did not recuse from the redistricting challenge, which is backed by Democrats seeking to throw out Republican-drawn electoral maps. But Protasiewicz said last week she's staying on the case.

Now, Vos is tying possible impeachment to how she rules on the case, emphasizing the importance of following past precedent.

“If they decide to inject their own political bias inside the process and not follow the law, we have the ability to go to the U.S. Supreme Court,” Vos said, “and we also have the ability to hold her accountable to the voters of Wisconsin.”

Oral arguments in the redistricting case are set for Nov. 21. A ruling likely won’t come until after the Dec. 1 deadline for calling a special election to replace Protasiewicz, if she were removed from office or resigned. That means Democratic Gov. Tony Evers would appoint her replacement, who would almost certainly be another liberal.

Wisconsin Democratic Party Chair Ben Wikler said Vos's comments are a signal that Republicans are backing off from impeaching Protasiewicz “and moving the goal posts.” He called the impeachment threat “an outrageous attempt at political extortion.”

“Time will tell if it’s just an attempt to save face," Wikler said. "But right now, it’s a climb-down.”

Vos first floated the possibility of impeachment in August after Protasiewicz called the Republican-drawn legislative boundary maps “rigged” and “unfair” during her campaign. Impeachment has drawn bipartisan opposition and two former conservative Wisconsin Supreme Court justices, asked by Vos to investigate the possibility, told him in the past week it was not warranted. Vos refused to say what advice he got from the third retired justice.

Wisconsin’s Assembly districts rank among the most gerrymandered nationally, with Republicans routinely winning far more seats than would be expected based on their average share of the vote, according to an Associated Press analysis.

The legislative electoral maps drawn by the Republican-controlled Legislature in 2011 cemented the party’s majorities, which now stand at 64-35 in the Assembly and a 22-11 supermajority in the Senate. Republicans adopted maps last year that were similar to the existing ones.

The lawsuit before the state Supreme Court asks that all 132 state lawmakers be up for election in 2024 in newly drawn districts.

Vos also said Protasiewicz’s acceptance of nearly $10 million from the Wisconsin Democratic Party would unduly influence her ruling.

Protasiewicz last week rejected those arguments, noting that other justices have accepted campaign cash and not recused from cases. She also noted that she never promised or pledged to rule on the redistricting lawsuit in any way. A state judiciary disciplinary panel has rejected several complaints against Protasiewicz that alleged she violated the judicial code of ethics with comments she made during the campaign.

Other justices, both conservative and liberal, have spoken out in the past on issues that could come before the court, although not always during their run for office like Protasiewicz did. Current justices have also accepted campaign cash from political parties and others with an interest in court cases and haven’t recused themselves. But none of them has faced threats of impeachment.

Sign the petition: Wisconsin believes in democracy. Do not impeach Justice Janet

A member of the secret panel studying Wisconsin Supreme Court justice’s impeachment backed her rival

Posted on September 15, 2023 by Associated Press

One of the former Wisconsin Supreme Court justices tapped to investigate impeaching newly elected Justice Janet Protasiewicz for taking Democratic Party money accepted donations from the state Republican Party when he was on the court.

The former justice, Republican David Prosser, gave $500 to the conservative candidate who lost to Protasiewicz, did not recuse from cases involving a law he helped pass as a lawmaker and was investigated after a physical altercation with a liberal justice.

Prosser is one of three former justices tapped by the Republican Assembly speaker to investigate the criteria for taking the unprecedented step of impeaching a current justice. Speaker Robin Vos has floated impeachment because Protasiewicz accepted nearly $10 million from the Wisconsin Democratic Party and said during the campaign that heavily gerrymandered GOP-drawn legislative electoral maps were “unfair” and “rigged.”

The impeachment threat comes after Protasiewicz’s win this spring handed liberals a majority on the court for the first time in 15 years, which bolstered Democratic hopes it would throw out the Republican maps, legalize abortion and chip away at Republican laws enacted over the past decade-plus.

It also comes at the same time that Assembly Republicans passed a sweeping redistricting reform bill Vos described as an “off ramp” to impeachment and Senate Republicans voted to fire the state's nonpartisan elections director. Both moves take on heightened importance in Wisconsin, one of a handful of swing states where four of the past six presidential elections have been decided by less than a point.

Vos won’t say who he’s chosen for the secret, three-judge impeachment review panel, but Prosser confirmed to The Associated Press that Vos asked him to participate. None of the other eight living former justices, six of whom are conservatives, have told the AP they have been picked. Justices are officially nonpartisan in Wisconsin, but in recent years the political parties have backed certain candidates. Others, like Prosser, formerly served in partisan positions.

A former liberal justice, Louis Butler, said he was not asked. Four former conservative justices — Jon Wilcox, Dan Kelly, 7th U.S. Circuit Court Chief Judge Diane Sykes and Louis Ceci — told the AP they were not asked.

Ceci, 96, is the oldest living former justice. He served on the court from 1982 to 1993 and served one term as a Republican in the state Assembly in the 1960s.

Ceci, interviewed at his suburban Milwaukee home in a retirement high-rise, said he doesn’t know anything about the impeachment threats Protasiewicz faces beyond what he reads in newspapers. Vos has not approached him about serving on the panel, he said.

A seventh former justice, Janine Geske, told the Wisconsin State Journal she was not asked. Vos said former Justice Michael Gableman, whom Vos fired from leading an investigation into the 2020 election, was not on it.

The most recently retired justice, conservative Patience Roggensack, declined to comment to the AP.

“I can’t talk to you right now,” she said Thursday, adding that she was on her way to a college class before hanging up.

Roggensack and Prosser voted to enact a rule allowing justices to sit on cases involving campaign donors. In 2017, a year after Prosser left the court, Roggensack voted to reject a call from 54 retired justices and judges to enact stricter recusal rules.

Roggensack, in 2020, sided with the conservative minority in a ruling that fell one vote short of overturning President Joe Biden’s victory in the state. And she endorsed Dan Kelly, the conservative opponent to Protasiewicz in this year’s election. Prosser donated $500 to Kelly, who replaced Prosser on the court after he retired.

Prosser served on the Supreme Court from 1998 to 2016 and also spent 18 years before that as a Republican member of the Assembly — two years as speaker.

There were numerous times during Prosser’s years on the court where he did not recuse himself from cases involving issues he had voted on as a member of the Legislature.

Prosser did recuse himself from cases involving the constitutionality of a cap on medical malpractice damages because he was speaker of the Assembly when the cap was instituted. But in 2004 he changed course and authored the majority opinion upholding the law he helped pass. He dissented from a 2005 Supreme Court ruling overturning the law.

Prosser also refused a request to recuse in 2015 from considering three cases related to an investigation into then-Gov. Scott Walker and conservative groups that supported him. The groups in question had spent $3.3 million to help elect Prosser in 2011.

He defended hearing the cases, saying that because the money was spent four years earlier, enough time had passed to make them irrelevant.

Prosser then voted with the majority to shut down the investigation.

Prosser was also embroiled in one the court’s most contentious periods in 2011, accused by a liberal justice of attempting to choke her. Impeachment was never raised as a possibility, even though police investigated but no charges were filed. The Wisconsin Judicial Commission recommended the court discipline him but nothing happened because the court lacked a quorum when three justices recused.

In 2016, Prosser received $25,000 of in-kind contributions from the Wisconsin Republican Party. Less than three weeks later he resigned with nearly three years left on his term.

Vos said Prosser’s past wouldn’t affect his ability to fairly offer advice on how to proceed.

“First of all, all he is doing is giving advice on whether or not someone ought to recuse and the criteria for impeachment,” Vos said. “That has nothing to do with what happened before when he was on the Supreme Court.”

Prosser said the charge given to him by Vos was investigating “whether there’s a legitimate reason for impeaching” Protasiewicz.

When asked whether he thinks the panel should include liberals, Prosser said, “I’m really not going to answer that question.”

“I really don’t know what the process is going to be, who’s going to be doing the writing,” Prosser said. “I just really don’t know.”

No matter who is on the impeachment review panel, Democrats say the process is a joke.

“The entire concept of having a secret panel deliberating in secret to advise an Assembly speaker on an unconstitutional impeachment on a justice who has yet to rule on a case is a farce,” said Wisconsin Democratic Party Chair Ben Wikler. “This is a charade.”

Vos said impeachment may be warranted if Protasiewicz doesn’t step down from hearing two Democratic-backed redistricting lawsuits seeking to undo Republican-drawn legislative maps.

Vos argues that Protasiewicz has prejudged the cases. She never said how she would rule on any lawsuit.

Under the Wisconsin Constitution, impeachment is reserved for “corrupt conduct in office or for the commission of a crime or misdemeanor.”

It is up to each justice to decide whether recusal in a case is warranted, and the conservative majority of the court adopted a rule saying that justices don’t have to recuse if they accepted money from parties arguing a case. Other current justices have also been outspoken on hot-button issues before they joined the court and all but one have taken money from political parties.

When asked Thursday if the panel would include liberals, Vos dodged the question.

“I’m trying to have people who are respected as smart,” Vos said. “And I think that you will find very quickly that the people that we asked are both of those categories. Hopefully they come back to us with their recommendations so that the Legislature has even more good information to act on whether or not it’s required for us to proceed with some kind of impeachment proceedings."

Wisconsin Democrats combat impeachment of court justice with $4M effort

Posted on September 6, 2023 by Associated Press

The Wisconsin Democratic Party on Wednesday launched a $4 million effort to pressure Republicans to back down from impeaching a new liberal state Supreme Court justice being targeted after she criticized GOP-drawn legislative electoral maps and spoke in favor of abortion rights.

After investing nearly $10 million in electing Justice Janet Protasiewicz, the effort is meant to protect what Democrats hailed as a major political victory. The judge's election tipped the balance of power in the state Supreme Court, giving Democrats the upper hand in state's fights over abortion and redistricting.

“Republicans are holding a political nuclear football,” Wisconsin Democratic Party Chair Ben Wikler said in reference to impeachment.

The effort will include digital and television ads, in-person voter outreach, and a website tracking where every Republican lawmaker stands on impeachment.

Protasiewicz is part of a 4-3 liberal majority on Wisconsin's Supreme Court. The escalating fight over her seat has implications for the 2024 presidential election in the battleground state. In 2020, the conservative-controlled Supreme Court came within one vote of overturning President Joe Biden's win in the state. More fights over election rules that will be in place for the 2024 election are pending, and any disputes over the winner could be decided once again by the state Supreme Court.

Protasiewicz began her 10-year term in August after winning her election by 11-points in April, aided with nearly $10 million from the Wisconsin Democratic Party. During the campaign, Protasiewicz spoke in favor of abortion rights and called GOP-drawn maps “unfair” and “rigged.”

Protasiewicz never promised to rule one way or another on redistricting or abortion cases.

Her win gave liberals a majority on the court for the first time in 15 years, boosting hopes among Democrats that it will overturn the state's 1849 abortion ban, throw out the Republican maps and possibly undo a host of Republican priorities.

Unable to defeat Protasiewicz in the election, Republican lawmakers are now talking about impeaching her because of her comments during the race and her acceptance of the money from the Democratic Party.

Republicans have raised impeachment as a possibility if Protasiewicz does not recuse herself from consideration of two redistricting lawsuits filed in her first week in office last month. The GOP-controlled Legislature asked for her to step aside from the cases.

Protasiewicz on Tuesday gave attorneys until Sept. 18 to react to the fact that the Wisconsin Judicial Commission, which investigates complaints against judges, dismissed complaints against her alleging her campaign comments on redistricting violated the state judicial code.

A lawsuit in a county court seeking to overturn Wisconsin’s 1849 abortion ban was filed before Protasiewicz won the election. That case is expected to eventually reach the Wisconsin Supreme Court.

Wikler said Tuesday that impeaching Protasiewicz would be “an absolute political, moral and constitutional disaster" that would “rewrite our system of government, to rip away what the founders intended, to rip away the principle of co-equal branches of government and replace it with an autocracy of the Legislature.”

He said the state party was joining with other as-yet-unnamed groups in a $4 million public relations campaign to pressure Republicans to back down.

Wisconsin Republican Party Chair Brian Schimming dismissed the effort, saying Democrats were trying to "divert attention away from the hyper-partisan and wildly inappropriate prejudgements of Janet Protasiewicz.”

The legislative electoral maps drawn by the Republican-controlled Legislature in 2011 cemented the party’s majorities, which now stand at 65-34 in the Assembly and a 22-11 supermajority in the Senate. It would take only 50 votes to impeach. It takes 22 votes to convict in the Senate, the exact number of seats Republicans hold.

If the Assembly impeaches her, Protasiewicz would be barred from any duties as a justice until the Senate acted. That could effectively stop her from voting on redistricting without removing her from office and creating a vacancy that Democratic Gov. Tony Evers would fill.

If there is a vacancy before December, that would trigger another Supreme Court election on the same date as Wisconsin's presidential primary in April 2024.

The far-right justices on Wisconsin's Supreme Court just can't handle the fact that liberals now have the majority for the first time in 15 years, so they're in the throes of an ongoing meltdown—and their tears are delicious. On this week's episode of "The Downballot," co-hosts David Nir and David Beard drink up all the schadenfreude they can handle as they puncture conservative claims that their progressive colleagues are "partisan hacks" (try looking in the mirror) or are breaking the law (try reading the state constitution). Elections do indeed have consequences!

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