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Defeated Wisconsin justice slams far-left opponent’s ‘dishonorable, despicable campaign’ GOP Senate digs in

April 6, 2023 | | Print Article

The Democrat Party just secured a major win in Wisconsin where a far-leftist just won a seat on the Wisconsin state Supreme Court, and the implications could be huge.

For one, Judge Janet Protasiewicz’s victory means the state Supreme Court leans to the left for the first time in 15 years.

For another, her victory could open the door to major statewide policy changes.

“Many progressives now hope [the] shift in the balance of power on the Badger State’s high court will allow Democrats to accomplish through the courts in Wisconsin what they have been able to enact legislatively in nearby Michigan, where Right-to-Work law was recently repealed, meaning workers can once again be forced to join a union as a condition of employment, and where prevailing wage mandates, which inflate the taxpayer cost of state-backed infrastructure projects, have been reinstated,” Forbes notes.

Protasiewicz’s victory could also affect things on the national level.

“That’s because Protasiewicz’ win puts the reconfigured Wisconsin Supreme Court in a position to overturn congressional and state legislative maps drawn by the Republican-run Wisconsin Senate and Assembly. Many Democrats are now hoping to replicate in Wisconsin, what a Democratic-led state supreme court has done in North Carolina for the past decade,” according to Forbes.

The good news is that Republicans are planning to fight back. In fact, the fighting back already started immediately after Protasiewicz’s win, when her opponent, Dan Kelly, slammed her for running a sleazy campaign.

“This was the most deeply deceitful, dishonorable, despicable campaign I have ever seen run for the courts. It was truly beneath contempt. And I say this not because we did not prevail. I do not say this because of the rancid slanders which were launched against me,” he said.

“My opponent is a serial liar. She has disregarded judicial ethics. She has demeaned the judiciary with her behavior. This is the future that we have to look forward to in Wisconsin. We could have the rule of law, or the rule of Janet. The people of Wisconsin chose the rule of Janet’s,” he added.

Listen:

How sleazy was her campaign? According to state Rep. Janel Brandtjen, Protasiewicz’s allies at a group called Wisconsin Takes Action offered payments of up to $250 “to sway their friends to vote for [her] through (sic) an app called Empower.”

“Wisconsin Takes Action set up an Empower app to attract Wisconsin residents to the polls, vote for Janet Protasiewicz for Supreme Court Judge, and reward them with gift cards for taking action,” Brandtjen reported on her website back in February.

“Downloading the app pays voters $30. Providing 75 names with phone numbers or emails in the app pays $60. Each time users reach out to their friends to early vote, make a plan to vote, or make contact on Election Day, they will get paid in gift cards on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays,” she added.

Her report predictably received zero attention from Wisconsin’s far-left-aligned press.

The great irony of Protasiewicz’s victory is that the Democrats’ win in the state Supreme Court was matched by the Republicans’ victory in a state Senate race.

“A GOP win in another Wisconsin race this week — the state Senate’s 8th District — gave Republicans a supermajority in the chamber. With that power, Republicans there will have the ability to pursue removal proceedings of certain elected officials if the Assembly votes to impeach them,” according to NBC News.

And it just so happens that in the closing days of his campaign, the Republican who just won the Senate race, Dan Knodl, had reportedly said that he would consider impeaching Protasiewicz from her prior post on the Milwaukee County Circuit Court.

“Now, with Protasiewicz’s victory Tuesday, the comments quickly spurred concerns among Democrats in the state that Republicans in the Legislature would make a move against Protasiewicz’s seat in the Supreme Court,” NBC News notes.

What remains unclear though is whether they’d be successful in impeaching her. Some say they wouldn’t.

Take the Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism:

“[A] legislative effort to oust a justice would steer Wisconsin politics into nearly uncharted waters. Lawmakers have impeached just one judge in state history — in 1853 (and the Senate didn’t convict) — and legal experts call a modern-day removal under the current set of facts unlikely, citing finer details of the process,” the center reported Thursday.

The problem, according to the center, is that impeachment isn’t supposed to be used to overturn elections.

“The Assembly may impeach an elected official by a majority vote based on specific reasons: corrupt conduct in office or for the commission of a crime or misdemeanor,” according to a Wisconsin Legislative Council memo.

Vivek Saxena
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