MADISON, Wis. (WXPR) — The head of an ethics and fundraising watchdog group is asking five county District Attorneys to intervene in the John Doe probe case tossed by the Wisconsin Supreme Court last week. The Wisconsin Democracy Campaign, which often supports Democrat-supported issues, is not satisfied with two Supreme Court decisions tossing out the John Doe probes against Governor Scott Walker.
For a second time, the court rejected arguments in the probe whether Governor Walker’s campaign improperly became associated with advocacy groups during the 2012 recall election. They dismissed the case and also Special Prosecutor Francis Schmitz of his prosecutorial authority.
Matthew Rothschild from Wisconsin Democracy Campaign wrote a letter to prosecutors in Milwaukee, Dane, Columbia,Dodge, and Iowa counties to become a party to the case so it can be appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court. He says without the Special Prosecutor, there is no one to make the appeal. “We’ll have no ability to limit campaign contributions or to require disclosure because now the richest individuals in the state or in the country, and the biggest corporations could give tens of millions of dollars to some outside group, then the candidate can go work with that outside group.” Rothschild says the public would never know…if the ruling stands….who contributed to the outside groups and how that influenced the political candidate. The Wisconsin high court did say in the ruling the District Attorneys who were involved before you petition to be included.
Last week in Antigo, Governor Walker said the ruling affirmed he did nothing wrong. “I said for years, that in the end, we thought it would end the way it did, that we believed that we were on the right side of the law, and now we’ve had the Supreme Court validate that twice, and hopefully, it’s time the State of Wisconsin can move forward.”
The Wisconsin Democracy Campaign has additional comments on it’s website, here.
by Ken Krall, WXPR
