The 'level of nastiness' in Wisconsin Supreme Court race makes a case against electing judges: columnist

06 April 2023

Although former President Donald Trump's arraignment and arrest dominated news coverage on Tuesday, April 4, there were other important stories as well that day. And one of them was liberal Milwaukee County Circuit Court Judge Janet Protasiewicz's double-digit victory over far-right MAGA Republican Dan Kelly in the Wisconsin Supreme Court race.

Protasiewicz made the election a referendum on abortion rights, slamming Kelly as an "extremist" who would help enforce a pre-Civil War abortion ban in Wisconsin that goes back to 1849. The judge also attacked Kelly as an anti-democracy ally of the MAGA Republicans who tried to overturn the 2020 presidential election results in her state.

Technically, the race was nonpartisan. But Protasiewicz's campaign received a lot of donations from Democrats, while MAGA Republicans and the Religious Right rallied around Kelly. Abortion rights were clearly on the ballot in the Wisconsin Supreme Court race, and they won by 11 percent.

Washington Post opinion columnist Ruth Marcus is not sorry to see a liberal enjoy a double-digit win in a key swing state like Wisconsin. Nonetheless, she has a problem with state supreme court justices being chosen via elections rather than nominations.

"Electing judges is a terrible way to create a judiciary that is independent and trusted by the public to rule impartially," Marcus argues in a column published on April 6. "Wisconsin is one of 22 states where judges on the highest court are only chosen through election. Its elections are technically nonpartisan, but the absence of a party label fooled precisely no one. Since his failure to be reelected to the (Wisconsin) Supreme Court in 2020, Kelly has been paid nearly $120,000 by the Wisconsin Republican Party and the Republican National Committee to work on election issues, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported. Protasiewicz, for her part, said she would 'likely' recuse herself from any case involving the Democratic Party of Wisconsin, one of her top campaign donors."

How state supreme court justices are chosen in the U.S. varies from state to state. In some states, they are nominated by governors and have to be confirmed after that; in others, they are chosen by voters. And Marcus believes that the latter encourages "nasty" partisanship. The Wisconsin Supreme Court race, she laments, became much too bitter.

"The race degenerated to a level of nastiness to rival any ordinary election," the columnist observes. "Kelly and Protasiewicz did not shake hands at their debate; after the election was called Tuesday evening, Kelly declared, 'I do not have a worthy opponent to which I can concede,' calling Protasiewicz a 'serial liar' who 'demeaned the judiciary with her behavior.' Talk about demeaning. This is the unseemly Trumpification of judicial elections. All that was missing was a chant of 'Lock her up!'"

Read Ruth Marcus' full Washington Post column at this link (subscription required).

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