'Which shall rule — wealth or man; which shall lead — money or intellect?' asked a former Wisconsin Supreme Court chief justice | Getty Images Creative

Does it matter to Wisconsin voters that Elon Musk is trying to buy a seat on the Wisconsin Supreme Court? Maybe not to “Scott A.” as Musk called him, the Green Bay voter to whom Musk gave $1 million as part of his campaign to reward Wisconsinites who sign a petition against “activist judges,” while at the same time handing over their personal data to Musk. Scott A.’s haul is one-fifth the size of Musk’s $20 million investment in campaign ads and door-knocking to support his preferred candidate, Brad Schimel. 

And Musk’s $20 million spending spree accounts for about one-fifth of the total, record-breaking $100 million that makes the April 1 contest the most expensive judicial race in U.S. history.

The race is a test of many things: Whether Musk, serving as unelected and unpopular co-president to Donald Trump, is a political asset or a liability; whether the new liberal majority on the Wisconsin Supreme Court will endure; whether the highest bidder is destined to win state court races even as the ad war becomes a blitzkrieg; whether three months into the Trump administration, amid mass firings, the dismantling of federal agencies and voter unease about the destruction of their health care and retirement security, Wisconsin might be the place where things begin to turn around. 

The money pouring into the Supreme Court race is obscene and a bad sign for the health of democracy regardless of next week’s outcome. But the sickness didn’t flare up overnight. It has been getting steadily worse for almost two decades.

Schimel makes the claim that he is running to restore the Court’s “impartiality,” motivated by his disgust at how “political” the Court’s new liberal majority has become. In truth, the politicization of the Court goes back almost two decades and Schimel, a highly partisan Republican, is an unlikely candidate to take us back to pre-partisan times. On the other side, Susan Crawford is backed by the Democrats and big out of state donors including George Soros. In a recent debate she conceded that the public has an interest in ethics rules that would require judges to recuse themselves from cases involving their donors, but the current rules don’t require that. Neither candidate has promised to recuse from such cases.

The turning point that led us to the current moment came in 2008. That was the year disgraced former Supreme Court Justice Michael Gableman defeated incumbent Justice Louis Butler in a dirty campaign that broke all previous spending records. The race cost $6 million — at the time, an astounding sum.

Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce, Gableman’s biggest-spending supporter, paid for ads calling Butler “Loophole Louie” and accusing him of being soft on crime. Gableman himself ran a disgusting ad that placed Butler’s face next to the mugshot of a convicted rapist. Both men were Black. The ad misleadingly claimed that Butler “found a loophole” and let the man out of prison “to molest another child.” In fact, Butler was not the judge in the case. As a public defender assigned to defend his client, he lost in court and his client was imprisoned, then later reoffended after he was released, having served his full sentence. 

Gableman went on to help destroy ethics rules on the Court, refusing to recuse himself from cases involving WMC, which had spent more than $2 million to help elect him. He played a key role in passing the current ethics rule allowing justices to decide for themselves whether to recuse in cases involving their big-money campaign contributors. 

Gableman embarrassed supporters, including Dodge County District Attorney Steven Bauer, who publicly withdrew his support during the campaign because of the attack ad. Tellingly, after he left the Court, Gableman disappeared, never landing a job at a law firm or in public service. His brief return to the limelight, as Assembly Speaker Robin Vos’s chief investigator of nonexistent voter fraud, featured Gableman threatening to jail the mayors of Democratic cities and wasting more than a million taxpayer dollars on a farcical investigation that ended when Vos fired him.  

But the damage done by Gableman and the people who poured money into electing him endures.

The 2025 Supreme Court race, which is on track to double the cost of the last record-breaking election in 2023, is 15 times as costly as Gableman’s expensive and shamefully politicized campaign. 

Ads featuring scary crime stories are still a major feature of Supreme Court races, sponsored by people who know and don’t care that tough-on-crime issues aren’t coming before the Court. Instead, the ads are paid for by ideological groups, political parties and corporations interested in favorable treatment — like Musk, who has a current lawsuit in Wisconsin seeking to overturn a state law blocking him from opening Tesla dealerships here.

Back in 1873, Wisconsin Supreme Court Chief Justice Edward Ryan worried about the rise of the robber barons, their accumulation of vast personal wealth and with it political power. Speaking at the University of Wisconsin Law School, he posed the question:  “Which shall rule — wealth or man; which shall lead — money or intellect; who shall fill public stations — educated and patriotic free men, or the feudal serfs of corporate capital?”

We are well on our way to becoming a nation of feudal serfs to Elon Musk. The liquidation of government agencies and institutions that serve the public interest are a giant step in that direction. The Wisconsin Supreme Court election will take us further down that road, or move us in the opposite direction. But until we do something about the arms race in campaign spending, Ryan’s vision of government by “educated and patriotic free men (and women)” will be increasingly out of reach.

There’s good news and bad news in a recent Wisconsin Court of Appeals decision upholding an open records judgment related to the ridiculous and ham-handed investigation into alleged 2020 election fraud headed by former Supreme Court Justice Michael Gableman.

On the good news side, the appellate court upheld a lower court ruling that the state of Wisconsin must pay $241,000 in legal fees because various officials — including Gableman and Assembly Speaker Robin Vos — flouted the public records law by failing to turn over legally requested information in a timely manner.

The bad news? There’s plenty. First, taxpayers — not the offending political characters — have to pony up the $241,000. And taxpayers clearly did nothing wrong.

Moreover, this case illustrates a near-fatal flaw in the state of Wisconsin’s otherwise exemplary Open Records Law. The statute is among the nation’s best, setting forth that Wisconsin considers openness the default position and holding that records requesters who are denied documents illegally may recover court costs and lawyers’ fees.

But think about that number again. Who has $241,000 to put on the line in an attempt to force the government to follow its own laws?

In this particular case, an established liberal organization called American Oversight fought to make the government abide by the law.

This same law, though, is supposed to empower every citizen to approach any level of government — the school board, the city council — and request access to public records, which then must be turned over except in relatively rare instances that fall within narrowly defined exemptions. That sounds better than it sometimes works in practice, as the Gableman case shows.

If authorities decide to be difficult and stonewall a records request, the citizen can hire a lawyer and go to court like American Oversight. And, in fairly short order, the citizen could wind up owing a lot of money.

That potential outcome is not a secret. Officials at all levels of government are well aware that prohibitive costs can lead to would-be records requesters relinquishing their rights rather than risking high legal fees. Any time that happens — and it does happen — a good law is turned upside down in a way that encourages public officials to just say no.

In the past, news media organizations frequently stood in for citizens and went up against public authorities bent on hiding secrets. That can cost a lot of money and, the state of the news business being what it is these days, fewer news organizations are willing to take on this risk. As a result, citizens’ rights to information are diminished.

An alternative does exist in the law. When records are refused, the law says requesters can turn to county district attorneys or the Wisconsin Attorney General’s Office. But again, in practice, that’s a weak option. Prosecutors are busy dealing with burglars and rapists and killers. Taking on their fellow government officials over a stack of paper is low on the priority list. It’s rare for a district attorney anywhere in the state to haul a city, county or state records custodian in front of a judge to enforce the law.

So too many officials believe they can get away with withholding public records. Or they can rest easy in the knowledge it will be taxpayers, not them, stuck with the bill even if they lose a challenge.

The Legislature could fix this, with a reform that sharpens enforcement teeth in the law. Instead, it’s the sound of silence that you hear coming from the Capitol, and every other government building.

Your Right to Know is a monthly column distributed by the Wisconsin Freedom of Information Council (wisfoic.org), a group dedicated to open government. Bill Barth is the former editor of the Beloit Daily News, where a version of this column originally appeared.

Your Right to Know: How cost is used to deny access to records is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

Judicial regulators filed a complaint Tuesday against a former conservative Wisconsin Supreme Court justice who spread election conspiracy theories and was hired by Republicans to lead an investigation into President-elect Donald Trump’s loss in the 2020 election, accusing him of violating multiple rules of conduct.

The Office of Lawyer Regulation’s 10-count complaint accuses former Justice Michael Gableman of violations that could result in a variety of sanctions, including possibly losing his law license. The complaint does not make a specific recommendation regarding what sanction the Wisconsin Supreme Court should apply.

Gableman did not immediately return text messages seeking comment.

The complaint stems from Gableman’s work investigating allegations of fraud and abuse related to the 2020 election that Trump narrowly lost in Wisconsin. Republican Assembly Speaker Robin Vos had hired him to lead the inquiry. Gableman found no evidence of widespread fraud during his investigation, drew bipartisan derision and cost taxpayers more than $2.3 million.

Vos said in 2021 when he hired Gableman that he was “supremely confident” in his abilities. But when he fired Gableman in August 2022, Vos called him an “embarrassment.” Gableman this year helped backers of Trump who were attempting to recall Vos from office. Two of their efforts failed to gather enough valid signatures to force a vote.

Vos in 2022 said Gableman should lose his law license over his conduct during the election probe. Vos did not return a message Tuesday seeking comment.

In his seven-month inquiry, Gableman was sued over his response to open records requests and subpoenas and countersued. He was ridiculed for scant expense records, criticized for sending confusing emails and making rudimentary errors in his filings and called out for meeting with conspiracy theorists.

The complaint accuses Gableman of making false statements, disrupting a court hearing, questioning a judge’s integrity, making derogatory remarks about opposing counsel, violating open records law and revealing information about representing Vos during the investigation while Gableman was promoting a failed effort to recall Vos from office.

Among the complaint’s allegations:

— Gableman filed writs in Waukesha County Circuit Court in an attempt to force Madison and Green Bay’s mayors to submit to depositions without telling the court that his office had agreed depositions wouldn’t be needed because the two cities had turned over election documents Gableman requested.

— He falsely accused Wisconsin Elections Commission Administrator Meagan Wolfe and officials in five Wisconsin cities of trying to cover up how election grants from the Center for Tech and Civic Life were used during testimony to the Assembly elections committee. The CTCL is a liberal group backed by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg.

— Gableman violated attorney ethics rules by publicly discussing private conversations with Vos related to the investigation. The complaint cites two videos Gableman appeared in where he supported the recall effort against Vos. The videos were shown at a program organized by Trump supporter Mike Lindell.

— Gableman practiced law while working on the investigation despite his claim to the contrary. He gave legal advice in his election report, represented his office as an attorney in legal filings in Waukesha County and signed a contract with Vos saying he would work as legal counsel.

— Gableman’s office destroyed public records that liberal group American Oversight had requested.

— During a hearing before Dane County Circuit Judge Frank Remington on whether the records were inadvertently destroyed, Gableman accused Remington from the witness stand of railroading him into jail and acting as an advocate for American Oversight. Gableman also was captured on a microphone while the court was in recess making sarcastic comments about Remington and American Oversight attorney Christa Westerberg’s ability to do her job without Remington’s help.

Remington ultimately found Gableman in contempt of court for not complying with open records laws. The judge forwarded the contempt order to the OLR.

Attorneys from the liberal law firm Law Forward also requested sanctions against Gableman in 2023. They alleged that Gableman “has embraced conspiracy theories, spread lies, rejected facts, impugned the character of people he perceives to be his adversaries, and abused the legal process.”

Gableman was a member of the Wisconsin Supreme Court from 2008 to 2018 and joined with the conservative majority in several major rulings, including one that upheld the state law that effectively ended collective bargaining for public workers. The court is now controlled 4-3 by liberal justices, including one who was elected to fill the seat vacated by Gableman.

Wisconsin Watch is a nonprofit and nonpartisan newsroom. Subscribe to our newsletter to get our investigative stories and Friday news roundup. This story is published in partnership with The Associated Press.

Wisconsin regulators file complaint against former Justice Michael Gableman, who led 2020 election probe is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.