Free Republic

Former Wisconsin Attorney General Peg Lautenschlager wants Republican Gov. Scott Walker to explain his criminal defense fund. Milwaukee prosecutors are investigating Walker's associates during his tenure as Milwaukee County executive. Five people have been charged so far. Walker has transferred campaign contributions into a criminal defense fund. He says he's not a target in the probe, but he can set up such a fund only if he or one of his agents are under investigation or have been charged with campaign or election violations. Walker faces Democrat Tom Barrett in a June 5 recall. Barrett has been demanding Walker explain...

MADISON, WI (AP) -- A challenger to Attorney General Peg Lautenschlager mentioned the incumbent's drunken driving arrest in a television ad unveiled Friday. An announcer in fellow Democrat Kathleen Falk's ad refers to Lautenschlager as: "Our state's top cop convicted of drunken driving in a state car, fined for misuse of the car by the Ethics Board."This marks the first time that any candidate in the race has used mention of Lautenschlager's arrest in a campaign advertisement. While Falk's ad mentions the arrest, it does not show any video of the incident taken from a police car. "Voters didn't need...

MADISON, Wis. (AP) -- The campaigns of Attorney General Peg Lautenschlager and Gov. Jim Doyle said Friday they would return tens of thousands of dollars in donations tied to a company the state investigated for questionable marketing practices.Lautenschlager and Doyle, both Democrats up for re-election in November, received donations in the last year from two executives of Buffalo Grove, Ill.-based International Profit Associates. The state Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection referred an investigation into complaints IPA was misrepresenting its business consulting practices to the state Department of Justice in late 2004, said Mike Bauer, administrator of DOJ's Legal...

(Says could hurt if lawsuit filed) This is one legal fight Attorney General Peg Lautenschlager will sit out. Lautenschlager, who has used her office to go after oil companies, hospitals and even other government agencies, is declining to step into a debate over a University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire policy banning resident assistants from holding Bible studies in their dorms. By refusing to issue an opinion on the constitutionality of the policy, the Democrat avoids taking a position on a controversial issue as she gears up for a tough re-election campaign for a second term as the state's top law enforcement...

Hayward - Chai Soua Vang's tearful farewell to his family after his testimony a day earlier proved prophetic Friday, as a jury convicted him of nine charges that guarantee he will spend the rest of his life in prison for killing six hunters and wounding two others. After three hours of deliberations, the jury rejected Vang's claims of self-defense and found the truck driver from St. Paul, Minn., guilty of six counts of first-degree intentional homicide and three counts of attempted homicide. In addition to the six mandatory life sentences, Vang faces an additional 225 years in prison. His sentencing...

Wednesday August 03, 2005 By JR ROSS Associated Press Writer MADISON, Wis. (AP) The attorney general agreed Wednesday to review whether Gov. Jim Doyle violated the state constitution when he used his veto authority to allow his top aide to give more than $400 million to Wisconsin schools in the budget without legislative oversight. Republican lawmakers have argued that Doyle, a Democrat, overstepped his authority with the move, saying only the Legislature has the power to appropriate funds. Senate President Alan Lasee, R-DePere, asked the attorney general to review Doyle's vetoes in the state budget, particularly those that give the...

Attorney General Peg Lautenschlager asked a judge on Wednesday to dismiss a lawsuit seeking benefits for the domestic partners of gay and lesbian state workers. Lautenschlager, a Democrat who personally supports domestic partner benefits, has been accused by conservative lawmakers of not vigorously defending the state against the lawsuit brought by six lesbian employees and the American Civil Liberties Union. The criticism increased after news that Lautenschlager appeared at a gay pride rally in Madison alongside the ACLU lawyer handling the case and two of the plaintiffs. The lawsuit seeks state-funded health insurance for the domestic partners of gay employees,...

MADISON, Wis. - The American Civil Liberties Union and the state's attorney general are making similar legal arguments in asking a judge to turn down the Legislature's request to intervene in a major gay rights case. They are on different sides of the dispute, but both agree the Legislature has no legal grounds to fight the lawsuit aimed at getting the state to pay for health care benefits for the partners of gay state employees. Republican lawmakers have hired the Alliance Defense Fund, a Christian advocacy group that fights gay rights, to represent their interests in the case even though...

Saturday April 16, 2005 BY RYAN J. FOLEY Associated Press Writer MADISON, Wis. (AP) Attorney General Peg Lautenschlager on Saturday called for changes to state law to allow her office to seek remedies for black and Latino car buyers who are charged higher rates than their white counterparts for auto loans from dealers in Wisconsin. ``Charging any citizen a higher rate because of the color of his or her skin is wrong, and it must end now,'' Lautenschlager said at a news conference in Milwaukee, where she was joined by a handful of Democratic lawmakers, including Sen. Spencer Coggs, D-Milwaukee....

Attorney General Peg Lautenschlager finally wandered out into the public to talk about her drunken-driving conviction. The Republicans are certainly glad she did. Following her Thursday talk at a victim impact panel on drunken driving held at Algoma High School, Lautenschlager snapped at a Green Bay Press-Gazette reporter for writing a story describing her February 2004 arrest as a crime. Asked if breaking a state law could be considered a crime to the general public, the first-term attorney general said, "The first offense is a civil forfeiture. You should be careful who you label a criminal." Talk about writing your...

So Peg Lautenschlager wants to take over the Chai Vang case. We wish the Wisconsin attorney general good luck. She'll need it. We're inclined to agree with the cynics who think this is more about politics than prosecutorial discretion. After all, it's certainly no coincidence that Lautenschlager will be up for re-election in 2006. It's also important to note that Lautenschlager is trying to live down a DWI conviction. Adding insult to injury, she was in a state-owned vehicle earlier this year when she was pulled over and refused to submit to a sobriety test. Clearly, a victory in the...

MADISON, WIS. -- Attorney General Peg Lautenschlager said Monday that she plans to seek reelection to a second term in 2006 and will personally prosecute the case against Chai Vang, the St. Paul man accused of killing six hunters and wounding two others. {snip} She said she would handle Vang's preliminary hearing Wednesday. Vang faces six counts of murder in the Nov. 21 shootings in Sawyer County. {snip} She said she wants to prosecute Vang because of her "personal interest" in cases that involve crimes against people. She last prosecuted a case of a kidnapper of a 12-year-old girl in...

Wisconsin Farm Bureau Federation: Farm Groups Join Forces to Fight for Cranberry Grower Against Nuisance Lawsuit by Attorney General 7/19/2004 MADISON, JULY 20 2004-Nine agriculture groups have joined with the Wisconsin Farm Bureau Federation in filing a motion to intervene as defendants in order to fight a nuisance lawsuit filed by Wisconsin's Attorney General against a Sawyer County cranberry grower. A lawsuit recently was filed by the Wisconsin Department of Justice and 15 out-of-state landowners in Sawyer County Circuit Court against the grower, claiming his cranberry operation released phosphorus into Musky Bay as the result of his application of fertilizer...

When an intoxicated Peg Lautenschlager drove her state car into a ditch in February, she damaged more than her credibility and political future. She also did quite a number on Mothers Against Drunk Driving, the group that leads the charge against drunken drivers. In the three months since Lautenschlager failed to walk a straight line for the cops, fund-raising has dried up for MADD Wisconsin. Many supporters have quit giving because of the group's namby-pamby statement declining to call for the first-term attorney general to resign after she pleaded guilty to drunken driving in late February. MADD's statement instead said...

WisPolitics: DOA Records Show AG Had Two Hit-and-Runs with State Car 4/21/2004 April 21, 2004 By Melanie Fonder WisPolitics.com Associate Editor Attorney General Peg Lautenschlager's state car was twice damaged last year before her February drunken driving accident -- incidents described as being hit and runs, records from the state Department of Administration released today. Repairs to the 1999 Buick Park Avenue as a result of those accidents were nearly $2,000 and were charged to the state. The manner in which they were reported may be a violation of state procedure regarding the use of fleet vehicles, DOA memos...

Gas receipts raise questions about attorney general's use of state car 10:41 PM 4/13/04 Scott Milfred Wisconsin State Journal Attorney General Peg Lautenschlager gassed up her state car in Racine just hours after attending a political fund-raiser in the same city, state fuel receipts show. <Yet she insists she didn't use the state car to get to the local Democratic Party fund-raiser, which could have violated state law. <The incident is one of several involving gas receipts that raise questions about whether the attorney general used her state car for personal or political events beyond what the state Ethics Board...

Lautenschlager raises legal limit to .13 percent By OMC Staff Writers Alcoholics, binge drinkers and drunk drivers are hailing today's decision by State Attorney General Peg Lautenschlager to raise the legal limit for driving to a nation-high .13 percent. Lautenschlager, who made headlines this winter when she was pulled over for drunk driving with a blood alcohol content of .12 percent, said the hike was necessary to spur commerce at economically depressed local taverns. "It's so hard to find a designated driver these days," said Lautenschlager, speaking at a press conference inside Jimmy's Corner Tap in Lodi. "No one wants...

Action 2 News learned late Wednesday morning that the state Ethics Board has now reached a decision as it looked into the Attorney General Peg Lautenschlager's use of a state-owned car without reimbursing the state. However, the Ethics Board isn't ready to make that decision public, and board members won't say if they shared that decision with Lautenschlager yet. The board met openly for about 15 minutes in the morning before going behind closed doors. Records show the attorney general put 20,000 miles on the state-owned car, which she used for commuting between her home in Fond du Lac and...

<p>Try as she might, Attorney General Peg Lautenschlager can’t erase from the public consciousness her drunken-driving arrest last week.</p> <p>She has publicly apologized to her family, her Department of Justice colleagues and the people of Wisconsin. She pleaded guilty to a drunken-driving charge and said she would comply with the legal requirements related to it, including a $784 fine, license revocation, a drug assessment and any recommendations that result from it.</p>

Tell the liberal local press that Lautenschlager should GO!In the middle of the page at: Post-Crescent Poll