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On Wednesday, a Wisconsin judge unsealed an 88-page report on the state Department of Justice’s (WIDoJ) investigation into a leak of sealed evidence from the politically motivated “John Doe” investigation of Gov. Scott Walker, his supporters, and various conservative groups related to his recall election campaign. Despite concluding a crime was committed during the John Doe proceedings, WIDoJ recommends no criminal charges. Instead, the report recommends that former Government Accountability Board (GAB) lawyer Shane Falk be referred to the state judiciary’s Office of Lawyer Regulation for discipline and that contempt proceedings be initiated against John Doe special prosecutor Francis Schmitz and former...

Part 270 of 268 in the series Wisconsin's Secret War MADISON, Wis. – Newly unsealed documents in a lawsuit against the state Government Accountability Board further reveal a rogue agency all in from the beginning of a political John Doe investigation into dozens of conservative groups and the campaign of Gov. Scott Walker – even as their hapless special prosecutor was “really questioning the validity of the case.” Thursday evening, Waukesha County Court released 182 pages of emails, transcripts of closed-door meetings and other previously sealed documents after attorneys for the GAB and the plaintiffs came to terms on precisely...

Our liberal friends in Wisconsin are unhappy. They think someone is leaking emails that make the state’s partisan campaign regulators look bad. We’ll plead guilty to having sources, but the emails are news and they sure are revealing. Today’s installment from court documents concerns how a special prosecutor and regulators at the Government Accountability Board (GAB) targeted the state’s conservative Supreme Court justices. The partisan goal was to force some justices to recuse themselves from hearing a constitutional challenge to their probe of Governor Scott Walker and his political allies. In a Feb. 11, 2013 email, then-GAB staff counsel Shane...

MADISON, Wis. – In January, testifying before the Legislature, Government Accountability Board director Kevin Kennedy called his agency a “Wisconsin success story.” “The Legislature should be proud of the Board, not only for its nonpartisan nature, but for its accomplishments and performance over the first seven years existence,” Kennedy said in defending the campaign finance, elections, and ethics regulator against a growing list of critics concerned that the agency was alarmingly partisan and less than accountable. SAVE MARY: An email obtained by Wisconsin Watchdog shows former GAB legal counsel Shane Falk worrying about what a prosecutor’s statement might mean for...