Free Republic

Three years ago, a group of ambitious and partisan district attorneys convened a special kind of investigation to target and punish conservatives. This week, the Wisconsin Supreme Court held that investigation was unconstitutional and unmoored from both reason and law. The legal theories underlying the Wisconsin high court’s decision are important, but before we consider them, we must recognize the human cost of this litigation and the politics that animated public officials’ attacks on conservatives for engaging in free speech. Some district attorneys in Wisconsin were disappointed by the failure of a prior John Doe investigation to derail Wisconsin’s union...

On July 16, we saw the definitive end to one of the greatest abuses of power in recent memory. After five years, the Wisconsin ­supreme court finally halted the Milwaukee district attorney’s notorious “John Doe” investigation that targeted Governor Scott Walker and political allies trying to reform the state’s laws regarding fiscally ruinous public employee unions. Imagine a grand jury investigation but without the jury, leaving a prosecutor who operates secretly—in this case, the district attorney’s investigation was headed by one John Chis­holm—with almost sole discretion to pursue whatever evidence he deems relevant to his investigation. (There was nominal ­supervision...

Conservative justices in Wisconsin handed the governor’s allies a win Thursday in the ‘John Doe’ election scandal. But liberals say the deck was stacked against them from the beginning. The gods are smiling on Scott Walker. And by the gods, I mean four of the six Badger State’s supreme court justices, who just put the kibosh on a lengthy and secret “John Doe” investigation that targeted some of the governor’s top allies and like-minded groups. The investigation was sparked over allegations that outside independent groups who supported Walker secretly coordinated with Wisconsin Republicans during the run up to the 2012...

The Lonestar State is GOP donor central, but Walker's rivals already have the big money locked up. Before most GOP presidential contenders set foot in Iowa or New Hampshire, they typically first hit another pivotal state: Texas. The Lonestar State is the undisputed center of the Republican Party's donor base, so almost all of the GOP hopefuls have trekked regularly there and established extensive fundraising operations in Texas. But there's one big exception: Scott Walker, who formally announced his presidential bid on Monday. The union-busting Wisconsin governor may be a conservative darling, but he's way behind the curve when it...

If you had to vote in your state primary/caucus today, knowing what you know now about the various declared and probable candidates, who would you vote for? Why? Who would you like to see as the running mate for your preferred candidate? If you could help staff your candidates cabinet and other top appointments, who would you choose? If you could recommend different congressional leaders than we have now, who would they be? And who would you like to see on the Supreme Court and why? And finally, feel free to donate to Free Republic.

CMD Denounces Corrupt John Doe Ruling From Conflicted Court Submitted by PR Watch Admin on July 15, 2015 - 8:43pm FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: July 16, 2015 Contact: Brendan Fischer, brendan@prwatch.org Madison, WI--Today, the Wisconsin Supreme Court overturned the state’s limits on money in politics, opening the door to unlimited, undisclosed spending coordinated directly with candidates, and handing Scott Walker a significant political victory as he begins his run for the White House. The decisions in the case can be found here. "The dark money groups that bankrolled the Walker teams recall victories got the decision they wanted from the justices...

The long unraveling of the so-called “John Doe II investigation” convened by partisan district attorneys in Wisconsin is now complete. This case was about using vague campaign-finance rules to intimidate conservative groups and smear Republican officials, including Gov. Scott Walker. No charges were filed in the John Doe II investigation and it was halted by both the state and federal courts.Today, the Wisconsin Supreme Court releases its final disposition in the case: To be clear, this conclusion ends the John Doe investigation because the special prosecutor’s legal theory is unsupported in either reason or law. Consequently, the investigation is closed....

The Wisconsin Supreme Court on Thursday ended a secret investigation into whether Republican Gov. Scott Walker's campaign illegally coordinated with conservative groups in winning his 2012 recall election. The court's action is a major victory for Walker as he pursues the presidency, though one expert said prosecutors could appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court. No one has been charged in the so-called John Doe probe, Wisconsin's version of a grand jury investigation where information is tightly controlled, but questions about the investigation have dogged Walker for months. The case centers on political activity conducted by Wisconsin Club for Growth and...

Scott Walker stumbled over his own prior comments Wednesday, saying that when he called on the Boy Scouts to reinstate a ban on gay leaders because it “protected children,” he meant the ban protected them from media scrutiny. “The protection was not a physical protection,” Walker said Wednesday at an event in South Carolina, according to The New York Times. Rather, the Wisconsin governor continued, he was referring to “protecting them from being involved in the very thing you’re talking about right now, the political and media discussion about it, instead of just focusing on what Scouts is about, which...

(VIDEO-AT-LINK) President Obama took advantage of a stop in La Crosse, Wisconsin on Thursday to get in on the fun of the 2016 presidential derby, telling an enthusiastic university crowd he's lost track of how many Republicans are running but that it's probably enough for "an actual Hunger Games. That is an interesting bunch." Obama also stoked a regional rivalry while questioning the economic credentials and policy agenda of the "bus full" of contenders for the Republican presidential nominaton, particularly the state's conservative governor and as-yet undeclared candidate, Scott Walker. "We've seen what happens when top-down economics meets the real...

“Missing from Scott Walker’s AP Press Release…Common Core” By Donna Garner 7.13.15 Scott Walker has decided to announce for the Presidency today, but notice what has been left out of Scott Walker’s AP press release…any mention of Common Core. Leading up to today’s launch, Scott Walker meant to tout his supposed “success” at dumping Common Core in Wisconsin; but when the grassroots people of Wisconsin caught him in a lie, he was forced to retreat from his original press release and hope nobody noticed. We noticed! Instead of dumping Common Core as often publicly stated by Scott Walker once he...

Scott Walker addressing the crowd in Waukesha right now. Started by reminiscing about a neighbor and scoutleader who was instrumental in getting him interested in government.

Yeah! OH YEAHHH!!!! It's over. It's ALL OVER for Scott Walker!!! Watch our Rolling Stone victory dance in the end zone as we spike the football and proclaim an end to Walker's political career. Why? Because of the SLAM DUNK of the century which Scott Walker cannot survive! So what happened? Did Walker perform a gross breach of ethics as bad as the publication of "A Rape on Campus?" Nope. Even worse. AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka wrote the six word slam dunk that will definitely ruin Scott Walker forever and ever and ever. When you read the "slam dunk" on Walker you...

You feel for Scott Walker, the governor from somewhere out in the Midwest, who had looked forward to this day all of his adult life — the day he would announce his candidacy for president of the United States. And on the weekend he does, what are the media talking about? Donald Trump. Trump stomped all over Walker’s announcement with an anti-immigration screed at a packed house in Phoenix, where he essentially accused everyone of everything. The New York Times wrote: “Donald Trump, the real estate mogul and reality television star who has taken center stage in the race for...

Former Sen. Rick Santorum (R-Penn.) warned Monday that Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker’s dissonance with his wife on same-sex marriage could cause him to be less “active” in his opposition. “Spouses matter,” Santorum said in an editorial meeting with The Daily Caller. “When your spouse is not in-sync with you — particularly on cultural issues, moral issues — [you] tend not to be as active on those issues." Walker panned last month’s Supreme Court decision legalizing gay marriage nationwide as a “grave mistake” where “five unelected judges [took] it upon themselves to redefine the institution of marriage.” But while those views...

So I've learned Democrats are pretty scared of Walker Scott Walker is a Health Care-Denying, Anti-Worker, Economy-Dragging, Education-Slashing, Marriage Equality-Opposing, Teacher-Disrespecting, Trickle-Down-Believing Anti-Choice Republican, and he's running for President. Finished laughing hysterically yet? No? We’ll give you a moment. OK, so now that you’ve had a chance to catch your breath, can we please talk about the horrific stench of desperation that’s emanating from the Dems? Because seriously. They’re flinging every last bit of poo they can squeeze out at the Walker wall, hoping something will stick. It’s truly a sickening spectacle — and par for the course with these...

"Scott Walker is a national disgrace," reads the entirety of AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka's statement. Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker is one of the most hardcore right-wing extremists in America. His slash-and-burn policies have gutted Wisconsin workers' collective bargaining rights, defunded Planned Parenthood and more – all of which has made him a prime punching bag for progressives around the country. For some reason, the Republican zealot is hell-bent on conducting a doomed campaign for president in 2016, a painfully obvious fact which he "revealed" Monday morning after months of tedious teasing, including one recent public appearance in which he bizarrely...

I confess that I do not begin to understand homosexual or transgender issues. As life would have it, this matter has found its way into the lives of my own circle of friends and family members, people whom I love and respect most dearly. While I acknowledge that I do not fully understand the issues which formed the basis of the case before the Supreme Court, I am comfortable with the decision and fully believe the Court is right in its ruling that laws forbidding same-sex marriage are unconstitutional. Frankly, I don’t have to understand anything other than that I...

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker will join the crowded field of GOP presidential candidates Monday. Politico reports that since the 1990s, Walker’s opponents – those he defeated – say Walker shouldn’t be underestimated. Walker has appeared on a ballot some 14 times and he only lost twice.

Timothy Egan, liberal New York Times reporter turned left-wing Times columnist, filed "Not Like Us" for Saturday's paper, portraying the Republican field as avidly chasing the "red-faced" "immigrant-hatred vote," calling out not only Donald Trump but Ted Cruz, a Cuban-American. But first, Egan unveiled a supposedly clever historical sleight of hand designed to shame conservatives: They were criminals -- thugs and thieves -- a single ethnic group that filled the jails of big cities. “Scum unloaded on American wharves,” one speaker in Philadelphia said of them. Dirty, filthy, foreign. As for their children, they were “utterly ignorant of a place...