Substacks
Wisconsin Republicans’ nuclear option Judd Legum
In April, Janet Protasiewicz was elected to the Wisconsin Supreme Court with more than one million votes, defeating her conservative opponent by a wide margin. Her victory tipped the balance of the court, and the new liberal majority will soon review a case, Clarke v. Wisconsin Elections Commission, that could overturn the state’s heavily gerrymandered, Republican-drawn legislative maps.
Protasiewicz was sworn in on August 1. But now, before Protasiewicz has had an opportunity to rule on a single case, Wisconsin Republicans are threatening to impeach her.
At issue are Protasiewicz’s comments during her successful campaign, in which she described the maps as “rigged,” saying that they “do not reflect people in this state.” Those comments have already been subject to a number of complaints by the Republican Party of Wisconsin and others to the Wisconsin Judicial Commission, alleging Protasiewicz violated the judicial code of ethics. In May, the Commission dismissed those complaints, finding that Protasiewicz’s comments during the campaign did not violate ethics rules.
Republicans also object to campaign contributions that Protasiewicz received from the Democratic Party. Assembly Speaker Robin Vos (R), who was one of the first to float the idea of impeachment, says that the $10 million contribution from the Democratic Party confirms that “Protasiewicz and the Democratic Party ‘are one and the same.'”
Republicans in the legislature have vowed to remove Protasiewicz from office unless she recuses herself from gerrymandering cases. If Protasiewicz were to recuse, the court would likely stalemate on the issue, locking in the existing maps. Protasiewicz could be impeached by a simple majority of the Wisconsin Assembly, a body where Republicans dominate. Conviction and removal in the Wisconsin Senate would require a two-thirds majority — but Republicans control exactly 22 of the body’s 33 seats. Even if Protasiewicz was ultimately not convicted by the Wisconsin Senate, she would have to recuse herself from cases until the trial was completed.
Republicans and conservative members of the court used to have a much different view on recusal. In 2007, Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce (WMC), the state’s largest business lobbying group, spent an “estimated $2.2 million” to help elect (now-Chief) Justice Annette Ziegler. That year, Ziegler sat alongside her colleagues on “a high-profile sales tax case” involving the WMC and refused to step down despite facing criticism. The court ruled 4-3 “in favor of WMC’s position,” and Ziegler wrote the majority decision. No Republicans called for Ziegler’s impeachment.
Ziegler did this again in 2009: she refused to recuse herself from a case with broad implications for WMC. This time, she was joined by former Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Michael Gableman, who declined to step down from the case despite receiving $1.8 million from WMC.
That same year, WMC proposed a rule to ensure the members of the court it helped elect could still hear its cases. WMC proposed that judges would “not be required to step aside from cases involving groups or individuals no matter how much they spent to help their campaigns.” The rule was narrowly approved by a vote of 4-3 of the court. Ziegler and Gableman voted in favor.
In 2017, a group of 54 retired Wisconsin judges petitioned the court to “adopt a rule requiring judges and justices to recuse from matters involving individuals and entities who financially supported their campaigns.” But the state’s conservative majority, which included Ziegler and another justice, Rebecca Bradley, shot the proposal down. Bradley criticized the petition for “its disregard for the Wisconsin Constitution and the United States Constitution, particularly the First Amendment.”
And yet, on August 15, Bradley publicly criticized Protasiewicz for failing to recuse herself from the gerrymandering case because she accepted money from the Democratic Party:
Despite receiving nearly $10 million from the Democrat Party of Wisconsin and declaring the maps “rigged,” Protasiewicz has not recused herself from the case. These four justices will adopt new maps to shift power away from Republicans and bestow an electoral advantage for Democrat candidates, fulfilling one of Protasiewicz’s many promises to the principal funder of her campaign.
Bradley did not mention that she received $70,000 from the Wisconsin Republican Party — a group that benefits from the existing maps — in support of her campaign. Another conservative justice, Brian Hagedorn, received $150,000. Vos and other Republicans are not demanding Bradley and Hagedorn recuse themselves from the gerrymandering case. And they are not threatening to impeach the pair if they fail to recuse.
Why Wisconsin Republicans are so desperate to keep their gerrymandered maps
Gerrymandering is not unique to Wisconsin. But, for more than a decade, Wisconsin Republicans have gerrymandered the state’s legislative maps so aggressively that it is effectively impossible for Democrats to gain control of the state legislature.
In 2018, for example, Democrats swept statewide contests for Governor, Attorney General, U.S. Senate, State Treasurer and Secretary of State. That year, 54% of Wisconsin voters selected a Democrat to represent them in the state assembly, with Democratic candidates collecting 200,000 more votes than Republican candidates. And yet, Republicans won 63 of 99 seats in the state assembly — nearly a two-thirds majority.
In 2022, it was a similar story. The statewide electorate was closely divided, with incumbent Governor Tony Evers (D) and incumbent U.S. Senator Ron Johnson (R) both narrowly winning reelection. But Republicans won 64 seats in the state assembly and 22 of 33 state senate seats.
How did Republicans create a map that could produce such lopsided results? First, they engaged in traditional gerrymandering practices like “cracking” and “packing.” In some cases, blocks of Democratic voters are “cracked” into many different pieces to dilute their voting power. For example, Milwaukee County, a Democratic stronghold, is split among 21 different legislative districts. When “cracking” isn’t feasible, Democratic voters are “packed” into districts with as few Republicans as possible so Republican voters can be used to gain control of other districts.
But the maps created by Wisconsin Republicans go even further to reduce Democratic voting power. Take, for example, District 47, a Madison-area district that is not only oddly shaped but contains “a host of disconnected pieces scattered across Dane County.” Some residents of District 47, “must cross two other assembly districts before reaching another part of their district.” In the map below, all areas shaded in yellow are part of District 47:
According to the lawsuit filed challenging the state senate and assembly maps, this is not an anomaly. Across the state, “A remarkable 55 assembly districts, consisting of between 2 and 40 disconnected pieces of territory, and 21 senate districts, consisting of between 2 and 34 disconnected pieces of territory, are noncontiguous.”
While Republicans are claiming Protasiewicz is unacceptably partisan, only a Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice completely blinded by partisanship would uphold non-contiguous districts as legal. The Wisconsin Constitution requires that assembly districts “assembly districts shall be ‘bounded by county, precinct, town or ward lines, to consist of contiguous territory and be in as compact form as practicable’ and that senate districts must be composed of whole assembly districts and must consist of ‘contiguous territory.'” As it stands, a “majority of the current legislative districts… violate these constitutional commands.”
Yesterday, U.S. officials arrested Ismael Zambada García, or “El Mayo,” cofounder of the violent and powerful drug trafficking organization the Sinaloa Cartel, and Joaquín Guzmán López, a son of its other cofounder. That other cofounder, Joaquín Guzmán Loera, or “El Chapo,” is already incarcerated in the U.S., as are another of El Chapo’s sons, alleged cartel leader Ovidio Guzmán López, and the cartel’s alleged lead hitman, Néstor Isidro Pérez Salas, or “El Nini.”
In a statement, Attorney General Merrick Garland said: “Fentanyl is the deadliest drug threat our country has ever faced, and the Justice Department will not rest until every single cartel leader, member, and associate responsible for poisoning our communities is held accountable.” El Mayo has been charged with drug trafficking and money laundering.
U.S. officials exploited rifts in the cartel to get Guzmán López to bring El Mayo in. The successful and peaceful capture of the two Sinaloa Cartel leaders contrasts with Trump’s insistence that the U.S. must bomb or invade Mexico to damage the cartels, a position echoed by Republican vice presidential candidate J.D. Vance and increasingly popular in the Republican Party. Mexico, which is America’s biggest trade partner, staunchly opposes such an intervention. Opponents note that such military action would do nothing to decrease demand for illegal drugs in the U.S. and would increase the numbers of asylum-seekers at the border as their land became a battleground.
Trump seems to think that governance is about dominance, but that approach often runs afoul of the law. Today the Justice Department reached a $2 million settlement with former FBI counterintelligence agent Peter Strzok and former FBI lawyer Lisa Page, who became the butt of Trump’s attacks after their work on the FBI investigation into the ties between the 2016 Trump campaign and Russian operatives. Trump’s Department of Justice released text messages between the two journalists. Today’s settlement appears to reflect that the release likely violated the Privacy Act, which bars the government from disclosing personal information.
Tonight, speaking to Christians at the Turning Point Action Believers’ Summit in West Palm Beach, Florida, Trump made his plans to become a strongman clear: “Get out and vote. Just this time. You won’t have to do it anymore. Four more years, you know what: it’ll be fixed, it’ll be fine. You won’t have to vote anymore, my beautiful Christians…. Get out, you’ve got to get out and vote. In four years, you don’t have to vote again, we’ll have it fixed so good you’re not going to have to vote.”
This chilling statement comes after Trump praised autocratic Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orbán in his speech at the Republican National Convention last week and then publicly praised China’s president Xi Jinping for being “brilliant” because he “controls 1.4 billion people with an iron fist.” It should also be read against the backdrop of the Supreme Court’s decision in Donald J. Trump v. United States that a president cannot be prosecuted for crimes committed as part of his “official duties.”
The Harris campaign reacted to Trump’s dark statements by ridiculing them, and him: “Tonight, Donald Trump couldn’t pronounce words [he mispronounced “landslide” as “land slade], insulted the faith of Jewish and Catholic Americans, lied about the election (again), lied about other stuff, bragged about repealing Roe, proposed cutting billions in education funding, announced he would appoint more extremist judges, revealed he planned to fill a second Trump term with more criminals like himself, attacked lawful voting, went on and on and on, and generally sounded like someone you wouldn’t want to sit near at a restaurant—let alone be President of the United States.
“America can do better than the bitter, bizarre, and backward looking delusions of criminal Donald Trump. Vice President Kamala Harris offers a vision for America’s future focused on freedom, opportunity, and security.”
Harris continually refers to Trump as a criminal in her speeches, but her campaign has taken the approach of referring to him and J.D. Vance as weirdos. On Tuesday, Minnesota governor Tim Walz said, “These guys are just weird.” Senators Chris Murphy of Connecticut and Brian Schatz of Hawaii recorded a video together about Vance’s “super weird,” “bananas,” and “offensive” idea that people with children should be assigned additional votes for each child, making their wishes count more than people without children.
As J.D. Vance continues to step on rakes, the “weird” label seems correctly to label the MAGAs as outside the mainstream of American thought. Today, Vance doubled down on his denigration of women who have not given birth as “childless cat ladies” but assured voters he has nothing against cats. In addition, a video surfaced of Vance calling for the federal government to stop women in Republican-dominated states from crossing state lines to obtain abortions.
Mychael Schnell of The Hill reported today that while MAGA Republican lawmakers like Vance, a number of House Republicans are bashing his selection as the vice presidential candidate. “He was the worst choice of all the options,” one said. “It was so bad I didn’t even think it was possible.”
“The prevailing sentiment is if Trump loses, [it’s] because of this pick,” another said, a sentiment that suggests Vance will be a scapegoat if Trump loses. Considering what happened to Trump’s last vice president after Trump blamed him for an election loss, Vance might have reason to be concerned.
Last night’s “Answer the Call” Zoom has now raised more than $8.5 million for Harris; the organizers thanked Win With Black Women “for showing us how it’s done.” Today the Future Forward PAC, which had threatened to hold back $90 million in spending if Biden stayed at the head of the ticket, began large advertising purchases in swing states for Harris.
Carl Quintanilla of CNBC reported that a week ago, those on a phone call of more than 400 people from Bank of America’s Federal Government Relations Team believed that a Trump victory was a “foregone conclusion.” Now that conviction is gone. “[T]here’s been a palpable sentiment reversal.”
The Harris campaign announced that it will launch 2,600 more volunteers into its ground game in Florida, a state where abortion rights will be on the ballot this fall, likely turning out voters for the Democratic ticket. The volunteers will write postcards, make phone calls, and knock on doors.
Today, Vice President Kamala Harris filled out the paperwork officially declaring her candidacy for president of the United States.
Notes:
https://www.cnn.com/2024/07/25/us/sinaloa-cartel-ismael-zambada-custody-report/index.html
https://www.texasstandard.org/stories/mexico-surpasses-china-us-biggest-trading-partner-exports/
https://www.politico.com/news/2023/04/10/gop-bomb-mexico-fentanyl-00091132
https://www.politico.com/news/2024/07/26/peter-strzok-lawsuit-settlement-00171498
https://www.vox.com/culture/363230/jd-vance-couch-sex-hillbilly-elegy-rumor-false
https://thehill.com/homenews/4793818-vance-vp-trump-house-republicans/
https://ballotpedia.org/Florida_Amendment_4,_Right_to_Abortion_Initiative_(2024)
X:
Acyn/status/1817007890496102490
Acyn/status/1816993825929461860
Victorshi2020/status/1817024584425619737
JoshRaby/status/1815889888207892619
EJDionne/status/1816923327048613906
shannonrwatts/status/1816882297595150756
JacobRubashkin/status/1816859976444338479
KamalaHarris/status/1816998711056052463
EdwardGLuce/status/1816814101823131803
carlquintanilla/status/1816848322050642373
ArtCandee/status/1816935834500657185
NewsHour/status/1816964874120974349
Oh, no, it’s the sister again, for another slow news week. Let’s get to it.
→ Biden dropped out: Six years ago emotionally, but technically this past Sunday, Joe Biden dropped out of the presidential race. He did it via X and promptly threw his support (and cash) behind Vice President Kamala Harris. Then he got Covid and hunkered down in Delaware—or depending on what hooch you’ve been drinking, died and was reanimated so he could appear before the cameras on Wednesday to address the nation. Joe’s family, including Hunter, sat along the wall of the Oval Office as he spoke. The president talked about the cancer moonshot, ending the war in Gaza, putting the party over himself, and Kamala’s tenacity, as Kamala’s pistol dug ever-so-slightly harder into his back. Right after, Jill, the First Lady of passive aggression, who apparently wanted to outdo her heart emoji, tweeted a handwritten note “to those who never wavered, to those who refused to doubt, to those who always believed.” I respect a First Lady who stands by her man and her energetic stepson. A First Lady who sees the high road way up there and says to herself, “If they want us out of here so bad, they can clean out the fridge and strip the beds themselves!”
→ Kamala is brat, Biden is boots, please God send the asteroid today: I’ve learned the hard way—and by that I mean my parents once asked me what “WAP” meant—that certain things should never be explained with words. It’s not that it’s impossible, it’s just that it embarrasses everyone.
That’s how I feel about the whole Kamala-is-brat thing. Brat is a good album about partying and getting older and having anxiety that was released earlier this summer by Charli XCX. But it’s since been adopted by too-online and very young people as a personality, and by Kamala Harris’s campaign as a mode to relate to those very young people. Her campaign is leaning into the whole green look of the album to try and win over Gen Z, and generally recasting her many viral moments—“You think you just fell out of a coconut tree?” “I love Venn diagrams” “What can be, unburdened but what has been”—as calling cards. It’s like when Hillary went on Broad City, only this time more cringe.
And now we have Jake Tapper and Greg Gutfeld grappling with the “essence” and the “aesthetic” and overall vibe of brat girl summer. We used to be a serious country. We used to make things.
Here’s the thing about Kamla: she is hilarious and campy, but unintentionally so. Any goodwill that her goofy dances or weird turns of phrase garner should be considered bonus points, not game play. Was there ever any doubt that Fire Island would go blue? We’ve been debating whether Kamala’s meme campaign is a good move for her prospects in the Free Press Slack, and here I’ll borrow from my older and wiser colleague Peter Savodnik: “There is nothing more pathetic than an older person who cares what a younger person thinks is cool.”
→ Boomer behavior: While Kamala’s campaign is being run by a 24-year-old twink with an Adderall prescription, J.D. Vance’s speechwriter seems to be a drunk Boomer who just got kicked out of a 7-11. Vance, appearing this week at a rally in Middletown, Ohio, riffed, “Democrats say that it is racist to believe. . . well, they say it’s racist to do anything. I had a Diet Mountain Dew yesterday and one today, and I’m sure they’re going to call that racist too.” Crickets. Horror. Major “Thanks, Obama” energy. There was also a bit on fried bologna sandwiches and a lot of “lemme tell you another story.” The guy is 39 but sounds older than Biden.
Fresher, 35-to-60-year-old blood is exactly what we’ve been begging for. Let the Boomers boom, let the Zoomers zoom. Kamala and J.D.: act your age.
July 26, 2024 Heather Cox Richardson
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