Posted on 10/17/2015 10:53:36 AM PDT by afraidfortherepublic
Part 263 of 262 in the series Wisconsin's Secret War
MADISON, Wisconsin — The public will have to wait for trial to see the brunt of “hot documents” attorneys have said will be “very embarrassing” to the state Government Accountability Board.
On Thursday, Waukesha County Judge Lee Dreyfus Jr. opted against lifting the protective order on 181 pages of records from a lawsuit alleging the GAB overstepped its authority at taxpayer expense in driving a politically charged John Doe investigation into dozens of conservative groups and the campaign of Gov. Scott Walker.
Dreyfus said the documents would probably come out in trial, although that remains a matter of discussion.
Instead, the GAB and the attorneys for conservative activist Eric O’Keefe and the Wisconsin Club for Growth are expected to soon come to terms on select records that may be unsealed.
The GAB has fought at every turn unsealing the records in question, arguing that a state confidentiality statute and the John Doe secrecy order prevents them from doing so.
O’Keefe’s attorneys argued there’s no prohibition on the plaintiffs from releasing information they have obtained through the legal discovery process. That’s the same argument the plaintiffs employed late last year when Dreyfus allowed the unsealing of information in a revised complaint.
It was in December that the public first learned of the GAB’s wider involvement in John Doe, that prosecutors contemplated targeting conservative talk show hosts and that GAB staff and Milwaukee County District Attorney prosecutors communicated on segregated Gmail accounts. The records revealed the GAB narrowly voted to end its involvement in the probe in July 2014.
“Mr. O’Keefe and the Wisconsin Club for Growth are looking forward to the time when filings and motions and ultimately a trial in this case will allow the release of key documents about the internal workings of the GAB that go to the heart of the current legislative debate about whether this state agency should continue to exist,” said Eddie Greim, an attorney representing the plaintiffs.
Republicans are pushing a bill that would overhaul the Government Accountability Board, decentralizing the agency by dividing it into elections and ethics commissions. The appointees to the elections board would be partisan, like the Federal Election Commission. The agency’s director would, too, and be subject to a four-year term and reappointment.
While the GAB has pushed to dump all of the “evidence” seized and collected in what the state Supreme Court in July found to be an unconstitutional investigation, the agency has furiously fought to keep sealed some 142,000 pages of records and testimony obtained through depositions. That includes the 181 pages of what Greim has described as “hot documents,” correspondence and closed-door meeting minutes exposing the GAB’s purposes and practices in the secret probe.
A trial date has not been set.
Earlier this month, Dreyfus ordered the release of communications between the GAB and left-leaning groups to the plaintiffs.
Attorneys for the conservatives want to know whether the GAB coordinated its legal efforts related to John Doe litigation with the Brennan Center for Justice and the Campaign Legal Center.
They need time to make sure all the disks have been wiped.
[Part 263 of 262 in the series]
That’s amazing!
Seriously, I hope it all comes out and those Nazis that did this face serious charges.
And the beat goes on. Judge’s ruling furthers delay into investigation of the GAB’s attempts to influence elections (contacts with Lois Lerner, John Doe managers, Shirley Abrahamson).
This has to be disappointing for Eric O’Keefe who is engaged in this fight nearly solo. He addressed a meeting I attended Thursday night and he seemed very confident that this ruling would go his way and that his lonely battle would soon be over.
FReep Mail me if you want on, or off, this Wisconsin interest ping list.
Post #4 should have gone to the Ping list.
So is this judge a RAT?
This GAB system and secret prosecutions reminds me of the dreaded “Star Chamber” trials of centuries past.
Tyranny and abuse of power is always finding ways to repeat its actions clocking them as required by events.
Seriously, I hope it all comes out and those Nazis that did this face serious charges.
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It would be nice if these ‘RAT Stasi operatives suffered serious charges...but they likely won’t. There are too many ‘RAT judges extant that will protect them come what may. These ‘RAT judges may also try to limit the public release of the “embarrassing” information until after the 2016 elections or, perhaps, permanently prevent its release.
His late father was Gov. of Wisconsin and was a Republican. I don’t know the political leanings of the son, however. Judges are supposed to be impartial.
The leftists in Wisconsin are used to having the media cover for them, not expose them.
The narrative the old media in Wisconsin treats this as the embattled prosecutor working hard at exposing the capitalist running dogs of Walker and Company, as they attempted to take the bread from the mouths of babies.
But most of Wisconsin is not on the Teacher Union payroll, and is tired of supporting their tax funded habits.
I think this will come out, and will gain traction.
Eric O’Keefe is a hero.
“His late father was Gov. of Wisconsin and was a Republican. I don’t know the political leanings of the son, however. Judges are supposed to be impartial.”
I suppose sequestering the information prior to trial is proper. But I think at the end of the day, the good citizens of Wisconsin deserve to see everything related to the GAB, particularly if the people who have abused this agency are not punished. The whole concept of a secrecy-based government investigative agency sends chills up and down my spine. I find it surprising that the Republican-led legislature hasn’t dealt with this yet.
They weren’t fastidious about leaking anything slightly embarasing to Walker. By the time the trial comes the GAB will no longer exist. However, someone should kick that Kennedy guy in the ass.
And the tooth fairy puts a dollar under your pillow when you lose a tooth.
Criminals unanimously love to use confidentiality Laws to hide their crime.
The only astonishing additional fact is that there was no review for Constitutional validity challenge prior to adopting the law!
The John Doe law in Wisconsin is unique in that it provides for these open-ended investigations and top secrecy. These folks went over the top, however, intimidating children about the raids. The John Doe law in WI dates back to our Territorial Days, so Constitutionality wasn’t a question at that time. I guess those niceties were overlooked when we became a state
bkmk
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