Republicans should not pursue impeachment of a liberal Wisconsin Supreme Court justice, concluded a conservative former justice whom Wisconsin Republicans tasked with looking into the matter.
“To sum up my views, there should be no effort to impeach Justice [Janet] Protasiewicz on anything we know now,” David Prosser wrote in a letter dated Friday to state Assembly Speaker Robin Vos, a Republican.
“Impeachment is so serious, severe, and rare that it should not be considered unless the subject has committed a crime, or the subject has committed indisputable corrupt conduct while in office,” he continued.
Prosser’s letter was obtained Monday by American Oversight, a left-leaning government watchdog, as part of a public records request related to a suit alleging that a panel Vos convened to explore whether Protasiewicz could be impeached had violated state laws by not letting members of the public attend its meetings. American Oversight shared the documents with NBC News. Prosser’s letter was first reported by The Associated Press.
Protasiewicz's win in April was a significant success for liberals, because it gave them their first majority on the technically nonpartisan court in 15 years.
Weeks after she was sworn in, Wisconsin Republicans, including Vos, began discussing the possibility of impeaching her if she refused to recuse herself from a redistricting lawsuit that could upend the GOP’s power in the Legislature.
Last month, Vos convened the panel of three former state Supreme Court justices to explore whether it would be possible to impeach Protasiewicz. Prosser — a Republican former Assembly speaker — is the only member whose identity is publicly known.
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Prosser said the Wisconsin Constitution “clearly” outlines that the Assembly’s powers to impeach civil officers are “limited to” those who have “engaged in ‘corrupt conduct in office, or for crimes and misdemeanors,’” adding that Protasiewicz’s previous comments about her views on the Republican-drawn maps did not amount to such conduct.
“Corrupt conduct is not a term that is open to a mere political grievance,” he wrote.
During her campaign for Supreme Court, Protasiewicz criticized the state’s maps as being “unfair” and “rigged” — statements that Wisconsin Republicans have used to demand that she recuse herself from all redistricting cases before the high court.
On Friday, Protasiewicz formally said she would not recuse herself from one such suit, leading to a 4-3 vote of the justices to hear the case during the current term.
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Prosser, however, seemed to defend Protasiewicz at times in his letter, pointing out that she had also “repeatedly stated that she could not say how she would decide a case about the reapportionment maps" and that “she would not participate in a case in which the Democratic Party of Wisconsin was a party.”
“These two statements reveal that Justice Protasiewicz is conscious of the Supreme Court’s ethical rules for justices and judges,” he wrote.
A spokesperson for Vos did not respond to questions about whether he would still move forward with impeachment efforts.
The release of Prosser’s letter is the latest development in a monthslong saga following Protasiewicz’s win, which gave the court’s new liberal majority the power to determine the future of several pivotal issues the court is likely to decide in the coming years, including abortion rights and the state’s legislative maps.
The current map, which experts have said is one of the most gerrymandered in the country, was approved by the state Supreme Court last year. (As is the case in many states, in Wisconsin, if the governor and the Legislature cannot agree on legislative maps, the issue falls to the state Supreme Court.) A map more favorable to Democrats could threaten to undo decades of Republican lawmaking.
Just days after Protasiewicz’s victory in April, some Republican lawmakers began openly talking about the possibility of impeaching her. Such chatter among Republicans never abated.
In a Sept. 13 announcement, Vos said he had tasked a panel of “former members of the Wisconsin Supreme Court to review and advise what the criteria are for impeachment” and directed the group to “come back with an analysis to say whether or not” impeachment “is possible and how it should occur.”
The secretive group has still not disclosed the identities of its two other members, though text messages Prosser released in response to the American Oversight suit indicate that former state Supreme Court Justice Patience Roggensack — the conservative jurist whom Protasiewicz replaced after she retired — was part of it. A spokesperson for Roggensack didn't immediately respond to questions.
In recent weeks, momentum against the feasibility of impeachment proceedings against Protasiewicz has grown. Last week, for example, before the release of the Prosser letter, the Wisconsin Judicial Commission, which handles disciplinary matters of state judges, rejected a lawsuit alleging that her comments about the maps during her campaign had violated the state’s Code of Judicial Ethics.
Meanwhile, the court’s new liberal majority got off to a tense start, with the initial days of the fresh term kicking off in August with the firing of a longtime court officer and days of bitter news releases and tweets among the justices.
