MILWAUKEE — Conservative Brad Schimel accused the liberal Wisconsin Supreme Court of carrying out a political agenda, saying if elected to an open seat he would help restore the rule of law.
Liberal rival Susan Crawford countered the former GOP attorney general was paying “lip service to the principle of impartiality and open-mindedness.” She added he’s made promises to supporters in private that he would rule the Wisconsin Constitution doesn’t include the right to an abortion.
During their first and only debate of the campaign Wednesday night at Marquette University Law School, Crawford also said Schimel is beholden to Elon Musk. She charged that the billionaire and Donald Trump adviser is trying to “buy a justice” on the Wisconsin Supreme Court.
Schimel knocked the wealthy donors on the Dem side, calling megadonor George Soros “a dangerous person to have an endorsement from.”
The two clashed repeatedly in the debate ahead of the high-stakes election April 1 that will determine ideological control of the state Supreme Court, hitting each other on abortion, their legal judgment and crime.
Schimel, a Waukesha County Circuit Court judge, insisted from the opening bell that he isn’t “rooting for any team” when he puts on the black robe and would do the same if elected to the state’s highest court.
“Justice is no longer blind on the Supreme Court,” Schimel said of the current 4-3 liberal majority. “That’s what’s at stake.”
Crawford followed by slamming Schimel on abortion, saying he has said an 1849 law that had been interpreted as banning abortion in almost all cases is “valid.”
“That is not the kind of open-mindedness that we expect from judges. It prejudices the parties in the case,” the Dane County Circuit Court judge said.
Schimel countered that the comment had been taken out of context, saying Crawford had someone record his speech and only released part of what he said. Schimel said the law had been passed by a Legislature and signed by a governor 176 years ago.
”It was a validly passed law. I don’t believe that it reflects the will of the people of Wisconsin today,” Schimel said.
Record spending
WisPolitics has tracked a record $59 million already dropped on this year’s race, which has drawn national interests. That has already topped the $56 million that was spent on the 2023 campaign as Janet Protasiewicz won an open seat on the court, giving liberals control for the first time in 15 years.
Schimel said he has no control over outside spending and slammed Crawford over Soros, who gave $1 million to the state Dem Party in January. Shortly afterward, it made a $2 million transfer to Crawford’s campaign. Schimel said Soros has funded district attorneys and judges who have “let dangerous criminals out on the street” and supported the defund the police movement.
Schimel also knocked a Friday rally in Kenosha featuring U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vermont. Video shared on social media showed a transgender performer at the event singing a song with the lyric, “Does your god have a big fat d–k? Cause it feels like he’s f–king me.”
Schimel called it “grotesque” and an attack on people of faith. He complained no one in the media has asked Crawford to disavow that, saying she should.
Crawford said she disavowed the lyrics, adding she doesn’t agree with some of the sentiments in the song. She added it wasn’t her event.
She then pivoted to Musk, highlighting the lawsuit his company has filed challenging a Wisconsin law that bars car manufacturers from owning dealerships. Crawford also knocked Musk, saying he’s firing air traffic controllers and those trying to solve the avian bird flu.
WisPolitics reported earlier this week two groups linked to Musk have now spent more than $12 million on the race.
“He’s basically taken over Brad Schimel’s campaign,” Crawford said.
‘Elon Schimel’ remark ‘slip of the tongue’
Crawford near the end of the debate referred to Schimel as “Elon Schimel.” That drew a rebuke during post-debate comments from former GOP Lt. Gov. Rebecca Kleefisch, who called the moniker “insulting, “silly” and “childish.”
Crawford after the debate said the remark was “a slip of the tongue.”
The two also had an exchange over Schimel’s support for Trump.
Asked if he would ever rule against Trump, Schimel said he’d do so if the president violated the law or brought a lawsuit in which he was wrong on the law.
“I don’t have any personal loyalty to him that supersedes the oath I take as a judge,” Schimel said.
But Crawford accused Schimel of changing his message before different audiences, pointing out he’s said before partisan crowds that he’d be part of Trump’s support network and that the state Supreme Court “screwed over” Trump in 2020.
Crawford said Schimel’s “screwed over” comments were about a Trump lawsuit to “throw out results of the Wisconsin election in 2020.”
But Schimel said his comments were instead about the Supreme Court deciding against hearing the Green Party’s lawsuit to get on the 2020 ballot after the Wisconsin Elections Commission denied the party access.
“I have said that was a mistake,” Schimel said. “The court should have heard the case, decided that issue, so we would know whether the Green Party had a right to be on the ballot or not.”
He added the decision affected the outcome.
“Yes, that did screw up an election because Donald Trump lost by 21,000 votes; the Green Party ticket typically takes over 30,000 votes,” Schimel said. “So the decision not to hear that case did affect the outcome of an election.”
Candidates defend their sentences
A series of ads in the election have focused on sentences each gave to criminal defendants.
Crawford said she did not regret in 2020 sentencing a man convicted of sexual assault to four years in prison after prosecutors requested a 10-year sentence.
“I don’t regret that sentence because I followed the law in that case, as I always do,” Crawford said.
She said the law requires judges to consider relevant aggravating and mitigating factors, and the Supreme Court ruled judges must give the minimum prison sentence necessary to protect the public.
“That’s what I did in that case and every other case,” she said. “And my goal is to always keep the community safe. And those have been sentences that have been successful. They have kept the community safe, unlike the short jail sentences that Brad Schimel has entered over and over where people have gone on to commit new crimes.”
Schimel responded that in the cases Crawford cited in her ads he’s always followed the wishes of the victims and the prosecutors in sentencing.
“My opponent just revealed the problem in her judgment, that weighing all the factors, giving the minimum amount of time to a dangerous sex offender weighs higher than protecting the community,” he said.
See Ad Watch for the latest ads in the race.
This story was updated at 10:07 p.m. to add additional content.
