In his latest grievance over the 2020 election and subsequent court rulings, President Donald Trump took to Twitter Monday to lambast conservative Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Brian Hagedorn for rejecting Trump’s last-ditch effort to overturn the results.
“Two years ago, the great people of Wisconsin asked me to endorse a man named Brian Hagedorn for State Supreme Court Justice, when he was getting destroyed in the Polls against a tough Democrat Candidate who had no chance of losing. After my endorsement, Hagedorn easily won!” Trump tweeted on Monday.
The president’s tweet is in reference to Hagedorn’s 2019 race against liberal state appeals judge Lisa Neubauer. There is no record of Trump endorsing Hagedorn, though the president did congratulate him after his victory last year.
“WOW, he just voted against me in a Big Court Decision on voter fraud (of which there was much!), despite many pages of dissent from three highly respected Justices,” Trump added. “One thing has nothing to do with another, but we ended up losing 4-3 in a really incorrect ruling! Great Republicans in Wisconsin should take these 3 strong decisions to their State Legislators and overturn this ridiculous State Election. We won in a LANDSLIDE!”
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Trump’s campaign never argued the votes were fraudulent. Instead the campaign argued some of the rules governing certain absentee ballots did not comply with state law and that more than 220,000 absentee ballots cast in only two heavily Democratic counties should be tossed out. That was rejected last week by the Wisconsin Supreme Court in a 4-3 ruling written by Hagedorn and joined by the court’s three liberal members.
Writing for the majority, Hagedorn said instead of seeking to cancel people’s votes after they were cast, the campaign should have challenged the rules voters and clerks relied on before the election. Most of those rules have been in place for several previous elections and apply statewide, not just in the counties where Trump was seeking to toss votes.
President-elect Joe Biden won the state by more than 20,600 votes, a margin similar to Trump’s 2016 victory in Wisconsin over Hillary Clinton. For the most part, the guidance followed in this year’s presidential election was the same guidance as in 2016, when Trump won.
Hagedorn, who said Tuesday he’d prefer not to comment on Trump’s latest tweets, told WISN 12 News Monday he has received extra police protection following several high-profile cases in which he sided with the state Supreme Court’s three liberal justices.
“I’ve definitely had some extra police protection,” Hagedorn told WISN 12. “Not just me but some of the justices because of some of the things directed our way. I’m not aware of any specific death threats necessarily. There are some things that are concerning and not fun as a father of five children to hear. It’s been the case that my 12-year-old daughter asked me at one point, ‘Dad can we play in the front yard today or should we play in the backyard?’”
Fave 5: State government reporter Mitchell Schmidt shares his top stories of 2020
Choosing my five favorite stories of 2020 seems almost paradoxical.
This year has felt like one exhausting slog of pandemic stories, state Legislature updates and, oh yeah, a presidential election thrown in for good measure. Thanks to a split government, there's been no shortage of politically-charged stories here in Wisconsin and the partisan divide has, maybe unsurprisingly, felt as wide as ever throughout the COVID-19 pandemic.
I don't know if "favorite" is the best way to describe them, but here are a few stories from 2020 that stood out to me:
Back in March, Gov. Tony Evers issued the state's first public health emergency in response to the then-emerging pandemic. At the time, Wisconsin had reported eight total cases of COVID-19.
As the pandemic progressed, positive cases and deaths climbed and state lawmakers battled over the appropriate response. In May, the Wisconsin Supreme Court struck down Evers' stay-at-home order, a decision that still resonates today with the state's coronavirus-related measures.
One story I was particularly excited about before I officially started working for the State Journal was the 2020 Democratic National Convention in Milwaukee. However, like most things this year, the pandemic drastically altered that plan.
In non-pandemic news, the state in October formally denied billions of dollars in state tax credits to Foxconn Technology Group — a story we managed to get before any other outlet in the state through records requests and sourcing.
Lastly, in November I worked on a story about how GOP-drawn legislative maps once again disproportionately benefited Republicans in state elections. Wisconsin is headed toward another legal battle next year when the next batch of 10-year maps are drawn.
Feel free to read my top stories below, or check out my other state government articles from this year, (by my count, there have been more than 300 so far).
Also, thanks to all the subscribers out there. This year has been challenging on so many people, so your support is so much appreciated.
Gov. Tony Evers declared a public health emergency in response to the growing number of COVID-19 coronavirus cases in Wisconsin, hours before …
In a 4-3 decision, the Wisconsin Supreme Court on Wednesday struck down the state’s stay-at-home order, handing Democratic Gov. Tony Evers a d…
With the nation continuing to deal with the COVID-19 pandemic, the DNC Committee announced first that delegates and then that most convention …
Wisconsin is denying Foxconn Technology Group billions of dollars in state tax credits until officials with the company come to the table to d…
Continuing a decade-long trend in Wisconsin due in part to GOP-drawn legislative maps, Democratic candidates on Tuesday secured fewer legislat…