Supreme Court primary nearly certain; partisan politics is issue

Talk about it

A three-way primary for the Wisconsin Supreme Court is one step away from being assured.

Incumbent Justice Pat Roggensack and challengers Ed Fallone and Vince Megna all filed their nomination papers by the Jan. 2 deadline. If state election officials confirm that they have enough signatures, all three will square off in a Feb. 19 primary.

Roggensack filed her papers last Friday. The other two filed this week, and they took digs at each other as well as Roggensack.

Fallone, a Marquette law professor, criticized attorney Megna for declaring himself as a Democrat and opposing Wisconsin’s voter ID law.

Megna says voters deserve to know where he stands, and he also came out against assault rifles. But the Milwaukee Lemon Law attorney stopped short of saying how he’d rule on both issues if they come up before the Supreme Court.

The court is supposed to impartial and non-partisan, but Roggensack is part of the court’s conservative majority, and former state Republican Party director Brandon Scholz is her campaign adviser.

Fallone has two Democratic operatives on his side – Melissa Mulliken and Nathan Schwantes – but the candidate said he chose the two for their talents and not their party affiliations.

Both Fallone and Megna say they want to restore civility to the Supreme Court, in the wake of the 2011 incident in which Justice David Prosser placed his hands around Justice Ann Walsh Bradley’s neck.

Roggensack said the justices are getting along just fine. Scholz said the election should be about Roggensack’s experience and not about Prosser’s and Bradley’s disagreements.

Two file for state superintendent

The two candidates for Wisconsin public school superintendent took jabs at each other about their qualifications right after they filed their nomination papers this week.

Incumbent Tony Evers said he has 36 years of experience as a teacher and a school administrator and Assembly Republican Don Pridemore cannot match that.

But the Hartford Representative said he’s a father, and he has served on the Assembly’s Education Committee. Pridemore said school safety should be handled by the individual districts as they see fit, but he said he won’t discuss any other policy ideas until he formally rolls them out during the next few weeks.

Evers has spent four years as the head of the state Department of Public Instruction. He said he wants another four years so he can keep working on a new way to pay for Wisconsin’s public schools.

Assuming both filed adequate signatures, they’ll face each other in the April 2 general election.

Tags: state news, politics, wisconsin