Saturday, August 13, 2022

Day 415 of Wisconsin's election review clown show circus, starring disgraced former State Supreme Court justice Michael Gableman

 
The end of the story?
 
Headline:  Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 8/12/2022
Vos did not respond to multiple requests from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel for comment. He told WISN-12's Matt Smith in an interview for UPFRONT that Gableman was sent a letter
"We did it through the process of the contract," Vos said. "I really don't think there's any need to have a discussion. He did a good job last year, kind of got off the rails this year and now we're going to end the investigation." 
Vos' decision to fire Gableman comes a week after Trump announced to a Waukesha crowd that Gableman had turned on Vos and that Gableman, like Trump, had endorsed Vos' primary opponent Adam Steen. Vos won the primary Tuesday but only barely — defeating Steen by just 260 votes.
This was the first headline Retiring Guy saw that announced Vos's action.


Keep in mind that with all of his violations of the Espionage Act sucking the oxygen our of media rooms everywhere, Trump is too distracted to stay focused on his ongoing fued with Vos.

Retiring Guy thinks we haven't heard the end of this termination.


HeadlineWisocnsin Public Radio, 8/10/2022
The letter came the day after Vos nearly lost a primary challenge to Republican Adam Steen, who campaigned on decertifying the 2020 election, which legal experts say is impossible. 
Steen was endorsed by former President Donald Trump, who had pressured Vos repeatedly on decertification, and Gableman who issued a robocall claiming the speaker stood in the way of his investigation. 
"Everything that my office and I have been able to do to expose all the corruption that took place has been in spite of Robin and not because of him," said Gableman in a recording obtained by WisPolitics. 
After declaring victory Tuesday night with a margin of less than 300 votes, Vos called Gableman "an embarrassment to the state" and said he would be talking to Republican caucus members about next steps regarding Gableman's investigation.

HeadlineWisconsin State Journal, 8/10/2022
Vos more or less single-handedly created the Office of the Special Counsel and picked Gableman to lead it, with a budget of hundreds of thousands of dollars. The goal of the OSC? To investigate “potential irregularities and/or illegalities” in the 2020 presidential election in Wisconsin. 
Vos and Gableman agree there were “problems” with the operation of the 2020 election, but they disagree about what to do next. 
Gableman has repeatedly asserted that retroactively decertifying the election is possible and should be considered. Vos has been steadfast in saying that decertification is not possible.

Headline:  Wisconsin State Journal, 8/10/2022
He also called former state Supreme Court Justice Michael Gableman, whom he hired to review the 2020 election, “an embarrassment to this state,” a stunning rebuke after Gableman endorsed Steen and appeared at Steen’s election night watch party at a Racine County funeral home. 
Vos also said he would meet with the Republican caucus to discuss whether Gableman’s investigation, which has found no evidence of widespread fraud after costing taxpayers over $1 million, would continue.
And who unleashed this beast?  

We're waiting for an apology, Robin.


Headline:  WisPolitics, 8/9/2022
Former Supreme Court Justice Michael Gableman recorded a robocall urging voters to support Adam Steen in tomorrow’s GOP primary, saying Assembly Speaker Robin Vos “never wanted a real investigation into the 2020 election in Wisconsin.” 
Vos, R-Rochester, said the call shows how desperate Gableman is to remain relevant.
Sounds like Vos stamped 'expired' on Gabby's forehead.


Headline:  Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 8/6/2022
Gableman, who gave an invocation at former President Donald Trump's Waukesha rally on Friday, is endorsing Assembly Speaker Robin Vos' primary opponent and plans to campaign with the longshot candidate in the days before Tuesday's election. 
Trump shared Gableman's endorsement of Adam Steen, a Republican who is challenging Vos in the 63rd Assembly District, at his Friday rally — an announcement that appeared to catch Gableman by surprise. 
"I wasn't expecting anyone to be interested in me at all," he said after the rally as the Village People's "Macho Man" played in the background and attendees filed back to their cars. 
"That was a surprise." 
Gableman said he had a long day, at least six hours of which was spent at Trump's rally, and would call a Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reporter on Saturday to discuss the endorsement.


HeadlineMilwaukee Journal Sentinel, 8/5/2022
Former Supreme Court Justice Michael Gableman, who is overseeing a taxpayer-funded review of the 2020 election for Vos, led the crowd in prayer at the start of the rally, asking God to protect the former president. 
His praise of Trump came after repeatedly claiming throughout the 13-month review that it was a nonpartisan endeavor.


Headline:  Washington Post, 8/2/2022
It was an extraordinary public statement from a former state Supreme Court justice hired by Republican lawmakers to probe the 2020 election: Wisconsin should take a “hard look” at canceling Joe Biden’s victory and revoking the state’s 10 electoral college votes. 
The comment in March drew applause from a packed hearing room in the state Capitol and praise from former president Donald Trump, whose allies have called for throwing out the results in Wisconsin and other battleground states even though constitutional scholars have scoffed at the notion as absurd. 
But a newly unearthed memo shows that the former justice, Michael Gableman, soon afterward offered a far different analysis in private. 
“While decertification of the 2020 presidential election is theoretically possible, it is unprecedented and raises numerous substantial constitutional issues that would be difficult to resolve. Thus, the legal obstacles to its accomplishment render such an outcome a practical impossibility,” Gableman wrote to Assembly Speaker Robin Vos.  [emphasis added]


Headline:  Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 8/1/2022
Taxpayers also will cover fees for attorneys representing Gableman and Assembly Speaker Robin Vos. Gableman hired prominent conservative attorney James Bopp to represent him in the lawsuit. Bopp said Monday he charges $450 per hour and is not the only attorney working on the case. James Bopp. 
The pair of rulings add to the bill taxpayers will cover for the review that Gableman began more than a year ago and used to push for the impossible and illegal effort to overturn the 2020 election results and to elevate his profile among supporters of former President Donald Trump. 
Those costs to taxpayers have eclipsed $1 million 
The review, launched by Vos, has not revealed any evidence to question Joe Biden's victory over Trump in 2020 by about 21,000 votes.


Headline:  Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 7/28/2022
The review has cost residents more than $1 million so far and yielded no evidence of fraud. 
“I guess what we found out from this long and torturous road is that, at least for the first part of this investigation, there was no actual work being done," Bailey-Rihn said. "The taxpayers were paying $11,000 for somebody to sit at the New Berlin library to learn about election law because they had no experience in election law.”


HeadlineCBS News, 7/28/2022
Dane County Circuit Judge Valerie Bailey-Rihn awarded about $98,000 in attorneys' fees to the liberal watchdog group American Oversight, bringing an end in circuit court to one of four lawsuits the group filed. Vos's attorney, Ron Stadler, said he was recommending that Vos appeal the ruling. 
The fees will be paid by taxpayers, which is why the judge said she was not also awarding additional punitive damages against Vos. Costs to taxpayers for the investigation, including ongoing legal fees, have exceeded $1 million. 
"I think the people of the state of Wisconsin have been punished enough for this case," Bailey-Rihn said. "I don't think it does anyone any good to have punitive damages placed on the innocent people of this state."
Related series of posts:
Days 293 through 395.  (4/17/2022 to 7/25/2020)

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