The Milwaukee Post

8 • Milwaukee County Post • 0505, 2017 If God had assigned the Wisconsin Department of Justice to investigate the murder of Abel, Cain would have gotten away with it. But a watershed moment occurred April 28. The guy who runs the agency, Republican Attorney General Brad Schimel, figured out that his investigators may be do-nothing stiffs. Perhaps that is unfair but it's a hard con- clusion to avoid when looking at the way the DOJ's top investigator stiffed his "investiga- tion" into hidden camera video that showed two top liberal political operatives openly bragging about committing vote fraud in Wisconsin. The sham "investigation" was so embarrassing that Schimel himself went on my radio program and was forced to contra- dict his earlier statements that the investiga- tion — virtually nonexistent as it was — was closed. Late last year, Project Veritas Action, an investigative organization run by conserva- tive James O'Keefe, publicly released videos of Scott Foval, a longtime Wisconsin liberal organizer, and Robert Creamer, a Chicago- based operative with deep ties to the Democratic Party, boasting of their shenani- gans. Foval's comments were especially revealing because he specifically talked about ways to commit election fraud in Wisconsin. Among other things, Foval explained that the best way to illegally trans- port Illinois residents to Wisconsin to cast votes is to buy cars from one of the local auto action agencies, slap Wisconsin plates on them, and then use them to run illegal voters up from Illinois. It's possible Foval was just bragging about something he never really did but it was a remarkable lead into poten- tial massive illegal electioneering. After the tape was released, Attorney General Schimel launched an "investiga- tion." But that investigation appears to be nothing more than one of Schimel's top assistants, longtime state attorney Roy Korte, watching the videos. Korte wrote a January memo that was released to the media last week that said the video showed no proof of criminal activity. Korte's memo said it was unclear if Foval was telling the truth and also unclear if his comments were made in Wisconsin. So, he closed the case. This appears to be the beginning, middle and end of Korte's investigation. If so, Korte has as much business running an investiga- tive agency as I do singing tenor at the Metropolitan Opera. A competent investiga- tor would have used the tape as a starting point, not the end, of the investigation. Auto purchase and license records are easily obtainable. Did Foval's employees buy a lot of cars at auto auctions? What does Foval say about it? What do the other employees of his organization have to say? What do the financials of Foval's group, People For the American Way, reveal? Those are just starters. The tape, in and of itself, didn't prove any crime but it certainly ought to have been a starting point for a criminal investigation. Korte investigated nothing. Project Veritas' O'Keefe blasted Schimel for the pathetically weak "probe." Schimel responded by coming on my radio program and saying the investi- gation was actually not over and that agents would now look at an additional 100 hours of video supplied by O'Keefe's group. Why the Schimel reversal? The best theory is that Schimel kicked the investigation over to Korte and never gave it another thought. When Korte closed the case, Schimel, apa- thetic about the whole thing, assumed Korte looked into it and found nothing. When he realized Korte's investigation consisted of nothing more than watching a video, Schimel, to his credit, realized his agency had just conducted the laziest and most inept job of policing since Barney Fife. Schimel deserves credit for keeping the investigation open and criticism for not rid- ing herd on it in the first place. Contrast the "see no evil, hear no evil" investigation of the Veritas tapes with the multiyear witch hunt into the Gov. Scott Walker campaign and state conservative organizations. That was an unending John Doe investigation that saw dozens of employees turning over all of their personal records in a desperate and futile attempt to find some evidence of a crime. Schimel should not abuse the rights of targets the way the Republicans were persecuted. But in a state in which Democrat prosecutors are willing to trample all over the Constitution to try to throw Republicans in jail, it would be nice if Republican prosecutors at least investigated actual political crime. The media in this state and many state Republican leaders have yawned about vote fraud for years. This has infuriated those of us who believe the system of democracy is delegitimized when elections are stolen and legal voters are disenfranchised by fraudu- lent votes. The non-investigation of the Veritas tapes was a new low. But it was such a debacle that it may now force the Department of Justice to conduct a real investigation with subpoenas, search war- rants and interviews. If Schimel isn't willing to make sure that's what his staff does, conservative leaders need to start recruiting an attorney general candidate who will. (Mark Belling is the host of a daily WISN radio talk show. His column appears weekly in the Milwaukee Post. Send your personal correspondences to Mark Belling at Clear Channel Communications, c/o WISN, 12100 W. Howard Ave., Greenfield, WI 53228). MARK BELLING STANDING UP for MILWAUKEE AG Schimel embarrassed into reopening vote fraud case OPINION Send your letters to: The Milwaukee Post, c/o Dan Muckelbauer, 3397 S. Howell Ave., Milwaukee, WI 53207, or by email to: dmuck@conleynet.com. We reserve the right to edit letters for style, length and clarity. Letters should be typewritten or printed and include full name, phone number and address. Please keep your letters to no more than 400 words. Letters policy Justice Neil Gorsuch carries record of extremely narrow interpretation of the law To the editor: The right wing is happy with the instal- lation of Neil Gorsuch on the Supreme Court. To do so they had to support for our nation's highest office an admitted sexual offender of women, President Donald Trump, and as Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, stat- ed, a "pathological liar" and "a narcissist at a level I don't think this country has ever seen." So what did the country get for all this in Gorsuch? While he doesn't display the boorish behavior of the man who selected him, his past decisions and his short time on the Supreme Court so far should give great pause. As an appellate judge, Gorsuch ruled against a truck driver named Alphonse Maddin whose truck had broken down in subzero weather and his employer told him to wait with his load in an unheated cabin. He was told by the truck driving firm to stay with his load or drive (very dangerous- ly) the truck and its load with frozen brakes, risking a huge accident. Well, he didn't do as they demanded, rightly, because he possibly faced freezing to death or could have killed someone on the high- way. He was fired. Judge Gorsuch upheld this firing, siding with the company in a very limited reading of a federal law writ- ten to protect truck drivers like Maddin. So right away we see that Gorsuch was more concerned with the interests of a firm than a trucker who might have died. In his first decision on the Supreme Court, Gorsuch voted to allow the state of Arkansas to continue with the execution of Ledell Lee. Lee was denied a DNA test by Arkansas because the state wanted to exe- cute him, among other inmates, before the expiration date of a drug (midazolam) to kill them expired. While reading stories like this makes me glad that Wisconsin did away with the barbaric death penalty a long time ago, it gives me little confidence in Gorusch upholding justice and fairness under the law. If Gorusch is what a supposed constitu- tionalist means, then we have some serious problems with those who call themselves that. They seem to be disdainful of the rights of those in the minority or the pow- erless and more concerned about the pow- erful and connected. The courts don't exist to enforce the most narrow reading of rights and liberties granted under the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. I wish someone would tell that to Gorsuch. Jerome McCollom Milwaukee LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

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