While lawmakers meet in an extraordinary session to quickly pass a right-to-work bill, union leaders are sponsoring an opposition rally at the state Capitol. Senate Bill 44 will be debated in the Committee on Labor, with a Senate floor vote expected on Wednesday, February 24.

The Assembly is expected to take action on Assembly Bill 61 after the Senate passes its version of the bill. The AFL-CIO held a press conference urging members to tell their senators to vote against the bill.

Gov. Scott Walker has indicated he will sign the bill if passed.

Photo of the interior of the Wisconsin State Capitol by Dori on Wikimedia Commons.

U.S. District Court Judge Charles Clevert ruled several portions of Wisconsin’s campaign finance laws unconstitutional. The court permanently enjoined the state from enforcing campaign finance laws against groups discussing candidates. Those laws, however, continue to be enforceable against express advocacy.

The court also struck down attribution and disclaimer requirements as applied to radio speech 30 seconds or shorter and enjoined enforcement of limits on what organizations could spend to solicit contributions to their own political committees.

U.S. District Judge Rudolph Randa ordered Wisconsin officials to stop enforcing the state law prohibiting certain coordination between candidate campaigns and independent groups. Randa’s order came in a lawsuit filed by Citizens for Responsible Government Advocates against the state Government Accountability Board and Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm.

Randa ruled the state cannot regulate groups coordinating with candidates, so long as the groups engage in issue advocacy. Groups engaging in issue advocacy generally make efforts to favor or criticize a candidate without explicitly urging a vote for or against the candidate.

The case will likely be appealed considering Randa’s prior related decision to halt a John Doe investigation against the campaign of Gov. Scott Walker was overturned by the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

A federal judge entered a preliminary injunction in favor of a conservative group challenging the state’s limits on the amount candidates can collect from political action committees. The group argued the limits infringed upon its First Amendment free speech rights.

The judge agreed and issued a preliminary injunction preventing the Government Accountability Board from enforcing the limit.

Democrat Mary Burke will face Republican Gov. Scott Walker in the November general election.

Burke, a former Trek Bicycle executive and state commerce secretary, is the first woman to be nominated by a major party for governor in Wisconsin.

A recent Marquette University Law School poll found women support Burke by a 48 to 41 percent margin, while men support Walker 52 to 42 percent.

A federal lawsuit has been filed to challenge the state law limiting campaign contributions to candidates from political action committees (PACs).

The CRG Network (CRG), a PAC working to elect conservative candidates, filed the lawsuit in the Milwaukee U.S. District Court against the state Government Accountability Board. CRG argues its rights to free speech and free association have been denied because of PAC contribution limits.

The Wisconsin Supreme Court upheld the law in 1990, but subsequent U.S. Supreme Court rulings may make the earlier state Supreme Court case irrelevant.

Prosecutors claim Gov. Scott Walker was involved with a plan to illegally coordinate fundraising with outside conservative groups to help him and several Republican senators survive a 2012 recall election. In court documents recently unsealed, prosecutors detail a criminal scheme by Walker and top aides to circumvent state law by helping plan campaign spending by a dozen outside groups.

No charges have been filed against Walker or any of his staffers. The documents became public as part of an ongoing lawsuit by Wisconsin Club for Growth, a group at the center of the investigation. A federal appeals judge now is considering whether to permanently stop the investigation.

Photo of Gov. Scott Walker courtesy of Gage Skidmore on Wikimedia Commons.

Targets of a John Doe investigation by the Government Accountability Board (GAB) have countered by filing suit against GAB. Conservative activist Eric O’Keefe, his Wisconsin Club for Growth, and “others similarly situated” filed the lawsuit in the Waukesha County Circuit Court.

The plaintiffs allege GAB does not have the statutory authority to appoint and pay special investigators to probe conservative organizations suspected of illegally coordinating with Gov. Scott Walker’s campaign during the state’s partisan recall elections.

The lawsuit follows a U.S. District Court decision effectively ending the John Doe investigation and a 7th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals decision declaring the state’s campaign laws restricting issue advertising unconstitutional.

The Government Accountability Board (GAB) is seeking comment on new guidelines for lobbyist campaign contributions. Following changes to campaign fundraising rules pursuant to 2013 Wisconsin Act 153, GAB concluded a lobbyist may deliver or convey a campaign contribution on behalf of a political action committee, conduit, or other person to a candidate for any office at any time.

The draft changes to GAB guidelines 1249 and 1250 are available here. Comments should be sent to Division Administrator Jonathan Becker at jonathan.becker@wi.gov or (608) 267-0647 by June 2, 2014.

The Government Accountability Board (GAB) voted to allow lobbyists to pass along donations from political action committees and clients to state lawmakers at any point during the year.

GAB previously concluded recently signed Senate Bill 655 removed the ability of lobbyists to deliver anyone else’s contribution at any time.

The change in interpretation was supported by Republican legislative leaders, lobbyists, and attorneys for the Legislature.

The 7th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals has declared portions of the state’s campaign finance laws restricting issue advertising unconstitutional. Wisconsin Right to Life Inc. and its state political action committee sued the Government Accountability Board (GAB) to prevent enforcement of state statutes and rules against issue advocacy groups spending money for political speech independently of candidates and parties.

The decision prevents GAB from enforcing both the state’s ban on political spending by corporations and the amount a corporation may spend on fundraising for an affiliated political action committee. The ruling will also affect a secret John Doe investigation into conservative organizations suspected of illegally coordinating with Gov. Scott Walker’s campaign during the state’s partisan recall elections.

The Government Accountability Board (GAB) has concluded a recently signed law allowing lobbyists to personally give campaign contributions a couple of months earlier also prohibits them from providing such contributions on behalf of clients at any time.

Whether by design or by drafting error, a late amendment to Senate Bill 655 removed the provision to allow a lobbyist to deliver a client’s contribution at any time.

GAB will review the matter at its meeting on May 21, 2014. The Legislature would have to reconvene to fix a drafting error.

Aggregate contribution limits for individuals and PACs contributing to state candidates are no longer enforceable, according to the settlement reached in Young v. Government Accountability Board.

The federal case challenging Wisconsin’s aggregate limits was on hold until the Supreme Court struck down aggregate limits for federal elections in McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission.

Before the settlement, Wisconsin law prohibited donors from giving more than $10,000 a year to all candidates combined.

The aggregate contribution limits for individuals and PACs contributing to state candidates are expected to be unenforceable following the Supreme Court’s McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission repeal of federal aggregate limits. The federal case challenging Wisconsin’s aggregate limits has been on hold pending McCutcheon. Young v. GAB seeks to remove aggregate limits set to prohibit even a $1 contribution if the individual donor has given the maximum $10,000 contribution to a single candidate.

The Government Accountability Board (GAB) has moved to dismiss the case, arguing the complaint does not sufficiently allege Mr. Young is harmed by the limit.