Earlier this summer, a draft opinion from the Wisconsin Supreme Court regarding a Planned Parenthood lawsuit was leaked, and despite calls for a full investigation, the Wisconsin Capitol Police are refusing to take any action.
At the time of the leak, Chief Justice Annette Ziegler told the Wisconsin Watch she was outraged and wanted answers. “Today the entire court was shocked to learn that a confidential draft document was ostensibly leaked to the press,” she said. “I have contacted law enforcement to request that a full investigation be conducted. We are all united behind this investigation to identify the source of the apparent leak. The seven of us condemn this breach.”
Law enforcement, however, is refusing to investigate, claiming it would be a “conflict of interest.”
Ziegler had asked the State Capitol Police, which is in charge of security at state office buildings and is part of Governor Tony Evers’ administration, to take action — but they refused. Britt Cudaback, a spokesperson for Evers, told the Associated Press said it was Evers’ support for abortion which created the conflict of interest. Cudaback said that because Evers has “significant concern about outcome of the court’s decisions in addition to being named parties in several matters currently pending before the Wisconsin Supreme Court,” the Capitol Police cannot investigate.
Cudaback further added that an investigation “will almost certainly require a review of internal operations, confidential correspondence, and non-public court documents and deliberations relating to any number of matters in which our administration is a party or could be impacted by the court’s decision.”
READ: Wisconsin Supreme Court unanimously rules for pro-lifer’s free speech near Planned Parenthood
Ziegler has responded by saying that the Supreme Court will now be forced “to pursue other means in an effort to get to the bottom of this leak.”
After Roe v. Wade was overturned, an 1849 law took effect in Wisconsin. This law stated, “Any person, other than the mother, who intentionally destroys the life of an unborn child is guilty of a Class H felony.” In 2023, Dane County Circuit Judge Diane Schlipper ruled that the statute refers to feticide, an act of homicide against a fetus committed by someone other than the child’s mother, not abortion. Sheboygan County District Attorney Joel Urmanski filed an appeal, and Planned Parenthood filed a petition asking for the Supreme Court to declare abortion a constitutional right in Wisconsin.
Wisconsin Right to Life said in a press release that Planned Parenthood’s request would amount to judicial overreach, saying, “There is no right to abortion in the Wisconsin Constitution, and it is the role of Wisconsin’s elected representatives to create policy on abortion – not the courts.”
