Supreme Court or Super Legislature?

 

The political activism of the Wisconsin Supreme Court’s liberal majority is a real and growing threat to our freedom. Chief Justice Jill Karofsky and her three liberal colleagues willfully ignore the clearly defined, critical responsibilities of the Supreme Court and, in the process, threaten the effective functioning of state government and destroy its credibility with the people of Wisconsin.

 

The Importance of an Apolitical Court

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The role of the Wisconsin Supreme Court is clearly spelled out in the state’s constitution. The court:

• Oversees the operation of the entire state court system.

• Determines constitutionality of laws and executive actions.

• Serves as the court of last resort for appeals.

• Oversees the rules regulating the legal profession.

• Takes “original action,” (bypassing the lower courts in rare high priority cases when they may create legal uncertainty and cause urgent irreparable harm). Four Justices must agree to take an original action case.

 

The Judicial Branch was carefully designed by our Founders to balance the other two branches of government in their respective duties. The Executive Branch is led by the Governor and administers, enforces, and implements state laws and oversees the daily operations of state government. The Legislative Branch has the primary authority to create, amend, or repeal laws; develops the state budget, and oversees executive agencies through audits and the confirmation of appointments.

 

The independent and complementary roles of each branch of government were crafted as checks and balances to safeguard against the concentration of power and dominance of a single branch.

 

We have witnessed an alarming increase in political activism and “legislating from the bench” throughout the judiciary across the country. When judges allow their political preferences to interfere with their strict adherence to the law as written our entire system of government is at risk of crumbling. There is no place for activist judges in the courts of America. The personal opinions of judges about what they believe the law should be cannot supersede what the law is if our republic is to survive.

 

 The liberal Justices of the Wisconsin Supreme Court have shown their willingness to involve themselves in political matters, cast aside any pretense of objectivity, and infringe on the authority of the other branches of government. In the 2026 race for Wisconsin Supreme Court, all 4 liberal justices have publicly endorsed liberal candidate Chris Taylor, something Justices carefully avoided prior to the 2024 Supreme Court election. Chief Justice Jill Karofsky has gone a step further by actively campaigning against Maria Lazar, the conservative candidate in the race.

 

In 2024, when Governor Evers and the Republican legislators were battling over redistricting maps, the liberal Supreme Court Justices threatened to redraw the maps themselves if agreement could not be reached, legislating from the bench in an action well outside of their scope of responsibility.

 

Liberals are pressuring the Court majority to bypass the court system to relitigate matters that have not gone their way in previous litigation. There is a real danger going forward that the liberal Court majority will abuse the intended use of original action to re-decide settled laws that the liberal extremists they align with want overturned. If we allow political motives to replace the stringent criteria developed to limit the use of original action, we will further accelerate our descent to an activist court.

 

Chief Justice Jill Karofsky’s Unethical Conduct

 

Karofsky has gone far beyond her inappropriate endorsement of Chris Taylor; engaging in media interviews to attack Maria Lazar. In a recent interview the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported Karofsky “slammed” Lazar’s work at the Department of Justice for carrying “the flag of the right-wing interests.”  She called Lazar’s work as an Assistant Attorney General defense of “controversial laws” and suggested several cases Lazar had overturned as an Appellate Court Judge are evidence she “got the law wrong, clearly,” implying that an overturned case is a black mark on a judge’s performance.

 

Karofsky cited Lazar’s defense of Act 10 while working for the Department of Justice, a law enacted in 2011 that restricted collective bargaining for public employees to base wages only, and required them to make pension and health benefit contributions, as is required of most private sector employees, to illustrate “right wing interests”. Estimates are that Act 10 has saved taxpayers more than $30 billion from its inception in 2011 through 2025.

 

Jill Karofsky’s views about what constitutes controversial and right-wing interests are seen through her own lens of left-wing extremism. When running for her current seat on the Supreme Court in 2020, she compared getting an abortion to having wisdom teeth pulled; no one’s business but the patient and doctor. She supports no gestational limits on abortion. Finding ways to constitutionally limit people’s right to possess firearms also made it to her agenda, as did her promise to advocate for “social justice issues” from the bench.

 

Karofsky implied that Lazar having a ruling overturned by a higher court is evidence of poor judicial performance. In fact, the Supreme Court of the United States has recently overturned two significant decisions of the Wisconsin Supreme Court that Karofsky presides over because the Wisconsin court made errors in the interpretation of the law regarding the Federal Voting Rights Act and the First Amendment. In 2022 the Court reversed in a 7-2 vote the Wisconsin Supreme Court’s adoption of Tony Evers’ legislative maps because of a “legal error” that allowed racial gerrymandering in Milwaukee. In 2025, the Court unanimously held that the Wisconsin Supreme Court violated the First Amendment religion clauses when denying tax-exempt status to Catholic Charities because it wasn’t “churchy” enough.

 

Judges are People First

 

Judges are people first. They have private lives, values, religious beliefs, and political leanings just like everyone else. The issue of primary importance in selecting the next Supreme Court Justice is not the fact that she is a human being with her own preferences and opinions about nearly everything that will come before her as a judge, but rather how specifically she promises to keep her own feelings and desires separate from the rule of law…and whether we believe her.

 

Here are some things we know about Maria Lazar and Chris Taylor.

 

Maria Lazar has never been a member of a political party. She was part of a small law practice for 20 years and worked as an Assistant Attorney General in the Justice Department prior to becoming a judge. She was elected to positions as a Judge on the Circuit and Appellate Courts.

 

Lazar has developed an extensive website as a tool to provide voters with details about who she is, why she’s running and her judicial philosophy, which simply stated is to consider only the facts and the law as written when deciding cases. She has published a number of her legal opinions on her website to assist voters in evaluating her approach to judicial reasoning.

 

As she campaigns across the state, Lazar is being pressured by the media to share her “stance” on hot button issues like abortion. It is a constant battle to help the voters understand that her job as a judge is not to have a stance, but to apply the law as written to the facts of the case. In the example of abortion, she has been clear that abortion is legal in Wisconsin until 20 weeks gestation, regardless of any personal view she may hold. This is settled law, having survived challenges through the system all the way to the Wisconsin Supreme Court. Despite her clarity, her opponents continue to deceive, insisting she will try to make abortion illegal.

 

Chris Taylor is a member of the Democratic Party. She was the Attorney and Policy Director for Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin before her election as a Democrat to the Wisconsin Assembly. Nearly a decade later, she was appointed by a Democratic Governor as a Circuit Court Judge and later elected an Appellate Court Judge.

 

When employed by Planned Parenthood, Taylor played a central role in advocating for “contraceptive equity” and expanded access to what liberals call “reproductive freedom.”  She is endorsed in her current race by “Reproductive Freedom for All,” an organization that opposes all government imposed gestational limits or any restrictions on abortion.

 

In the Assembly, she championed the causes of the far left; advocating for transgender policies, replacing the word “mother” with “parent who gave birth” in state documents, and expanding “reproductive rights.” She fought against housing “discrimination” based on immigration status, advocated for the environmental conservation policies of the left and “progressive” social policies. Taylor staunchly opposed Act 10 - participating in protests and speaking out in opposition to local and national media.

 

Chris Taylor’s website provides little information that will help voters evaluate her. She describes her “judicial philosophy” as “people centered grounded in making sure people get a fair chance in our courts.” She “knows how important it is for our courts to be places where people feel heard, respected, and treated equally under the law.”  She speaks the language of liberal extremists.

 

As Chris Taylor campaigns around the state, she avoids speaking about her extensive record of pursuing the liberal policies that are far from the mainstream of Wisconsin voters. Taylor and her backers understand that Wisconsin voters will not knowingly elect a liberal extremist.

 

While in the Assembly, Taylor sponsored legislation that would require judges to recuse themselves from cases involving anyone who has donated $1,000 or more to their campaign. She has now backed away from that position calling it “not workable.”  She is preparing for the time when liberal donors come calling in search of judges who are willing to be policy makers.

 

 

 Supreme Court or Super Legislature?

 

Maria Lazar is not a politician. She is a candidate for Supreme Court who describes her political preferences, if pressed, as “conservative leaning.” She is quick to stress that her political leanings and any other personal preferences or opinions she may have will not play any role in executing her duties as a judge.

 

Chris Taylor is a politician with a long, inescapable record of fighting for the most extreme liberal positions. She has offered no assurances that she will not legislate from the bench. To the contrary, her campaign ads focus on her work as an “advocate” for people, which is not the work of a judge or Justice. Taylor avoids settings in which her views may be exposed or challenged; and is flying below the radar while Chief Justice Karofsky and Dark Money donors do the dirty work of spreading lies about Maria Lazar.

 

Maria Lazar has sounded the alarm that activist judges, legislating from the bench, will degrade our Supreme Court into a Super Legislature. Chris Taylor would expand the liberal majority by adding another activist judge to the Court. The election of Maria Lazar will be a major step forward in restoring impartiality and a commitment to follow the law as written to the Court. Watch the only debate Chris Taylor would agree to on March 25 at 7:00 p.m. and do what you can to get out the vote for Maria Lazar. Our votes have never mattered more. Benjamin Franklin showed great insight when asked if the Founders had created a republic or a monarchy. He responded, “A republic, if you can keep it.” It’s our responsibility to make sure we keep it.