We're all well aware by now of the denials by just about every Republican official in Washington that the US Attorneys scandal had anything to do with politics.
And anyone from Wisconsin is sure to be aware of Milwaukee-based US Attorney Steven Biskupic's prosecution persecution of Georgia Thompson, a civil servant appointed to her job during the administration of Republican Governor Scott McCallum, for awarding a state contract for employee travel to Adelson Travel, which has ties to Democratic Governor Jim Doyle. The facts that Adelson Travel was actually the lowest bidder for the contract and that Thompson followed long-established rules for awarding the contract was no barrier to her prosecution persecution.
So far, that just sounds like another example of incompetence from a BushCo appointee. Here's the problem: until Biskupic charged Thompson -- and he did so rather transparently to embarrass Gov. Doyle as he was running for reelection against BushCo friend Mark Green -- he was on the list of US Attorneys to be fired. By undertaking a partisan political case in an effort to swing an important election in the Republicans' favor, he seems to have saved his job.
Of course, Biskupic claims there was never any public pressure to take the case to trial:
In a statement Saturday, Biskupic fired back at both his Democratic critics and his bosses in Washington, repeating assertions he was never pressured to take on those cases.
"Until the recent controversy surrounding the firings of the eight U.S. Attorneys around the country, it was never communicated to me that my job could be in jeopardy or that I was considered to be disloyal to President Bush's agenda," Biskupic said.
Perhaps. Perhaps not. If Biskupic really didn't know his job was in jeopardy for not being loyal enough to the president -- which is not his job -- then he's either thoroughly incompetent or unprofessionally vindictive:
In a stunning reversal, a federal court of appeals struck down a state worker's [ed. note: that's Georgia Thompson] fraud conviction that Wisconsin Republicans used in efforts to paint Gov. Jim Doyle's administration as corrupt...
During oral arguments Thursday, one of the members the three-judge panel said the charges against Thompson were unfounded.
"I have to say it strikes me that your evidence is beyond thin," federal Appeals Judge Diane Wood told prosecutors. "I'm not sure what your actual theory in this case is..."
Michelle Jacobs, a spokesman for U.S. Attorney Steven Biskupic in Milwaukee, said it was difficult to comment without seeing the written decision.
But she agreed it would be difficult to ask the court to rehear the case -- the next step for any appeal by prosecutors. That's because the decision appeared to hinge on the facts presented at trial, which wouldn't change, she said.
That's an unusual move, too -- federal appeals judges usually take weeks or even months to issue decisions. In this case, they ordered Thompson's conviction overturned and her immediate release after a couple hours of oral arguments.
In any case, though, it seems that there is reason to believe Biskupic could have known his job was in jeopardy. We all know what happened to David Iglesias -- he refused to undertake groundless cases intended to help Republicans win elections and he got fired for it. Aside from Thompson's case, Biskupic was also in trouble with the Rove Conspiracy for not pursuing the purported epidemic of voter fraud -- particularly from convicted felons -- in Wisconsin. And again, the problem is that the charges are completely overblown:
Several dozen felons -- as many as 82 -- may have illegally voted in Wisconsin in the 2006 fall elections, a state Elections Board audit has found.
The number amounts to just thousandths of 1 percent of the 2.16 million voters who voted in that election statewide and two-tenths of 1 percent of the roughly 41,500 state felons who were being supervised in communities on Nov. 7.
As one of the sources in the story notes, that works out to about one felon per county. Moreover, the actual count is likely even lower:
Elections Board Executive Director Kevin Kennedy said the count of 82 felons voting may still be high because it's not certain yet that felons and voters with the same names are the same people. The number was unlikely to have affected the outcome of elections even for small-town offices, he said.
There is little mention of Biskupic prosecuting convicted felons for voting, or anyone else for voter fraud for that matter. Perhaps because the evidence of such crimes is slim to non-existent:
Initially, the Elections Board review suggested two felons the Corrections Department actually listed as being in prison on Nov. 7 might have voted. But spokesman Kyle Richmond said further review suggested the cases might have involved different people.
So this is what it comes down to for Republicans: lie about the severity of the problem, threaten the livelihood of US Attorneys who won't go along with the lies, and save the jobs of US Attorneys who manufacture fraudulent cases intended to manipulate election outcomes. And even where there is some evidence that a crime might have occurred, don't bother investigating. Even if it turns out that the two people accused of voter fraud couldn't possibly have voted illegally because they were in prison at the time, just assume that anyone similarly named must have voted illegally and seek them out for prosecution. I'm sure that will be a comforting thought for anyone with a surname like Smith, Jones, or Williams.
Now, I'm sure some will read this and note that some prominent Democrats, including then-Attorney General Peg Lautenschlager, Dane County District Attorney Brian Blanchard, and former Milwaukee County District Attorney Michael McCann, did not protest Biskupic's decision to charge Thompson. But what would you have them do? It's a no-win situation for them -- if they protested, the Rove Conspiracy would just claim they were obstructing an investigation into corruption in the Democratic governor's administration in an attempt to manipulate the election themselves. Instead, they gave Biskupic enough rope to hang himself. Here's hoping he takes the Rove Conspiracy down with him.
Note: all linked and excerpted articles are from the Wisconsin State Journal, which while hardly wingnutty, is the more right-leaning of Madison's two daily newspapers. I guess I'd call it "centrist."