Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-VT), chairman of the U.S. Senate Committee on the Judiciary should order the issuance of a subpoena for U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Wisconsin, Steven Biskupic, to appear before the committee. Biskupic should be asked to bring all documents or communications between himself and any staff members of President Bush and Attorney General Alberto Gonzales pertaining to discussions regarding the investigation or prosecution of state employees for the purpose of embarrassing the administration of Wisconsin Govenor Jim Doyle.
Biskupic obtained a conviction last September of State of Wisconsin purchasing agent Georgia Thompson. The timing could not have been worse for Democrats as the case made headlines through out the state in the months preceding the November elections after the September sentencing.
Thompson's case has major implications for Doyle's re-election campaign in which he squares off against challenger Mark Green on Nov. 7... Thompson has consistently denied the charges. Her attorneys argued that she had a clean criminal record before this case, did not profit from her actions and was not likely to re-offend.
On March 15, 2007, Biskupic told a Wisconsin State Journal reporter that no one told him to conduct political probes.
U.S. Attorney Steven Biskupic said Thursday that no one in the White House or the U.S. Justice Department directed him to conduct public corruption investigations - including his probe of campaign donations to Gov. Jim Doyle that led to the indictment of a Kenosha businessman.
On Thursday after less than a half an hour of deliberations, a three judge federal appeal court reversed the conviction:
In arguments Thursday, the appeals judges called the charges against Thompson unfounded.
"It strikes me that your evidence is beyond thin," Judge Diane Wood told prosecutors. "I'm not sure what your actual theory in this case is."
In the meantime, every state employee has to ask if it is possible that they may become a pawn in a larger political struggle between Republican prosecutors and Democratic political leaders. Conversely none of us are served well if there is a real criminal act by a public employee; there is always the suggestion that the prosecution is politically motivated, making it more difficult to obtain a proper conviction.
And now we have new reports from Dan Bice in the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel that the Wisconsin GOP complained to Karl Rove about the lack of voter 'fraud' in Wisconsin, which was unfounded.