Governor Scott Walker just made a shocking appointment to the Wisconsin Supreme Court. He has replaced retiring judge David Prosser with Daniel Kelly, a little known lawyer from Waukesha.
Kelly is extremely conservative, which is perhaps unsurprising. But his views on affirmative action are especially concerning. He first applied for the position in 2014, and in his application he compared affirmative action to slavery. From the Journal Sentinel:
"Affirmative action and slavery differ, obviously, in significant ways," Kelly wrote in 2014. "But it's more a question of degree than principle, for they both spring from the same taproot. Neither can exist without the foundational principle that it is acceptable to force someone into an unwanted economic relationship. Morally, and as a matter of law, they are the same."
Absolutely unbelievable.
Unsurprisingly, Kelly also is against gay marriage. From the Journal Sentinel:
Kelly labeled as one of the best opinions in the past 30 years U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia's dissent railing against the 2015 decision that found same-sex couples had a right to marry. He excerpted a portion of Scalia's decision that ridiculed the majority opinion for allowing the high court—"an unelected committee of nine"—to revise the U.S. Constitution.
Walker, who has corrupted the Wisconsin Supreme Court by turning it into an explicitly political entity during his tenure, had the sole say in who would replace Justice Prosser.
It's worth noting that Kelly has almost no experience to suggest that he would be a good judge. But, the Journal Sentinel reports that he has strong conservative ties.
Kelly has been closely involved with conservative legal groups. The president of the Milwaukee chapter of the Federalist Society, he also sits on an advisory panel to the Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty.
He was an adviser to state Supreme Court Justice Rebecca Bradley's campaign this year and served as an attorney on Prosser's campaign during a recount after he narrowly won re-election in 2011.
Coincidentally, Bradley was also first appointed by Walker and is also pretty awful.
Walker chose Kelly from a pool of eleven applicants. As for his feelings on Kelly's views about Affirmative Action, his spokesman apparently "did not say whether the governor agreed with that sentiment or if he asked Kelly about the matter when he interviewed him for the job."
