Wisconsin Democrats late Tuesday filed a motion to intervene in the lawsuit that state Republicans filed on Thursday against state election officials, with the Dems seeking to become legal parties to counter the GOP’s claims that the procedures in the recall targeting Gov. Scott Walker are a violation of Walker’s rights.
A copy of the filing, made in the names of the Committee to Recall Walker and other organizers, was sent to TPM by the state Democratic Party.
The state GOP’s lawsuit filed Thursday afternoon against the state Government Accountability Board, which oversees elections in the state, claims that Walker’s 14th Amendment rights of Equal Protection are violated by putting a burden on his campaign to review and challenge petition signatures within a ten-day period. Instead, they say, the GAB must make a greater effort to look for duplicate signatures, and for invalid names and addresses. (The petitions will be filed in mid-January, which will then kick off the review process. The same procedures were used in a series of state Senate recalls, on both sides of the aisle, earlier this year.)
The motion to intervene from Team Recall argues that they have interests as the people working to bring about a recall as soon as possible, and thus have a stake in the outcome of a challenge to the rules under which they have been working. In addition, they lay out in detail their opposing argument to Team Walker’s legal case.
They say that Walker’s campaign has the same rights as any other incumbent who has been challenged to review and challenge signatures under long-established procedures — and that if they are unable to do so, it is only due to their own lack of preparation and use of their resources on other causes. Thus, the filing says, Walker is not entitled to have the established rules changed in his favor.
But going beyond that, they make an accusation against the GOP: Misconstruing and distorting the rules and the GAB’s statements, and giving the impression that many false signatures would be accepted, in order to create distrust in the process.
Key quote from the filing:
AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES
l) The complaint fails to state a claim for which relief may be granted.
2) The “injuries” of which plaintiffs complain are premised on (i) misstatements regarding the GAB’s procedure for petition review and (ii) plaintiffs’ asserted refusal to participate in the petition review and challenge process in a meaningful way despite FOSW’s [ed. note: The Walker campaign committee — Friends Of Scott Walker] possession of millions of dollars. FOSW is not entitled to have the taxpayers pay to compensate for FOSW’s strategic decision to spend its vast resources on things other than playing its customary and statutory role in the petition review process.
3) There is no basis in law for demanding a court order forbidding an administrative agency to “say” certain things.
4) Because FOSW and Thompson have long been aware of the statutory and administrative provisions governing petition review, but nonetheless waited until over a half million signatures were gathered on petitions demanding a recall election for Scott Walker, the complaint is barred by laches.
5) The complaint is barred, in whole or in part, by the doctrine of unclean hands.
6) This lawsuit is merely one of a number of court proceedings started by Scott Walker’s allies in an attempt to create unnecessary uncertainty, disruption, and expense, and to intimidate administrative decision-makers in connection with the ongoing recall efforts. This abuse of the court system is improper and unfair to the courts, the other stakeholders, and the public.
