{"id":4584,"date":"2023-07-31T22:54:59","date_gmt":"2023-07-31T22:54:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/?p=4584"},"modified":"2023-07-31T23:04:21","modified_gmt":"2023-07-31T23:04:21","slug":"partisan-janet-court-takes-1st-shot-against-conservatives-with-planned-firing-of-respected-state-courts-director","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/?p=4584","title":{"rendered":"Partisan \u2018Janet Court\u2019 Takes 1st Shot Against Conservatives With Planned Firing of Respected State Courts Director"},"content":{"rendered":"

This post originally appeared at https:\/\/www.wisconsinrightnow.com\/partisan-janet-court-takes-1st-shot-against-conservatives-with-planned-firing-of-respected-state-court-director\/<\/a><\/p>\n

\"randy<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is highly unusual. This is a wrecking ball\u201d \u2013 Director of State Courts Randy Koschnick<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

The extremely left-wing and partisan \u201cJanet Protasiewicz court\u201d is about to take its first shot against conservatives in Wisconsin with the planned unprecedented firing of Director of State Courts Randy Koschnick, while he is out of state and without conservative justices being informed, Wisconsin Right Now has learned.<\/p>\n

Although Koschnick has been an innovative, non-partisan director who is respected by judges on both sides of the aisle and who has avoided making political statements in the post, he once ran as a conservative for state Supreme Court against liberal icon Shirley Abrahamson, and he was appointed to the State Courts Director post by the state Supreme Court in 2017. Thus, his planned termination smacks of the new \u201cJanet court\u2019s\u201d first attempt to undo the old conservative majority\u2019s actions.<\/p>\n

We are calling the new liberal majority the \u201cJanet court\u201d because Protasiewicz\u2019s election flipped control to the left.<\/p>\n

In an exclusive interview with Wisconsin Right Now, Koschnick said that left-wing Justice Jill Karofsky<\/a> called him on July 31, 2023, and told him that \u201ctomorrow the court is going to vote to terminate me.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said that new left-wing Justice Janet Protasiewicz, whose election cemented the liberal majority on the court, will be part of that majority. Koschnick said that he was told the court has enough votes to fire him, but Karofsky would not give him a reason and the vote is happening without an agenda, without a regularly scheduled session, and while he is out of state.<\/p>\n

Koschnick said that conservative Justice Rebecca Bradley did not know about his planned firing until he called her Monday. He said he does not believe conservative Justice Annette Ziegler was told by the new liberal majority either. He is not sure where sometime-conservative justice Brian Hagedorn stands on the matter.<\/p>\n

\u201cRebecca Bradley was not aware of any vote until I called her and no conference is scheduled until September,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\u201cI told her (Karofsky) that there is no agenda before September, no meeting scheduled. I said I\u2019ve don\u2019t nothing wrong. I\u2019ve gotten awards from the state bar for being an innovator. I\u2019ve never had a complaint,\u201d Koschnick told WRN. \u201cShe said we have vote to terminate me tomorrow. This is highly unusual. This is a wrecking ball.\u201d<\/p>\n

Koschnick, the former chief Judge of Jefferson, Waukesha, Ozaukee, and Washington Counties, who was appointed to be director of state courts by the state Supreme Court in 2017, said the action was \u201cso unprecedented,\u201d repeating that there is \u201cno meeting, conference, public hearing, agenda. I asked for a reason because I am highly competent, and she did not deny that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Koschnick said Karofsky did not provide a reason.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was shocked,\u201d he said. \u201cI can\u2019t think of any reason.\u201d<\/p>\n

Asked if he thinks it\u2019s political because he ran as a conservative for state Supreme Court once, Koschnick said, \u201cit has that appearance.\u201d He reiterated, \u201cI\u2019ve never made any political statements or actions\u201d in that position. \u201cI can\u2019t speculate on motive, but it\u2019s highly unusual.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said that, since he serves at the pleasure of the state Supreme Court, normally he would expect all members of the court to be consulted, but the conservatives weren\u2019t even told.<\/p>\n

Koschnick told \u201cthem I was out of state at a conference for state court administrators until Thursday. No response.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said that \u201cnormally the chief justice sets the agenda, and they have a scheduled conference and discuss it, and the entire court votes, either closed or open, with an agenda.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said the court is not even in session but has a regularly scheduled conference set for September to discuss administrative matters.<\/p>\n

Koschnick was a lawyer for 14 years, and then a circuit judge in Jefferson County for 18 years. He said he received the innovation for keeping the courts open and running during COVID.<\/p>\n

Asked for key accomplishments, he said that he put together a chief justices mental health summit \u201cto bring stakeholders around the state together to reach mental health needs before people end up in jail.\u201d He \u201clargely resolved the state court reporter\u201d shortage with extensive outreach and training. He said that \u201cjudges across the political spectrum all tell me I\u2019ve done a good job. I\u2019ve never been accused of anything; never made political statements.\u201d<\/p>\n

Before she was elected, Protasiewicz took the unprecdented action of telling voters that she was left-wing on a series of partisan issues, from declaring Act 10 unconstitutional to declares that she supports abortion.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This post originally appeared at https:\/\/www.wisconsinrightnow.com\/partisan-janet-court-takes-1st-shot-against-conservatives-with-planned-firing-of-respected-state-court-director\/ \u201cThis is highly unusual. This is a wrecking ball\u201d…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":4586,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4584","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-wi-right-now"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4584","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/20"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4584"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4584\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4587,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4584\/revisions\/4587"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4586"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4584"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4584"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4584"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}