Wisconsin Republicans will do anything to keep their gerrymandered maps

Wisconsin Assembly Speaker Robin Vos (R) announced Wednesday that he has created an impeachment panel to explore the criteria needed to impeach state Supreme Court Justice Janet Protasiewicz.

Vos’s announcement comes just one day after Wisconsin Republicans introduced Assembly Bill 415, which would establish a nonpartisan redistricting system where an unbiased third party would draw legislative maps. Other states like Iowa have a similar system in place.

On the surface, it seems like a step towards equal maps. However, even with an independent panel, the process has shown ultimately to still give the legislature full control.

Under the legislation, the state Congress would still have the power to draw the maps if the third-party maps are rejected twice. And a first rejection can lead to a more skewed second map, even if it’s done by the same third-party map maker.

In 2021, Iowa Republicans rejected a balanced map from their redistricting agency in favor of one more skewed towards Republicans. In the most recent Congressional elections last November, Republicans won all four of the state’s House seats.

Vos is also likely trying to avoid the lawsuits the state Supreme Court will hear that could overturn the gerrymandering Republicans have been using to keep legislative majorities for years.

Republicans are threatening to impeach Protasiewicz if she does not recuse herself from these cases. The GOP says Protasiewicz has compromised her impartial opinion by calling the legislative maps “rigged” on the campaign trail.

Under state law, the Wisconsin Legislature can impeach “civil officers” if a majority of the state Assembly votes on it. The state Senate then holds a trial and can remove the person from office if 2/3rds of the body votes in favor of conviction. The Republicans do currently have a 2/3 majority in the Senate, but it is unclear whether each legislator is on board with removing Protasiewicz from office; any Republican senator voting against impeachment will allow Protesiewicz to keep her seat.

Still, the Assembly could, as Wisconsin columnist Dan Shafer theorized, for impeachment, suspend Protasiewicz for an extended period of time through inaction and effectively keep her off the bench without a Senate vote.

“What could happen is that the Assembly votes to remove, but the Senate never takes action, effectively sidelining Protasiewicz from taking action on any of the cases she was elected to rule on, throwing the court into limbo,” Shafer wrote last week in “The Recombobulation Area” column.

Protasiewicz won her election in April after defeating her conservative opponent Dan Kelly by a margin of 56% to 44%. Kelly lost despite previously serving on the Court after former Gov. Scott Walker (R) appointed him to fill a vacancy in 2016. Kelly is likely part of the panel created by Vos since he’s done similar work for the GOP in the past.