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A Project of The Annenberg Public Policy Center

Spinning Wisconsin Voters

Spinning Wisconsin Voters

In Wisconsin’s race for governor, both sides are playing “spin the voter” with Republican incumbent Scott Walker’s record on jobs.

Wisconsin Trek-ery

Wisconsin Trek-ery

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker claims his Democratic opponent is “sending jobs overseas.” But Mary Burke says the family company makes “more bikes in the U.S. than anyone.” Neither is telling the whole story.

Americans United for Change

Americans United for Change is a liberal group whose message closely mirrors that of the Obama White House.

The Whole Truth in Wisconsin Air Wars

The Whole Truth in Wisconsin Air Wars

If using partial truths in political advertising is an art, then ads in the Wisconsin recall election for governor should be in a museum. Former Dane County Executive Kathleen Falk and Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett are among the Democrats seeking to unseat Republican Gov. Scott Walker …

Wisconsin’s Baffling Budget Battle

The budget battle in Wisconsin has generated much confusion and misinformation, as we have seen in e-mails from our readers in recent days: The state is not on track to end this fiscal year with “a slight surplus.” It is facing a $137 million deficit …

Aftermath of a Court Race

Wisconsin ’08 was one of the nastiest state Supreme Court elections in modern history. Incumbent Justice Louis Butler went down to defeat after opponent Mike Gableman and business interests in the state ran slashing, misleading ads portraying him as soft on crime. We criticized the spots in several stories.
Today, Gableman, though sitting on Wisconsin’s highest court, is still fighting a legal battle over whether he lied in one of the ads that helped put him there.

Wisconsin Judgment Day, the Sequel

In this second of our “Court Watch” series, we return to what’s become a racially charged campaign in Wisconsin to replace Louis Butler, the only black justice on the state Supreme Court, with a white, business-backed lower court judge, Mike Gableman. We look at two ads that attack Butler and find both to be misleading.

Judgment Day in Wisconsin

Summary

Some of the hardest fought campaigns in 2008 will be to determine who sits on the highest courts in a number of states, courts where the stakes can be billions of dollars for corporations and insurance companies; millions in fees for trial lawyers; compensation for those who have been injured by negligence; or the liberty of individuals who have been convicted, rightly or wrongly, of crimes. In the past, some of those who would be state supreme court judges,