Recently, the Wisconsin state Supreme Court dismissed a Trump campaign lawsuit challenging the election outcome in the state — and after the ruling, two of the court’s liberal justices, who voted against the campaign, faced misogynistic and anti-Semitic threats and online hatred. On Friday, Wisconsin state Supreme Court Chief Justice Patience Roggensack condemned the comments that her colleagues, Jill Karofsky and Rebecca Dallet, have faced. Although conservative Justice Brian Hagedorn sided against the Trump campaign in the recent ruling against their challenge to the Wisconsin election outcome, Roggensack, a fellow conservative, supported the campaign’s position — and she was unequivocal in her condemnation of the hate that Karofsky and Dallet have endured.
Roggensack said, in part, as follows:
‘I acknowledge that all members of the public have the constitutional right to speak in criticism of public servants, which certainly includes all justices of the Wisconsin Supreme Court. However, no justice should be threatened or intimidated based on his or her religious beliefs… Wisconsin has a long history of protecting the right to freely worship, as well as the right to freely speak. As we are about to begin a new year, let us all refocus on coming together where possible and treating those with whom we disagree with the respect that each of us would like to receive.’
Sachin Chheda, who serves as a campaign spokeswoman for both Dallet and Karofsky, recently told the Times of Israel that the “volume and intensity of the feedback they’re getting has hit a new level,” adding that the rhetoric is “more vile… more racist… more gendered… [and] more threatening than what we have seen in the past.”
In the recent Wisconsin state Supreme Court ruling against the Trump campaign, four of the court’s justices concluded that “challenges to the established election rules should have come before the polls closed,” Madison.com explains. In other words, the Trump campaign waited too long for their challenges to remain valid — although it’s unclear that the court would have suddenly ruled in Trump’s favor if he’d brought the case earlier. Post-election court rulings against Trump have covered just about all possible avenues for his arguments.
Trump personally targeted Hagedorn — who sided with the Wisconsin state Supreme Court’s three liberal justices — on Twitter after the ruling, complaining, in part, as follows:
‘After my endorsement, Hagedorn easily won! WOW, he just voted against me in a Big Court Decision on voter fraud (of which there was much!), despite many pages of dissent from three highly respected Justices… Republicans in Wisconsin should take these 3 strong decisions to their State Legislators and overturn this ridiculous State Election. We won in a LANDSLIDE!’
Trump did not win the election, let alone with a landslide. More acutely, Trump’s insistence on targeting individuals who oppose his political positions helps provide cover for hatred like that which Dallet and Karofsky have faced. For some of his most fervent followers, he’s turned politics into a cultish hate-fest, threatening the stability of American democracy. His followers take his lies seriously.
