Kloppenburg Doubles Down On A Smear

Apparently Joanne Kloppenburg has no problem with one of her supporters putting our false, defamatory information about her opponent, State Supreme Court Justice David Prosser.

Via Charlie Sykes, Kloppenburg refused to denounce the Greater Wisconsin Committee’s smear in Friday night’s debate with Prosser, a story we wrote about here.

Prosser asked Kloppenburg to call for the ad to be taken down. She declined to do so.

“It’s not my ad,” Kloppenburg said. “Like it or not, third parties have a First Amendment right to run ads of their own choosing.”

The ad by the liberal Greater Wisconsin Committee cites Prosser’s decision as Outagamie County district attorney in 1978 not to prosecute Father John Patrick Feeney after hearing allegations Feeney had molested boys. Feeney was convicted in 2004 of sexually abusing one of the boys and attempting to sexually abuse the other.

Prosser called the ad despicable and said it lies about what happened. He implied during the debate that he was considering legal action against the group. Afterward, he said he was “absolutely” thinking of doing so.

“There are statements that are highly misleading and put me in a false light,” he said. The ad also includes “an outright, objective lie, and it’s inexcusable.”

During the debate, he said: “It is false factually. It is malicious beyond belief. It is the worst ad we can think of that has ever been run in a judicial campaign.”

Some background on the ad:

While serving as Outagamie County, Prosser deferred prosecution of a Catholic priest accused of sexually molesting two young boys over concerns over the emotional trauma of making the boys testify in open court and the promise of the Green Bay Archdiocese that internal disciplinary steps would be taken against the priest.

Eventually the priest, Father John Patrick Feeney, was convicted on similar charges and sent to prison with testimony from both victims as adults and with assistance from Prosser.

The Sentinel Journal’s Patrick McIlheran says the best way to counter the smear is to tell the truth.

The anti-Prosser ad appears to be wrong or misleading on several points – it says he told police not to investigate when in fact they’d done so; it implies Prosser knew the priest had a long history of abuse, something that didn’t come to light until decades later – but the Greater Wisconsin Committee ought to be free to put its low, edge-of-dishonest argument on the air. The cure for such stuff is truth, such as (Troy) Merryfield has offered in response.

That truth – that Prosser acted correctly on what information was available in 1979 – can be the standard by which voters judge the anti-Prosser case.

Troy Merryfield was one of Feeney’s 1979 victims. He has spoken out with a letter demanding that the GWC pull the sleazy ad and defending Prosser’s actions.

Merryfield’s brother issues a statement in defense of his brother here.

Patrick at Badger Blogger calls it: “The hateful, vindictive, win-at-all-costs mentality of Liberalism.”

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