House Speaker Gets 15 Months for Political Use of Employees

Here’s another “not yet in Illinois” story. The first went up May 13th.

And, actually, it was an “Assembly” Speaker, not a House Speaker.

The Associated Press and others (WisPolitics.com, for example) report that former Wisconsin Assembly Speaker Scott Jensen (R- Waukesha) was sentenced to 15 months in state prison for using GOP caucus, that is, state employees for political purposes or, as AP puts it,

on state time with state resources.

Caucus employees worked for the state, supposedly to do legislative research, but, like legislative Policy Staffs in Illinois, had a primary responsibility for political work.

The caucus workers testified they served as field campaign operatives, held campaign strategy meetings in both Jensen's office and the caucus' state offices, recruited candidates and produced campaign literature on their state computers, all under Jensen's oversight.

Does that sound familiar?

The former Speaker was sentenced to 18 months in jail—state prison, not Club Fed—after a March jury conviction. Jensen also is barred from entry into the State Capitol for 5 years. Restitution remains open. An appeal is expected.

He could have gotten 16 years in the prisons he probably underfunded.

Former GOP Assistant Majority Leader Bonnie Ladwig (R-Racine) was sentenced to 30 days electronic monitoring and $4,500 in fines and restitution “for using her position in the Legislature to help collect money for GOP candidates,” AP reports. She could have gotten a year in prison.

House Republican fundraiser Sherry Schultz, a full-time House employee, got 4 months of electronic monitoring, 5 years’ Capitol banishment, plus restitution to be decided later, according to the Capitol Times.

The judge said,

You essentially were the grease that helped that machine function smoothly.

Former Assembly Majority Leader Steve Foti (R-Oconomowoc) hired Schultz. Foti got 60 days in jail and is allowed to be a work release lobbyist.

But Republican Corruption blog readers should remember

· Senate Majority Leader Chuck Chvala, D-Madison, got 9 months in December, after pleading guilty to doing pretty much what the Republicans sentenced this week did.

· Milwaukee Democratic Party State Senator Brian Burke got 6 months for using his staff for political purposes.

Will the convictions make any difference?

Here’s what a Common Cause Wisconsin press release, posted on WisPolitics.com, said,

While the Jensen sentencing marks the end of one phase of Wisconsin's most serious and widespread poitical scandal in the last 100 years, it most certainly does not mean Wisconsin has been cleansed of the corruption that precipitated the Legislative Caucus Scandal.

Almost nothing has been done to transform and reform the political culture in Wisconsin. If anything, there is even more special interest money undermining our elections and public policy-making process now, than when Jensen and Chuck Chvala exercised absolute control over the Wisconsin Legislature.

If it isn't time to clean up and reform this political cesspool now, then there will never be a good time to do so.

The Wisconsin State Journal weighed in with this editorial.

Remember, this is Wisconsin. Its politicians learned from ours.

Part of the headline of Common Cause Wisconsin press release in WisPolitics.com is

CAPITOL CORRUPTION CONTINUES UNABATED

I couldn't find a paragraph on this in the Chicago Sun-Times or Tribune this morning, although the entire AP story was posted on the Trib's internet site yesterday. Stories like this, including, "Is Blago 'Toasting?'" today, are a regular feature on McHenry County Blog.