This is a column by Meg Ellefson, reprinted with permission from WSAU.com.
This week, the unelected members of the City of Wausau Ethics Board unanimously voted to conduct a second taxpayer-funded investigation of Wausau Mayor Doug Diny for moving an unsecured, empty dropbox from outside of Wausau City Hall last fall. The city council voted last month to authorize hiring a $250/hour Waukesha attorney to advise the board on their investigation.
In a bombshell moment, a Wausau Ethics Board member revealed at the meeting that he received a fundraising call from Democrat Attorney General Josh Kaul – just hours before the Ethics Board voted on the Diny matter. Kaul’s office is currently conducting an outrageous taxpayer-funded investigation into Diny.
See the board member’s comments at 1:22:04:
Newly appointed vice-chair Doug Hosler stated that he had received the phone call from Kaul, joking that he was “well-connected.” He went on to explain that it was “for money for a campaign” but then asked Kaul to comment on the DOJ investigation of Diny: “And so I said, now that I’ve got you on the phone, this is what I’m interested in.”
“I talked to Josh Kaul today,” he said. “Josh Kaul called me, but it was for money for a campaign.”
Moving an unsecured dropbox
In September of last year, Mayor Diny, a US Army veteran, moved the empty dropbox into the building for safekeeping, after Wausau’s unelected city clerk had located the dropbox outside the building. “I was hired to tighten things up at city hall. This action is consistent with my overall position and what I heard from residents when I was knocking on doors. I was uncomfortable with certain staff actions that ran counter to previous agreements I had with the clerk on the matter,” Diny told WSAW-TV.
City clerk Kaitlyn Bernarde then referred the incident to the Marathon County District Attorney and the Wisconsin Department of Justice, raising questions about whether it was politically motivated. Shortly thereafter, like clockwork, far-left Attorney General Josh Kaul opened a criminal investigation into Mayor Diny.
Important to note that the dropbox (which has now been secured to the pavement with working camera equipment and lighting replaced) is not exclusively an absentee ballot dropbox, as it once was when rising Democrat star (now former) Wausau Mayor Katie Rosenberg appeared in a bizarre video gesticulating in front of the original absentee ballot dropbox outside of city hall during her single term as mayor. Although the Wisconsin Supreme Court originally ruled them illegal, the dropbox remained in place through Rosenberg’s term as mayor.
Wausau City Hall
In addition to absentee ballots, residents are encouraged to use the repurposed box to co-mingle utility and tax payments and other correspondence to the city. One could easily question the integrity and legality of absentee ballots that are dropped into the box alongside other city mail. Ironically, the dropbox sits just a few feet from a USPS mailbox outside Wausau city hall.
Kaul’s investigation
Wisconsin Attorney General Josh Kaul has evidently adopted a page out of Democrats’ bestselling book “Rules for Lawfare Against Political Opponents” when he authorized concurrent Wisconsin DOJ raids of the Mayor’s office and home last fall.
Anticipating that the mayor would not be home to protect his wife, five armed agents descended upon his home while his wife was babysitting their grandchild. The agents seized Diny’s mobile phone, personal computer and his wife’s mobile phone. The raid and a simultaneous one at his office were executed under a warrant for election fraud.
To date, their personal devices have not been returned. As has become standard operating procedure for leftists targeting their political opponents – lawfare rules and the punishment is the process.
“Josh Kaul called me”
The bombshell moment came shortly after the Wausau Ethics Board, made up of appointees from past mayors (including Mayor Diny’s opponent incumbent Katie Rosenberg) voted to approve yet another taxpayer-funded sham investigation.
Because of local public pressure, former chair Kay Palmer recused herself from all discussion and decision-making on the citizen complaint against Diny due to her “association with the League of Women Voters,” saying she would not “be an unbiased participant in the hearing of this complaint.” However, another board member stunningly revealed that he had received a phone call from Wisconsin Attorney General Josh Kaul earlier that day prior to the meeting.
Vice-chair Hosler described Kaul’s response: “I can talk about political things, but I cannot talk about that case. And the only person who can talk about that case with us has to be an attorney.”
Hosler, a significant donor (almost maxing out) to former Wausau Mayor Katie Rosenberg (who now works in the Evers administration) most recently contributed $1,000 to Josh Kaul last April. That seems like a glaring conflict of interest.
What is particularly curious is that the Ethics Board Meeting began at 4:30 p.m on the day of Hosler’s phone conversation with Kaul.
Which means Kaul would have had to have made the fundraising call during the business day. One is left to wonder if he was sitting in his state office using a state-issued phone when he made the phone call to Hosler.
Someone needs to investigate the investigators.
Paging United States Attorney General Pam Bondi.
GoFundMe account set up
Mayor Doug Diny has retained an attorney for his defense. The partisan Wisconsin Department of Justice is using lawfare in an attempt to intimidate the mayor, drain him of his resources, and send a message to anyone that dares challenge the tactics of the left. The non-profit organization Get Involved Wisconsin has started a gofundme account to support the mayor, who was duly elected by Wausau taxpayers to represent them and preserve and uphold election integrity in Wausau. Both Mayor Diny and his wife are United States Army Veterans.
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