Tag: Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty

Lawyer Sues Wisconsin Bar over Clerkship Program That Allegedly Selects Students Based on Race

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Lawyer Group

A Wisconsin lawyer sued the state bar Wednesday over a diversity clerkship program that allegedly limits eligibility to students who are minorities or who identify as LGBT.

Attorney Daniel Suhr, backed by the Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty, filed the lawsuit because he objects to his bar membership dues being used to fund an “unconstitutional program” that selects participants based on protected traits like race. The “Diversity Clerkship Program,” which has offered paid internships to nearly 600 students, is restricted only to students “with backgrounds that have been historically excluded from the legal field,” according to its website.

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Biden Admin Investigates Wisconsin School After Man Identifying as Trans Allegedly Exposed Genitalia to Four Freshmen Girls

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The Department of Education (ED) opened an investigation into a Wisconsin school Wednesday after an adult man identifying as transgender allegedly exposed himself to underaged girls, according to an ED letter.

After a swimming class in March at Sun Prairie Area High School (SPASD), four freshmen girls were exposed to the genitalia of an 18-year-old male student claiming to be transgender who allegedly undressed in front of them, and despite SPASD being informed of the incident, nothing was done. Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty (WILL) demanded that the ED Office of Civil Rights (OCR) investigate SPASD after allegedly failing to address the incident.

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Star News Challenges FBI’s Assumptions in Covenant Killer Manifesto Lawsuit

M.D. Kittle

Attorneys for Star News Digital Media Inc., the parent company of The Tennessee Star, asked a federal judge to order the Federal Bureau of Investigation to respond to a motion for limited discovery as part of a nationally watched public records lawsuit.

Star News Digital Media Inc. filed the lawsuit in May, demanding the FBI release the manifesto and related writings of Audrey Elizabeth Hale, the Covenant School killer.

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Tennessee Appeals Court to Hear Oral Arguments in Covenant Killer Records Case

M.D. Kittle

The Tennessee Court of Appeals is scheduled to hear oral arguments Monday afternoon in The Tennessee Star’s lawsuit demanding the Metropolitan Government of Nashville and Davidson County release the Covenant School killer’s manifesto and related records.

The court is weighing whether to overturn Davidson County Judge I’Ashea Myles’ ruling to allow Covenant Presbyterian School parents, staff and others to intervene in the lawsuit and argue why the manifesto should remain locked away from the public.

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Judge Rules Wisconsin School District’s Gender Affirming Policy Without Parental Consent Violates Constitutional Rights

M.D. Kittle

In a major victory for parental rights, a Waukesha County judge has ruled the Kettle Moraine School District’s policy of affirming students’ preferred gender identities without notifying guardians is a violation of basic constitutional rights.

Judge Michael P. Maxwell, in what is expected to be a nationally watched ruling, found the southeast Wisconsin school district violated parents’ constitutional rights to raise their own children by allowing minor students to change gender identity at school without parental consent, and even over their objection.

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Court Rules Wisconsin Elections Commission Illegally Used Voter Registration Form

M.D. Kittle

The Wisconsin Elections Commission has lost a lawsuit challenging its use of an unlawful voter registration form, the latest legal problem for a controversial state elections regulator with a history of bending the law.

The lawsuit, filed by the Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty (WILL) on behalf of Wisconsin taxpayer and voter Richard Braun, challenged the use of the National Mail Voter Registration Form in Wisconsin.

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Wisconsin School District That Used Prepared Statement to Inform Students About Teacher’s Pending Sex Change Faces Open Records Lawsuit

M.D. Kittle

After school officials reportedly read a statement to students about a teacher’s upcoming sex change, the Eau Claire Area School District faces a lawsuit demanding it to turn over the document. 

The Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty (WILL), a Milwaukee-based civl rights law firm representing parent Leah Buchman, claims the district has been sitting on the document for weeks, citing an ongoing investigation. 

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Federal Lawsuit Targets Race-Based Government Grant Decisions Alleged to Discriminate Against White and Other Business Owners

M.D. Kittle

In the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling striking down affirmative action in college admisssions, a San Antonio-based government program that allegedly uses race-based preferences to hand out federal grants faces a federal discrimination lawsuit.

The lawsuit, filed this week by the Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty (WILL), could spark a national re-examination of such taxpayer-funded, race-focused initiatives.

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Wisconsin Law Firm Files Civil Rights Complaint Against Sun Prairie Schools over Transgender Shower Incident

M.D. Kittle

The Sun Prairie Area School District now faces a civil rights complaint following an incident earlier this year involving an 18-year-old biological male identifying as a woman who exposed his genitals to four freshman girls in a high school shower.

The Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty (WILL) filed the sex discrimination complaint Wednesday with the U.S. Department of Education Office of Civil Rights.

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Federal Judge: FBI Must Respond by July 3 in The Star News Network Lawsuit Demanding Agency Release Covenant Killer Manifesto

M.D. Kittle

A federal judge has given the Federal Bureau of Investigation until July 3 to respond to The Star News Network’s lawsuit demanding the agency turn over the manifesto and related records of Audrey Elizabeth Hale, the Covenant School killer.

The FBI had sought to delay the proceedings by another two weeks or a full month.

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Baraboo Schools Accused of Holding Racially Discriminatory Focus Groups on ‘Racism as a Public Health Issue’

M.D. Kittle

The Baraboo School District held focus groups as part of a “Racism as a Public Health Issue” initiative that was exclusively for black, indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC) middle schoolers, offering the minority students in attendance a $100 gift card plus a pizza party. 

According to records obtained by The Wisconsin Daily Star, the public health session was part of a $35,000 grant issued to Public Health Sauk County by Governor Tony Evers’ Department of Health Services.

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Judge Orders Preliminary Injunction Against Biden’s ATF in Key Second Amendment Case

M.D. Kittle

A Milwaukee-based public interest law firm has won a key victory in a Second Amendment battle. 

The Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty on Wednesday secured a preliminary injunction in federal court on behalf of three veterans challenging the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives’ rule regulating up to 40 million pistols equipped with stabilizing braces. 

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Sun Prairie School District Charges Wisconsin Law Firm $11K to Search for Records Related to Transgender Shower Incident

M.D. Kittle

The Sun Prairie Area School District is charging a Milwaukee-based law firm more than $11,000 for records connected to what witnesses called a “disturbing” incident involving a transgender “woman” in a high school girls’ locker room.

Dan Lennington, deputy legal counsel for the Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty (WILL), told The Wisconsin Daily Star that the charge is excessive and the law firm is considering all of its legal options.

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Exclusive: Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty Report Urges Ending ‘Taxation Without Representation’ in Funding Badger State Tech Colleges

M.D. Kittle

A new report finds Badger State homeowners pay nearly a half-billion dollars annually in property taxes to fund Wisconsin’s technical colleges, a figure expected to grow in the next biennial budget. 

But in Wisconsin there are no directly elected members to authorize these taxes, creating a system of “taxation without representation,” according to the study from the Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty (WILL). 

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The Star News Network Files Legal Action Against FBI in Seeking Covenant School Killer’s Manifesto

M.D. Kittle

The Star News Network’s attorneys have filed a new case with the U.S. Department of Justice demanding the Federal Bureau of Investigation turn over Nashville mass shooter Audrey Elizabeth Hale’s manifesto.

The Milwaukee-based Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty (WILL) on Wednesday filed an administrative appeal with the Justice Department’s Office of Information Policy after the FBI twice rejected The Star News Network’s Freedom of Information Act requests, seeking the expedited release of the documents.

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Woke Wisconsin School District Accused of Failing to Protect Girls in Transgender Shower Incident

M.D. Kittle

The Sun Prairie Area School District failed to protect four freshman girls from being exposed to the genitals of an 18-year-old biological male — identifying as a transgender woman — who was showering in the girls’ locker room, according to a Milwaukee-based public service law firm. 

 In a letter to the woke Madison-area school district, the Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty (WILL) alleges the “alarming incident” in early March not only violated the girls’ privacy rights, but district administrators’ “completely inadequate” response continues to put Sun Prairie students in further danger. 

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New Report Finds Wisconsin Local Government Strangling Home Businesses with Red Tape

M.D. Kittle

The Badger State’s home-based businesses are facing a bureaucratic nightmare of red tape, according to a new report by the Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty. 

WILL’s new policy report, “Wisconsin: A Broken Home for Home-Based Businesses,” analyzes the relative burden of regulations on the businesses in the state’s 20 most populous communities. 

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Wisconsin Law Firm Files Discrimination Lawsuit Against Biden’s Woke Small Business Agency

M.D. Kittle

The Biden administration is facing another discrimination lawsuit, accused once again of employing identity politics to play favorites. 

On Tuesday, the Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty (WILL) filed the complaint in U.S. District Court-Northern Texas alleging President Joe Biden’s Minority Business Development Agency “violates the Constitution’s core requirement of equal treatment under the law.” 

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Commentary: Liberal News Outlet Tramples the Truth in Reporting ‘Mispronouning’ as ‘Sexual Harassment’ Story

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As readers may be aware, in the spring of 2022 my colleagues and I at the Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty represented three eighth-grade boys who were accused by the Kiel Area School District of “sexual harassment” under Title IX for “mispronouning.”

As we pointed out, “mispronouning” does not violate Title IX and is not “sexual harassment” under any reasonable definition of that term, and punishing students for their speech violates the First Amendment. The district had also violated Title IX’s clear procedural requirements. We urged the district to drop its misguided investigation, and it ultimately did. 

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Sun Prairie School District Accused of Using AmFam Donation for ‘Discrimination Laundering’

M.D. Kittle

Sun Prairie Area School District’s use of American Family Insurance grant funds to promote programs that appear to be exclusively for black students is an attempt to launder race discrimination, a public interest law firm attorney told The Wisconsin Daily Star.

Documents obtained by The Star News Network show Madison-based American Family Insurance cut a check for $35,000 to fund a cross-country field trip in October for Sun Prairie East High School students to visit Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU).

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Wisconsin Law Firm Sues Biden Administration over Woke ESG Investing Policies

M.D. Kittle

The Biden administration’s woke Environmental, Social and Corporate Governance (ESG) policies are putting politics ahead of people and hurting retirees savings, a federal lawsuit filed Tuesday alleges.

The complaint, filed by the Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty (WILL) on behalf of two Waukesha County residents, seeks a temporary restraining order prohibiting the U.S. Department of Labor from implementing its controversial ESG rule, pending the resolution of the lawsuit. Ultimately, the suit seems a declamatory judgment that the rule violates federal law on administrative powers.

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Prominent Transgender Psychologist Backs Parents’ Rights in Wisconsin School District Case

Bradley Vasoli

Two nonprofit law firms challenging Wisconsin’s Kettle Moraine School District’s (KMSD) gender-transition policy announced this week they’ve enlisted the expertise of two mental-health professionals including a prominent transgender psychologist.

The center-right Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty (WILL), headquartered in Milwaukee, and the faith-focused Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), based in Arizona, filed the lawsuit last summer on behalf of parents of a daughter who attended Kettle Moraine Middle School. The anonymous plaintiffs assert that district officials defied their wishes and acceded to the daughter’s request that faculty and staff recognize her as a transgender boy and call her by her preferred male pronouns and chosen name. 

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Study: Students in Wisconsin Choice Schools Outperforming Public School Peers

M.D. Kittle

On this National School Choice Week, a new study by the Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty shows parental choice programs continuing to outperform public schools, particularly in the state’s largest city. 

“Apples to Apples: Accessing Wisconsin State of Education”, accesses Badger State educational performance across public, charter, and private voucher schools.

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Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty: State Government Should Ban TikTok

Bradley Vasoli

A Milwaukee-based think tank is weighing in on the Wisconsin state government’s social media policy, urging Governor Tony Evers (D) to ban the video-sharing application’s use by state agencies. 

In a report called “The Mysterious TikTok-ing Noise,” the Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty (WILL) notes that numerous other governors earlier this month signed orders instructing all departments under their control to delete the program from their devices. The piece also observed the unanimous vote taken last week by the U.S. Senate to adopt the same policy for all federal computer hardware. 

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Wisconsin School Policy Hiding Students’ Gender Identity from Parents Can Continue, Court Finds

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The Wisconsin Supreme Court ruled Friday that a school policy allowing students to secretly change their pronouns at school could remain in place.

In a 4-3 ruling, the state’s supreme court denied an injunction against the policy on procedural grounds because the plaintiffs were anonymous, allowing the gender identity policy to continue, the court’s opinion said. The final decision on the policy will be sent back to a circuit court.

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Wisconsin School District Claims White Students Can’t Be Discriminated Against

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A Wisconsin school district claimed state and federal non-discrimination laws do not apply to white students because they are not part of a protected class, according to the response a student’s parents received after they filed a complaint alleging their child was racially discriminated against.

Assistant Superintendent Tanya Fredrich of Elmbrook Schools investigated the complaint and asserted “that the student is not a member of any class that is legally protected from discrimination by state or federal law” in a Nov. 17 statement obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation.

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