Wisconsin appeals court race takes partisan turn

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WAUKESHA, Wis. (AP) — Voters in southeastern Wisconsin on Tuesday were choosing a Court of Appeals judge in a race that took a sharp partisan turn and featured ads referring to the Waukesha Christmas parade killings.

The race for a six-year term was between incumbent Judge Lori Kornblum, appointed by Democratic Gov. Tony Evers in November, and Waukesha County Circuit Judge Maria Lazar.

The race is nonpartisan, but Kornblum has the backing of the state Democratic Party and labor unions. Republicans have lined up behind Lazar, including three conservative Wisconsin Supreme Court justices, four former Republican congressmen and several county Republican parties.

Kornblum spent more than 20 years as a prosecutor in Milwaukee County before going into private practice in 2014. Lazar was in private practice for 20 years before joining the state Department of Justice in 2010 under Republican Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen.

She ran unopposed for Waukesha County Circuit Court in 2015.

Lazar is running TV and radio spots attacking Kornblum as “a liberal, appointed by Gov. Tony Evers to legislate from the bench.” The spots also highlight that Kornblum worked in the district attorney’s office under John Chisholm, a Democrat.

An outside group supporting Lazar has also run a spot linking Kornblum to Chisholm and blaming him in part for the Waukesha Christmas parade attack where Darrell Brooks is charged with killing six people and injuring more than 60.

One of Chisholm’s assistant prosecutors recommended what Chisholm called “inappropriately low” $1,000 bail for Brooks, which he posted days before the parade. Kornblum left Chisholm’s office seven years before the parade deaths.

One of Kornblum’s ads attacks Lazar for a sentence she imposed that was lower than prosecutors recommended for David Scharlat, a former Brookfield police officer and federal agent who was found guilty in 2019 of sexually assaulting a woman with whom he’d had an ongoing sexual relationship.