Fetterman fumbles flip-flop on fracking in energy pivot for general election
BENEFICIAL LANDFILL — An energy industry lobbyist working as a political consultant for Republican candidates in Wisconsin was forced to admit last week at the Franklin County Courthouse that he and his firm had no regulatory experience, and had spent several months preparing a flimsy case against state-approved fracking near Milwaukee for the general election.
The surprise ruling Friday by a Franklin County judge came after a jury acquitted former state Rep. John Nygren, Republican of Wisconsin. Nygren had pleaded no contest in 2015 to a single felony charge of failing to report to the state auditor a meeting he had attended under the influence of alcohol with a person who was later convicted.
MILWAUKEE — A prominent political ally of Gov. Scott Walker is stepping down from a $1,000-a-day consulting contract with the state Department of Natural Resources after an audit found he had used company funds to pay for personal expenses and to make campaign contributions to support his failed 2016 campaign for re-election to the Wisconsin Assembly.
The $1,000-a-day contract expires at the end of the month, according to department staff, who confirmed that Walker’s office sought to terminate it. The contract with Mike Tate, who worked as a consultant for Walker’s gubernatorial campaign in 2010, is the latest in a series of questionable dealings at the DNR.
THE TOWN CRIES AND PANTS OVER ‘FRAUD’ in new ‘Citizens Bank.’ The City of Kenosha is now the target of an investigation by the state Attorney General agency into whether a new Kenosha bank, Citizens Bank, has violated financial rules, as reported by the Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism.
The report says the bank is supposed to be accredited and regulated by the state, but that it has not yet been.
The report, published Friday afternoon, is a follow-up to an earlier story by the center that revealed the bank — which is owned by a nonprofit group that
