On eve of confirmation vote, Wisconsin Ethics Commission issues report clearing its leader's name

MADISON - The state Ethics Commission issued a report Monday finding its director had acted in a professional and nonpartisan way, just as Republican state senators prepare to oust him.

Republicans who control the Senate 18-13 plan to vote Tuesday to deny the confirmations of Brian Bell, director of the Ethics Commission, and Michael Haas, director of the Elections Commission.

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"There is not a scintilla of evidence that Commission Administrator Brian Bell has ever performed any of his governmental duties in a partisan manner," the Ethics Commission found.

It issued its opinion Monday after spending much of the day in closed session reviewing a 35-page report on Bell's conduct.

The attempt to remove Bell and Haas come as GOP ire simmers over a John Doe investigation of Gov. Scott Walker and other Republicans that was conducted by prosecutors and the now-disbanded Government Accountability Board. Bell and Haas previously worked for the accountability board.

The state Supreme Court found nothing illegal occurred and shut down the probe in 2015, but anger over the issue was sparked anew after GOP Attorney General Brad Schimel issued a report last month about the investigation.

As anger over the issue built, Bell asked for the Ethics Commission to investigate his performance in an effort to clear his name. The commission, which consists of three Democrats and three Republicans, hired former Dane County Circuit Judge Patrick Fiedler for that work.

Fiedler and his partners conducted interviews with dozens of people who knew or had worked with Bell. GOP lawmakers who had disparaged Bell declined interview requests with Fiedler's team who were seeking to find out the basis for their criticisms of him.

In public statements, Republican lawmakers have said they wanted to see Bell and Haas go in part because they had previously worked for the accountability board, which at the state's time oversaw campaign finance laws.

At the accountability board, Bell did not work on the probe of Republicans. Haas was not part of the core investigation team but reviewed legal filings when the investigation was challenged in court.

After the state's high court terminated the John Doe probe, Walker and Republican lawmakers dissolved the accountability board and replaced it with the Ethics Commission and Elections Commission, which each have three Republicans and three Democrats.

Bell and Haas came under renewed scrutiny last month when Schimel issued his report on his attempts to find out who leaked secret material from the probe in 2016 to the Guardian U.S. newspaper.

Schimel wasn’t able to figure out who leaked the material but found it came from the accountability board.

The report by the Ethics Commission looked into whether metadata from John Doe documents published by the Guardian provided clues about where the documents were scanned. The Ethics Commission blacked out that part of its report, but provided the full version of it to the attorney general in case it could assist him in determining who leaked to the newspaper.