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Gov. Scott Walker says he isn't worried about a John Doe investigation of his current and former aides.

That's because, Walker said, he is a man of integrity.

"I know that throughout my career - first in the Legislature, then as county executive and now for the last 10 months as governor - I live by the standards I got from my parents," said Walker, whose father was a Baptist minister. "Certainly, they got me to the rank of Eagle Scout, and I continue to have that kind of integrity."

Talking to reporters after holding his second Job Creation Forum on Tuesday, the first-term Republican governor said he had no idea that his spokesman, Cullen Werwie, had been given an immunity deal until it became public late last week.

Walker said he doesn't believe Werwie should have told him about the deal sooner.

"He'd be violating the law, if that was part of the condition," Walker said. "For me, I just learned about it the other day, just like everything else we've talked about or things people in the media have talked about."

John Doe investigations are secret proceedings in which witnesses can be subpoenaed and compelled to testify under oath about potential criminal matters and are forbidden from talking publicly about the case.

But there is one exception to all this secrecy: Immunity orders are given in open court. The judge in the Walker case granted Werwie immunity in April, but it was first reported by No Quarter last week.

Also receiving immunity were a railroad lobbyist and a local Republican Party official.

For the second time in recent days, Walker tried to cast some doubt on news reports regarding the investigation being conducted by the Milwaukee County district attorney's office over the past 17 months.

"To me, you look at any of the stories that you and others have been a part of - you've either got people who don't know what they're talking about as sources or they're violating the law," said Walker, who added that he has not been contacted personally by investigators.

Prosecutors did subpoena emails from Walker's campaign shortly before the November 2010 general election. The campaign has hired former U.S. Attorney Steven Biskupic, now a criminal defense lawyer with Michael Best & Friedrich.

The investigation initially had focused on campaign activity by Walker's former county workers. But several sources said last week that prosecutors continue to look at new angles.

"Every time there's a new witness, this thing sprouts a new branch and heads in a completely new direction," said one person familiar with the investigation.

Walker also acknowledged Tuesday that his longtime campaign treasurer, John Hiller, had left that post. Records show Hiller was replaced by Kate Lind on May 13.

The governor said the change had nothing to do with the John Doe investigation

"For us, we put someone on who is a professional comptroller to make sure, with the volume of supporters we have, we had somebody who could handle that," Walker said. Two insiders said Hiller had also broken formal ties with the campaign around the same time he began soliciting clients with business before the state.

The long-simmering criminal investigation boiled over earlier this month when FBI agents and other authorities raided the Madison house of Cindy Archer, a former top-ranking county aide to Walker who had been the No. 2 official in his Department of Administration.

Last month, Archer moved to the Department of Children and Families to become the agency's legislative liaison. She was to start Aug. 22 but began taking paid medical leave that day and has not yet reported for the job.

Archer was appointed to the job on Aug. 18, a day before it was formally offered to her. The job was offered by Walker chief of staff Keith Gilkes, not Children and Families Secretary Eloise Anderson, who is responsible for filling the job. Anderson never interviewed Archer for the job.

At the press briefing, Walker said it made sense for his office to appoint Archer to her new job.

"We needed to make a change at the Department of Administration," Walker said. "We thought there was someone, obviously being a deputy secretary, (who) was more than qualified to handle any other position in state government."

Archer's new job pays nearly $100,000 a year, a drop in pay of about $24,000. But she is pulling down almost $40,000 more than the last person in the job. Archer was able to make so much more than her predecessor because lawmakers this year converted the job and 38 others like it from civil service jobs into political appointments.

Contact Daniel Bice at (414) 224-2135 or dbice@journalsentinel.com. Follow him on Twitter @ NoQuarterr.