Groups, candidates spent $4.3 million in Supreme Court race

MADISON, Wis. (AP) - Wisconsin Supreme Court candidates and outside groups spent at least $4.3 million ahead of Tuesday’s election, according to figures nonpartisan analysts released Wednesday.

Justice at Stake, a group that focuses on keeping courts impartial, and the Brennan Center for Justice, part of the New York University School of Law, analyzed campaign finance reports and television advertising in the race between Rebecca Bradley, JoAnne Kloppenburg and Joe Donald in which Bradley won a 10-year term on the state’s high court.

The groups found that the conservative Wisconsin Alliance for Reform spent an estimated $1.9 million on television ads supporting Bradley. The Republican State Leadership Committee spent $114,049 on ads backing her.

The Greater Wisconsin Committee spent $381,360 on television ads supporting Kloppenburg as well as $107,323 on other advertising.

The three candidates together raised a total of $1.9 million, with Bradley raising $861,424, Kloppenburg $748,690 and Donald $305,231.

Bradley and Kloppenburg defeated Donald in a February primary. Bradley went on to best Kloppenburg in the general election Tuesday. The two of them raised a combined $1.6 million.

Government watchdog group Wisconsin Democracy Campaign also released estimates of outside groups’ spending. That organization found outside groups supporting Bradley spent about $2.7 million, with Wisconsin Alliance for Reform spending about $2.6 million of that on television and radio ads.

The Greater Wisconsin Committee spent $710,000 on ads and other efforts to support Kloppenburg, including a $600,000 ad to air a television ad criticizing Bradley for inflammatory writings from when she was a college student that bashed gays, AIDS sufferers and feminists.

A political action committee affiliated with the Wisconsin Education Council, the state’s largest teacher’s union, spent about $2,400 on mailings supporting Kloppenburg, according to Wisconsin Democracy Campaign.

Wisconsin Democracy Campaign’s estimates were higher because the research group Justice at Stake and the Brennan Center for Justice used didn’t track the cost of running ads on cable.