Society · Drain the Swamp · July 1, 2026

Wisconsin’s Democratic AG Wants the Fake Electors’ Court Files Sealed — in the Same Case He’s Prosecuting.

Wisconsin Attorney General Josh Kaul (D) is asking a Dane County judge to seal discovery documents in the criminal case his own office is prosecuting — the state’s pending felony forgery prosecution of three Republican lawyers tied to the 2020 “fake electors” scheme. According to The Federalist, Kaul’s office filed a motion around June 30–July 1, 2026 for a protective order, arguing that “this matter has generated attention from the media and the public” and that the attention “has caused concern for the victims and witnesses who are named in the discovery and may testify in this matter.”

The legal hook is Marsy’s Law — the crime-victim-privacy amendment Wisconsin voters added to their constitution in 2020 (Wis. Const. Art. I, §9m). Whether a state ballot measure written to shield victims of violent crime from harassment was meant to cover the paper trail of a disputed 2020 election scheme is now the fight in front of Judge John Hyland. Kaul’s office declined to say anything further: “I can’t speak to anything that may be happening in the state of Wisconsin given that we generally don’t comment or confirm or deny the existence of investigations,” a spokesperson told the outlet.

This is not the civil lawsuit that already settled. It is the separate, still-pending criminal case — and President Trump’s (R) November 2025 pardons of everyone involved don’t reach it, because pardons only cover federal crimes. This is a state prosecution — one this page walks through section by section below.

11 felony counts each — forgery charges against defendants Kenneth Chesebro, Michael Roman, and Jim Troupis — up to 6 years and $10,000 per count — after Kaul's office added 10 counts in December 2024 to the original single count filed June 4, 2024 · Source: Wikipedia; Wisconsin Watch
0 damages paid — the 10 non-attorney Republican electors settled the related civil suit in December 2023 for no monetary damages, after plaintiffs sought $2.4 million · Source: Georgetown Law ICAP; Wisconsin Right Now
June 16, 2026 — date Chesebro, Roman, and Troupis reaffirmed not-guilty pleas at arraignment — the case that's now the subject of the AG's sealing motion is still headed to trial · Source: Wisconsin Watch
Nov. 7, 2025 — date President Trump pardoned all three criminal defendants and the 10 electors — a pardon with zero legal effect on this state prosecution · Source: Urban Milwaukee
Wis. Const. Art. I §9m — the 2020 Marsy's Law crime-victim-privacy amendment Kaul's office is citing as the legal basis to seal the discovery record · Source: The Federalist

§ 01 / Two Separate Cases — Don't Confuse Them

Wisconsin’s fake-electors story runs through two entirely different courtrooms, and conflating them is the most common error in coverage of this case. The first is a civil lawsuit, Penebaker v. Hitt, filed in May 2022 by Law Forward and the Georgetown Law Institute for Constitutional Advocacy and Protection on behalf of Wisconsin voters. It targeted the 10 Republicans who signed certificates falsely claiming to be Wisconsin’s electors for Donald Trump — Andrew Hitt, Robert Spindell Jr., Bill Feehan, Kelly Ruh, Carol Brunner, Edward Scott Grabins, Kathy Kiernan, Darryl Carlson, Pam Travis, and Mary Buestrin — plus attorneys Jim Troupis and Kenneth Chesebro. That civil case settled in December 2023 for no damages, though per Law Forward, Georgetown ICAP, and PBS NewsHour, the 10 electors “acknowledged” their votes were used in an effort to undermine the 2020 election and disrupt the transfer of power. Wisconsin Right Now characterizes the settlement differently, describing it as involving no admission of wrongdoing — the sourcing on how to read that settlement language is genuinely split, and we present both characterizations here rather than pick one. Troupis and Chesebro settled their piece of the civil case separately in March 2024, for an unspecified payment and turnover of documents.

The second case is criminal, it is still open, and it is the one at issue here: State of Wisconsin v. Chesebro, Roman, and Troupis, filed by AG Kaul’s office in Dane County Circuit Court. This is the prosecution generating the sealing fight — not the settled civil suit, and not anything touched by Trump’s pardons, which cover only federal offenses and have no bearing on a state forgery charge.

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§ 02 / The Sealing Motion

Per The Federalist’s reporting, Kaul’s office filed a motion around June 30–July 1, 2026 seeking a protective order over discovery materials in the criminal case — the evidence being exchanged between prosecutors and the defense ahead of trial. The stated rationale, drawn directly from the motion’s language, is that ongoing media and public attention to the case has caused “concern for the victims and witnesses who are named in the discovery and may testify in this matter.”

Cartoon satire: a manila folder stamped 'DISCOVERY' being locked inside a filing cabinet by a state official, while a giant key labeled 'MARSY'S LAW' dangles from his hand, courthouse columns in the background — Kaul's office is citing Wisconsin's 2020 Marsy's Law crime-victim-privacy constitutional amendment as the legal basis for sealing discovery in the pending criminal case. Source: The Federalist.

That framing rests on Wis. Const. Art. I, §9m, the Marsy’s Law provision Wisconsin voters added by referendum in 2020 to expand privacy and notification protections for crime victims. It was not written with a disputed presidential-election paper trail in mind, and whether it stretches to cover discovery in a politically charged forgery case against three Trump-aligned lawyers is exactly what the defense intends to test. Kaul’s office would not discuss the motion beyond its filing: a spokesperson told The Federalist, “I can’t speak to anything that may be happening in the state of Wisconsin given that we generally don’t comment or confirm or deny the existence of investigations.”

“This matter has generated attention from the media and the public. The attention has caused concern for the victims and witnesses who are named in the discovery and may testify in this matter.”
Wisconsin AG Josh Kaul's office, in its motion for a protective order, per The Federalist

§ 03 / The Defense Pushes Back

Joe Bugni, the attorney representing Jim Troupis, told The Federalist the defense will fight the sealing request head-on: “we will file an opposition brief and seek a hearing.” Troupis himself, a former Dane County Circuit Court judge who served as Trump’s 2020 Wisconsin campaign attorney, framed the entire prosecution in blunt political terms: “This is a political case… This has nothing to do with the law.”

Bugni was equally direct about where this is headed regardless of how the sealing fight resolves: “This case is headed to trial. No question. Neither side is going to blink. And when we get to trial, Troupis has the right to a fair and impartial jury.” A sealed discovery record, the defense will argue, cuts against exactly that kind of public accountability for a case this politically charged — the opposite of what Marsy’s Law was written to protect.

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§ 04 / A Judge Already Under Scrutiny

The judge who will rule on the sealing motion, Dane County Circuit Court Judge John Hyland, has already faced a defense challenge to his impartiality this year. Per the Washington Examiner, defense attorneys alleged that Hyland’s ruling denying a motion to dismiss may have been drafted by a retired judge rather than Hyland himself, and sought his recusal. Hyland denied the motion, stating: “The Court is satisfied that no person other [than] the assigned staff attorney and I had a hand in drafting or editing the decision.”

Cartoon satire: a judge's gavel resting on a bench beside a stack of case files, with a shadowy ghostwriter figure sketched faintly behind the judge's chair, a courtroom clock reading a date in 2026 — Judge John Hyland denied a defense recusal motion this year over allegations his dismissal ruling may not have been self-drafted, and separately ruled Chesebro's out-of-state investigator statements admissible. Source: Washington Examiner; Wisconsin Law Journal.

Hyland has also already made substantive rulings pushing the case toward trial. He found probable cause in December 2025 to bind Troupis and Roman over for trial, and on April 23, 2026, ruled that statements from Chesebro’s out-of-state investigator are admissible evidence. None of that resolves the pending sealing motion, which is a separate question now headed for its own briefing and hearing.

Who's Named

AG Josh Kaul (D) — Wisconsin’s attorney general, whose office both brought the criminal charges and is now seeking to seal the discovery record.

Gov. Tony Evers (D) — reacted to the original 2024 charges with a single word: “Good.”

Judge John Hyland — nonpartisan judicial office; denied a recusal motion and will now rule on the sealing request.

Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) — called the prosecution a case of Democrats “weaponizing Wisconsin’s judiciary,” even as separate reporting shows his own Senate office handled the fake elector certificates on January 6, 2021 — a fact relevant to who touched the scheme, stated here without further characterization.

§ 05 / What Both Sides Have Said About the Case Itself

When Kaul’s office first announced the charges in June 2024, Gov. Tony Evers (D) offered a one-word reaction: “Good.” The joint statement from Dane and Milwaukee County election clerks was considerably more expansive: “The architects of the fake electors scheme should be brought to justice as a deterrent to any who may consider engaging in similar acts in the future.”

Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) took the opposite view: “Now Democrats are weaponizing Wisconsin’s judiciary. Apparently conservative lawyers advising clients is illegal under Democrat tyranny. Democrats are turning America into a banana republic.” Separate reporting on the broader fake-electors episode has documented that Johnson’s own Senate office was involved in handling the fake elector certificates on January 6, 2021 — a fact worth holding alongside his criticism of the prosecution, without drawing a legal conclusion from it that no charging document has drawn.