Former state treasurer Godlewski addresses Jefferson County Dems; calls April election ‘most consequential’

By Kim McDarison

Sarah Godlewski, an American businesswoman and politician who served as Wisconsin’s state treasurer under Gov. Tony Evers from 2019 to January, 2023, addressed members of the Jefferson County Democratic Party and the Jefferson County Women United group. 

The event, which attracted some 50 attendees, most of whom were women, was held Sunday at the Fort Atkinson Club community center, Fort Atkinson.  

During her 20-minute presentation, Godlewski talked about the importance of the upcoming April 4 general election, calling it the “most consequential of our lifetime,” while enumerating several rights, among them women’s reproductive rights, the outcome of which, she said, will be affected by the choice made in April as voters, statewide, elect a Supreme Court justice. 

Addressing attendees in advance of Godlewski, Jefferson County Democratic Party co-chair Kelli Rowley said Jefferson County Women United is an informal group begun in 2021 and comprised of activists “who care about voting and work to find ways to encourage each other to be involved.” 

The women’s group, in collaboration with the Jefferson County Democratic Party, sponsored the event. 

In her opening remarks, Rowley said she was glad to see those in attendance as a representation of “strength” heading into the April election, and added that voter turnout in Jefferson County “is on the rise.” 

She next introduced Godlewski, whom, she said, would deliver information outlining the importance of the upcoming spring general election. 

Godlewski is the founder of a political action group called “Women Win Wisconsin,” Rowley said. 

‘Women matter’ 

Godlewski began her presentation by expressing her confidence that votes cast by women this election would have impact. 

“If there’s one thing we’ve learned over the past few elections it’s women matter. And don’t mess with a group of women because we can get the job done,” she said. 

She spoke about the importance of past elections during which time she often heard those elections labeled as “the most important election of our lifetime,” she said. 

“I think about it a little differently. I think that when we are looking at April, this is the most consequential election of our lifetime. And it’s consequential for a few different reasons. For starters, we are electing a Supreme Court justice for 10 years. I mean, that is a decade. And if you think about what has happened since 2013, and how our Wisconsin Supreme Court has been involved in different policies and setting different laws, it’s been transformative,” she said. 

Godlewski noted the relationship between Wisconsin’s sitting Supreme Court justices, citing a 4-3 conservative majority. 

Looking to April and the seat on the court that is up for reelection, she said: “This seat will determine for the future if the liberals, in fact, can control the Supreme Court. And what is on the line when we are talking about this election — we are talking about attacking our freedoms and attacking our rights.” 

Among rights Godlewski cited as in jeopardy were those associated with women’s reproductive choices. 

She said: “I’ll be honest, I just get frustrated that I even have to talk about this right now because we had 50 years to make this the law of the land, and we knew Roe (v. Wade) was hanging by a shoestring, but yet, we failed to get it done. And now we have to look at the courts to resolve where women can make their reproductive healthcare choices.” 

Pointing to a case known as “Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization,” a landmark decision addressing whether the Constitution protects the right to an abortion, which was overturned in 2022, Godlewski said that following the decision to overturn that case, in Wisconsin, lawmakers reinstated, she said, “a 1849 criminalized abortion ban,” adding: “I mean 1849 was a time before women could vote; it was a time before doctors were told that they should wash their hands. I mean this was even a time before sliced bread was invented. And we’re going back to those days? A time when we are criminalizing doctors? A time where there’s no exception, not even for rape or for incest?” 

Godlewski said potential outcomes from the April election put “women’s lives on the line. 

“And thank goodness for Gov. Evers, because he’s at least been able to stop these additional attacks, because they’re still trying to come at us from the Legislature.”

She said the potential for a liberal-leaning judge chosen during the April election by voters offered her hope for better outcomes for women, citing a case in opposition to the 1849 abortion ban that is working its way through the court system and will likely come before the Supreme Court after a new justice is seated. 

Said Godlewski: “Right now, there is this case that the attorney general here in Wisconsin set forth, which basically questions the legitimacy of the 1849 law. What is says is that since 1849, there have actually been laws in Wisconsin that have set parameters around abortion. For example, there’s been one in 1985 that talks about how you cannot get an abortion after 24 weeks. There’s another law that talks about you have to wait 24 hours before you can get an abortion. So what the attorney general is saying: how did we all just go back to 1849 when we’ve got other laws on the books that recognize abortion as a healthcare practice? Like, this just doesn’t make sense. And so this is eventually going to go to the Supreme Court here in Wisconsin.” 

Godlewski shared her views about Dan Kelly, a former right-leaning Supreme Court justice who is running in April to regain a seat. He will run against a left-leaning challenger Janet Protasiewicz. 

The top vote-getter will replace conservative Justice Patience Roggensack, whose term expires in July 2023, and who did not run for reelection. 

According to Godlewski, Kelly has been employed by an anti-abortion group.  

“He literally worked for an anti-abortion group. On top of that, he has been endorsed by not just one, but multiple anti-abortion groups, and it is very clear where he stands on this issue. And so, let’s make no mistake about it, women will continue to be back in 1849 if we allow Dan Kelly to win this election,” she said.  

LGBTQ rights, PFAS

Godlewski next commented about the future, from her perspective, of LGBTQ rights, saying, “We also know LGBTQ and marriage equality is on this ballot.”  

She stated: “Dan Kelly has said that marriage needs to be between a man and a woman. And the Supreme Court in Wisconsin has actually listened to a case in 2022 about LGBTQ rights. So if they can take the rights away from half of our population today, what’s next?” 

Additionally, she said “water rights” and “rights to a clean environment” were both on the ballot.  

“We have seen in Wisconsin PFAS (per-and polyfluoroalkyl substances), these forever chemicals that are poisoning our lakes, they are poisoning our water, they are poisoning our drinking wells. Here in Wisconsin we have 50 communities that have already tested PFAS that are above recommended levels in their drinking water.”  

She cited the community of Peshtigo as among those with elevated levels of PFAS in their drinking water. 

“And here’s what is at stake is these communities are dealing with expenses, like how do I get bottled water to these citizens? How do I rebuild a new drinking system, and then at the same time, the health effects that we are seeing,” Godlewski said. 

Relating the issue back to the Supreme Court race, she said: “There’s a case right now going through the Wisconsin court system that wants to hold corporations accountable for the PFAS that they submitted in the water. They want to make corporations pay for the damages that they have done. That’s what’s at stake. And guess what? We already know where Dan Kelly stands on this issue because in 2019, when Dan Kelly was on the court, big oil went up to the Supreme Court and the challenge was about who needs to pay, basically, for environmental insurance in case a spill happens. The big oil companies said, ‘we don’t want to pay for this, because, you know, it shouldn’t be our problem if anything happens.’ Guess who sided with big oil? Dan Kelly. So we know, because he has shown us through his record where he stands on this issue.” 

Gerrymandering, democracy 

Godlewski told those in attendance that fighting for rights would not be possible without democracy, and she said, “we have clearly seen in the last few years how the Supreme Court has affected democracy.”  

She pointed to gerrymandering, saying: “When our districts for Assembly and Senate look more like letters of the alphabet than actual districts, that’s a problem, and Gov. Evers, as soon as he got into office, started the Fair Maps Task Force — brought people together to figure out how can we draw these maps in a very fair and inclusive way, came up with these maps and guess what happened? The Legislature said, no, no, no, no. I don’t like this. Well, why would they like them, because they took 60% of the vote when they draw their maps. It’s not even close. And so what ends up happening is when the governor proposes maps, and the Legislature proposes maps, the Supreme Court becomes the arbitrator. They’re the ones that then decide which maps will actually happen. And this is a process that occurs every 10 years. And so just this past year, the Supreme Court set an unimaginable precedent that we have never seen before. They created this precedent called ‘the lease changed doctrine,’ which says they’re going to vote for the maps that are least changed, regardless of how they are drawn, regardless of how they look like, they’re going to go for the ones that are the least changed.” 

Godlewski cited what she called “the second big attack that we’ve seen on democracy,” again pointing to actions associated with the state Supreme Court. 

Citing the 2020 election, she said: “When Donald Trump sued to overturn the will of the people, and to overturn our 10 Electoral College votes … it went to the Supreme Court, and thank goodness for (Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice) Brian Hagedorn, who is a conservative justice,” whom, she said, “did actually agree with the liberal justices and said that this isn’t legit, threw the case out, but Dan Kelly was involved in that case. He was actually the attorney for the Republican Party and it was released in the January 6 Commission in Congress that he was advising the chair of the Republican Party and the National Republican Party on how to overturn this election.” 

She called Kelly “a political hack,” and threw her support behind Protasiewicz.   

“Janet (Protasiewicz) couldn’t be more opposite of Dan Kelly,” Godlewski said, adding: “Janet has the ethical background and the experience that we need with somebody to sit on the Supreme Court, who will actually uphold our freedoms and our rights as Wisconsinites. But we cannot take this election for granted. I know a lot of us in this room are feeling pretty darn good about the (past primary) election in February. And we should be celebrating that success because we had a record-breaking turnout in the primary where almost a million Wisconsinites voted in that election.” 

Offering some statistics, she said that during the last August primary, some 750,000 voters cast their ballots. During this year’s February primary election, she said one million people voted.  

“That’s a huge accomplishment, and if you would add up the Democratic, the two candidates on the Democratic side (who ran in the February primary), we had almost 54% of the vote. But here’s the thing: we’ve been here before. Whether it is in 2016, where we all thought that Hillary Clinton had it locked up here in Wisconsin, to 2019, with Lisa Neubauer on the Supreme Court, the polls had her 10 points ahead against Brian Hagedorn. Lisa Neubauer lost by 5,000 votes. That’s it. And when you put those 5,000 across all of the wards in Wisconsin, it’s literally just a few votes,” Godlewski said. 

Godlewski ended her presentation by telling attendees that she plans to do her part to help get out the vote through her organization Women Win Wisconsin, with six rallies planned to take place across the state.  

When it comes to winning the April 4 election, she said, “it’s women who are going to make that happen.” 

A summary of Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Heath Organization is here: https://constitutioncenter.org/the-constitution/supreme-court-case-library/dobbs-v-jackson-womens-health-organization. 

A summary of Roe v. Wade is here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roe_v._Wade. 

A story about PFAS in Peshtigo is here: https://www.wpr.org/town-peshtigo-residents-have-lived-pfas-pollution-years-theyre-still-waiting-permanent-source-safe. 

A story about ties between Kelly, Trump and plans to advance a “fake elector scheme” as reported by NBC News is here: https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/elections/daniel-kelly-wisconsin-supreme-court-trump-fake-electors-rcna71276. 

Dan Kelly’s ballotpedia.org profile is here: https://ballotpedia.org/Daniel_Kelly_(Wisconsin). 

Janet Protasiewicz’s ballotpedia.org profile is here: https://ballotpedia.org/Janet_Claire_Protasiewicz.