Clockwise from top left, Justice Ann Walsh Bradley, Justice Rebecca Grassl Bradley, Justice Annette Kingsland Ziegler, Justice-elect Jill Karofsky, Justice Brian Hagedorn, Chief Justice Patience D. Roggensack and Justice Rebecca Frank Dallet. (Contributed)

Wisconsin Supreme Court to hear arguments on Safer at Home extension

May 3, 2020

By Patrick Lynn

The Wisconsin Supreme Court on Tuesday will hear oral arguments in a lawsuit seeking to block the extension of the state’s Safer at Home order.

Speaker Robin Vos and Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald, both Republicans, announced in mid-April that the Wisconsin Legislature would pursue legal action against Gov. Tony Evers’ extension of the Safer at Home order, claiming it went beyond the executive branch’s powers.

“The public outcry over the Safer at Home order continues to increase as positive COVID cases decrease or remain flat. There’s immense frustration regarding the extension, as it goes beyond the executive branch’s statutory powers,” Vos and Fitzgerald said in a joint statement. “Wisconsinites are forced to sit by with no voice in the process. Other Midwestern states with more confirmed cases, like Ohio, have set firm dates to begin a phased reopening far earlier than the Evers administration.”

Evers responded by calling the move a “political power grab.”

“Legislative Republicans, they’re telling 4,600 plus people in the state of Wisconsin who have [sic] contracted COVID-19 and the families of those 242 people that have died, we don’t care about you,” he said. “We care about our political power.”

Evers issued the Safer at Home order in mid-March, ordering schools and nonessential businesses to close. Under the order, public and private gatherings of 10 or more people were also prohibited.

In mid-April, Evers extended that order through his health secretary, Andrea Palm, keeping extending the closures through May 26.

The Tuesday hearing will take place at 10 a.m. via video conference. Both sides will have 45 minutes to make their arguments.