Hijacking Campaign 2020 | Independent Expenditures | Issue Ads | Candidates | Offices | Campaign 2020
Posted: August 12, 2020
Updated: June 24, 2021
Fall: Oath • Spending
Spring: Oath • Spending
Service Employees International Union (SEIU) is a labor union which represents health care, home care, nursing home, public service and building service workers in Wisconsin. This is the Wisconsin-based branch of the union. Before 2018 the union made independent expenditures through its PAC. With the 2018 fall election it started using an unregistered independent expenditure group instead as such groups are held to looser reporting requirements and funding source restrictions than a PAC.
This committee made independent expenditures in both the 2020 fall legislative and spring Wisconsin State Supreme Court elections. (See note at the bottom of the page about spring election activity.)
A committtee sponsored by the national SEIU was involved in the same elections in 2020.
Fall Election
The day of the August 11 primary elections SEIU first reported spending nearly $14,000 on "virtual" canvassing in four Democratic primaries in the Milwaukee area, the 6th Senate and the 8th, 11th and 14th Assembly districts. Two months after the November election it upped that figure to $75,000. The SEIU-favored candidates lost in both the 8th and 11th Assembly District primaries.
Spring Election
Less than a week before the February 18 Wisconsin State Supreme Court primary, it first reported spending $38,000 against incumbent Justice Daniel Kelly. Kelly faced two challengers in the primary, Marquette University law professor Ed Fallone and Dane County Circuit Court Judge Jill Karofsky. Fallone was eliminated in the primary. Karofsky won the April 7 election.
By the end of the election SEIU had reported spending over $333,000 for canvassing, literature and phone banks to defeat Kelly.
Note: This organization reported independent expenditure activity as an unregistered committee during the 2020 Wisconsin State Supreme election. Several months after the election it filed a report crediting all independent spending to this committee. The original reports showing spending by the SEIU's unregistered committee are still available on the Ethics Commission campaign website.
This organization is registered with the Wisconsin Ethics Commission as an independent expenditure committee following the January 2010 U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Citizens United v. FEC.