Hijacking Campaign 2025 | Independent Expenditures | Issue Ads | Candidates | Campaign 2025
Posted: March 3, 2025
Updated: March 22, 2025
Based in Nashville, Tennessee, the ironically named First Principles Wisconsin first registered to operate as an independent disbursement committee in the state of Wisconsin on January 20, 2025. Nothing is really known about the committee, but its registered email contact shares the same domain as that of Crosby Ottenhoff, LLC, a firm that provides accounting services to political committees.
At the beginning of March, the committee reported its first independent expenditures in the 2025 Wisconsin State Supreme Court election with half a million dollars going towards phone calls, online and television advertising to oppose Dane County Circuit Court Judge Susan Crawford. Crawford faces Waukesha County Circuit Court Judge Brad Schimel in the April 1st election for an open seat on the high court. Since the 2023 spring election, liberals have enjoyed a 4-3 majority on the officially nonpartisan court. The election of Schimel, a former Republican state attorney general and county district attorney, would flip control back to conservatives.
Eleven days before the April election, the group reported spending over $115,000 on television ads opposing Crawford.
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.