His legal headaches keep piling up.
Wisconsin’s bipartisan ethics committee has reportedly accused President Donald Trump’s Save America PAC of scheming with Wisconsin Republicans to circumvent campaign finance laws in a 2022 race to unseat a powerful Trump critic in the state — Wisconsin Assembly Speaker Robin Vos (R).
The Wisconsin Ethics Commission recommended Save America be charged with felonies alongside state Rep. Janel Brandtjen (R) and a string of others, as the blog WisPolitics first reported Friday.
The commission sent its recommendation to multiple county prosecutors on Tuesday, according to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. If those prosecutors do not charge the parties within 60 days, the commission can go over their heads, the paper noted.
The allegations stem from the 2022 primary race involving Vos and a Republican challenger, Adam Steen.
Vos earned Trump’s ire in 2020 when he pushed back on Trump’s efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election — after spending years trying to cement Republican power in his home state.
Wisconsin law stipulates that $1,000 is the most an individual can donate to a candidate for the state assembly. The commission alleged that larger individual donations were funneled to Steen’s campaign illegally by taking advantage of state laws that put no limits on the amount political parties can donate to candidates, per the Washington Post.
WisPolitics laid out how the scheme worked: Donors who wanted to support Steen were told to make out checks to the Langlade County GOP with “63” in the memo line, and that money would be directed toward Steen even if it was above the $1,000 limit. (The number refers to Vos’ district.)
Steen’s effort to unseat Vos was a big failure.
But the ethics panel’s recommendation comes as Vos continues to fight off challenges from Trump-aligned segments of his party. Last month, Trump allies in Wisconsin filed a petition seeking to recall Vos from office.
It also adds to the towering list of accusations involving the Republican presidential front-runner. Trump is currently facing 91 charges in multiple jurisdictions ahead of the 2024 presidential election in November.