Wisconsin Supreme Court candidate Brad Schimel opposes abortion rights
Schimel’s opponent, Susan Crawford, has been endorsed by EMILYs List, a national abortion-rights group.

This year, the Wisconsin Supreme Court could undergo a seismic shift when Justice Ann Walsh Bradley retires on July 31. The election for her open seat will take place on April 1.
Candidate Brad Schimel is facing off against Dane County Judge Susan Crawford in the race for Bradley’s seat. Schimel served as a judge in Waukesha County and is the former Waukesha County district attorney and former Republican state attorney general. Schimel opposes abortion rights, a position he’s promoted for over a decade. In a 2014 PBS interview, Schimel said, “I believe that life begins at conception.”
Tanya Atkinson, the president of Planned Parenthood Advocates of Wisconsin and the CEO of Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin, said Schimel’s commitment to the idea that life begins at conception is “really chilling — that is probably the most conservative position on reproductive health and freedom that that somebody could hold. And so everything that could flow from that as his agenda really could harm the people of Wisconsin.”
The Michigan Independent contacted Schimel’s campaign for comment but did not receive a response.
While serving as Waukesha County district attorney in 2012, Schimel was among a number of attorneys who signed in agreement with a Wisconsin Right to Life legal white paper that endorsed a pre-Civil War statute that had previously been interpreted to make abortion illegal at conception, with no exceptions for rape, incest, or the health of the pregnant woman.
Dane County Circuit Judge Diane Schlipper ruled in 2023 that the law pertained to infanticide and not to abortion.
Sheboygan County District Attorney Joel Urmanski appealed the ruling to the Wisconsin Supreme Court in February 2024, asking the court to decide whether the law applies to consensual procedures. The court, which gained a liberal 4-3 majority with the election of Justice Janet Protasiewicz in 2023, heard oral arguments in the case in November. A ruling is likely to come in the next few months.
During his time as the state’s attorney general from 2015 to 2019, Schimel appealed a 2013 federal appeals court ruling on abortion to the U.S. Supreme Court. The federal court had blocked a Wisconsin law that would have required abortion providers to have hospital admitting privileges. The law would have resulted in the closing of several clinics that provide abortion care. In 2016, the Supreme Court formally refused to take up Schimel’s appeal.
“What I think is important is that we look at people’s actions,” Tanya Atkinson, president of Planned Parenthood Advocates of Wisconsin and CEO of Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin, told the Wisconsin Independent. “As Maya Angelou says, when somebody shows you who they are, believe them the first time. And Schimel time and time and time again has shown us that he absolutely will use the law in a way that would undermine reproductive rights.”
In a May 2024 meeting of the Fox Valley Initiative in Appleton, asked about his position on abortion, Schimel reportedly said that as a state Supreme Court justice, he would respect the will of the voters if a bill or referendum providing exceptions to bans on abortion were to pass.
Haley McCoy, the deputy communications director for the Democratic Party of Wisconsin, said she believes Schimel is simply “trying to save face right now, sort of rewrite his record, but his record really speaks for itself.” She added, “He really is an anti-abortion extremist.”
As an attorney, Crawford represented Planned Parenthood. She announced her run for the Supreme Court in June 2024 and had raised $2.8 million as of Jan. 10. She has been endorsed by the four sitting liberal justices on the court, Protasiewicz, Walsh Bradley, Rebecca Dallet, and Jill Karofsky, as well as by the Wisconsin Democratic Party.
“The entire agenda that he’s promoted throughout his public life flies in the face of, certainly, what the people of Wisconsin have repeatedly demonstrated that they want and expect,” Atkinson said.