But the release of hundreds of emails sealed foryears under the John Doe’s secrecy order—recently released as part of thelitigation involving the O’Donnell Park tragedy—reveals more serious evidenceof how Walker’s top campaign advisers were actuallycalling the shots on county matters to protect Walker and his campaign forgovernor from political damage from this tragedy.
And make no mistake: Scott Walker was definitelyaware that his campaign and county staffers were working together to shape hisimage as he ran for governor in 2010.
Walker was copied on almost all of the emails.
‘Make Sure There Is Not a Paper Anywhere’
Immediately after a concrete slab fell off theO’Donnell Park parking structure and killed 15-year-old Jared Kellner andinjured two others on June 24, 2010, Walker’s campaign aides took control ofWalker’s image.
Nowhere in any of the emails released is thereevidence of Walker or any of his campaign or county staffers expressingsympathy or concern for the Kellner family or the public’s safety. Their onlyinterest seems to be managing Walker’s image and distancing himself from anypotential cause of the structure’s failures.
To do so, Walker’s campaign and county aides worked outsideof the county’s official email servers to prepare his messaging, dig upinformation on the structure’s history and discuss how to respond to requestsfrom the public.
Because they conducted their operations outside ofthe official network, Walker’s aides were able to evade open records requestsfrom reporters and members of the public about the true state of the parkingstructure—and the extent to which Walker’s campaign and county aides werealigned.
As Keith Gilkes, Walker’s campaign manager, put itimmediately after Kellner was killed: “Make sure there is not a paper any wherethat details a problem at all.”
At the same time Walker’s campaign was working onthe response to the tragedy, his inner circle was complaining about the“politicization” of it. Walker himself wrote on July 20, 2010, “It isdisgusting that anyone would use a tragedy for such blatant political purposes.”
It’s difficult to see how Walker could have alegitimate complaint about politics intruding on his official county affairs,since he politicized the matter by sending that email from his campaign emailaccount to his top campaign aides and his top county aides on their personalemail addresses.
Inside Walker’s Inner Circle
Walker was copied on almost all of the emailsdealing with O’Donnell Park, but not at his county email address.
Instead, Walker discussed this official countymatter via his campaign email account with his inner circle. The main playersincluded:
■ FranMcLaughlin:Walker’s county spokeswoman at the time of the tragedy, McLaughlin proved to bethe main conduit between Walker’s campaign and county staffers. McLaughlinwould receive an email at her official county account, then forward it to apersonal email account to get it off of the county’s official email system.
From her personal email, McLaughlin would forwardthe message to the inner circle, which included Walker at his campaign emailaccount, Chief of Staff Tom Nardelli at his personal email account, DeputyChief of Staff Kelly Rindfleisch at her personal email account, longtime Walkercampaign and county aide Tim Russell at his personal email account, Walkercampaign manager Keith Gilkes, campaign spokeswoman Jill Bader, longtime countyand campaign advisor Jim Villa and campaign operative R.J. Johnson. Frequently,Department of Administrative Services chief Cindy Archer would participate onher private email account. McLaughlin often used her “gopfran” email address onthese county matters as well.
From the emails it’s clear that McLaughlin had torun all communications through this inner circle, which apparently is the samecircle that prosecutors dubbed “The Campaign Group.” McLaughlin was frequentlyoverruled on her suggestions and deferred to Walker and his campaign advisorson statements about O’Donnell Park and responses to reporters.
McLaughlin was so committed to Walker’s politicalfuture that she monitored all news coverage of county matters and forwardedthem to the group. No matter was too small for her attention. For example, sheemailed Walker and his inner political and county circle “can someone getsupporters to vote?” on a BusinessJournal poll asking if former Congressman Mark Neumann or Walker would winthe Republican primary for governor.
McLaughlin was given immunity from prosecution forher activities while Walker was in office. She’s currently the spokeswoman forMilwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke.
■ Tim Russell: Russell was a longtimecounty and campaign aide to Walker. In June 2010, Russell was working asWalker’s director of Housing in the Department of Health and Human Services, aposition that had nothing to do with O’Donnell Park. At the same time, as welearned from the John Doe investigation, Russell was embezzling more than$20,000 from a sham veterans’ charity he’d set up with Walker’s blessing.
Prosecutors alleged that Russell also purchased aprivate wifi router for the county executive’ssuite so that Walker’s inner aides could communicate without having to gothrough the county’s email server.
In January, Russell was sentenced to two years inprison and five years on probation for his crimes. His domestic and businesspartner, Brian Pierick, was sentenced to community service and fined $2,100 formisdemeanor delinquency for sending graphic images to a Waukesha County teen.Pierick’s personal email address pops up from time to time in the O’Donnellemails.
■ KellyRindfleisch:Russell hired Rindfleisch as a policy analyst for Walker’s county executiveoffice in January 2010 and by June 2010 she was working as Walker’s deputychief of staff. But that wasn’t her only place of employment. While Rindfleischwas working as Walker’s county aide, she was also working as a fundraiser forBrett Davis, a Republican candidate for lieutenant governor. Prosecutors allegethat she exchanged more than a thousand emails with Walker’s campaign staffersduring regular business hours at the county.
Immediately after the O’Donnell tragedy, Walkercampaign manager Keith Gilkes ordered her to go to work early the next day to“Keep on top of Sue Black, [county aide Steven] Kreklow, [county aide Cindy]Archer and all staff to make sure there is not a paper any where that details aproblem at all. My fear is some 1999 memo to [former County Executive Tom]Ament outlines a problem—and somehow Ament remembers it and finds it. [Countyattorney Tim] Schoewe needs to have every piece of paper ever created on thisstructure completely reviewed. You are the only person capable of overseeingthese people.”
Rindfleisch agreed to a plea deal with prosecutorsfor one felony count of misconduct in public office and was sentenced to sixmonths in jail and three years of probation. She’s appealing her conviction andremains free during the appeal.
■ Tom Nardelli: Nardelli served as Walker’schief of staff and Rindfleisch’s boss during the O’Donnell Park aftermath, thensecured two state positions when Walker was elected governor. He abruptly quithis state job in August 2011, while the John Doe probe was heating up.
Nardelli routinely used a personal email account forthe O’Donnell Park matters, but he seemed to chafe against the Walker campaignstaffers’ intrusion on county affairs, at one point grumbling, “just in caseanyone cares what I think as COS [chief of staff].” Nardelli appears to havesent that message on his cell phone via his private email account.
When, just a month before the general election in2010, he finds that a lawsuit would be filed in the O’Donnell Park case,Nardelli advised Walker: “You need to be as far away from this issue aspossible.”
Nardelli was never charged with a crime or grantedimmunity from prosecutors, and it’s unknown if he testified in the probe.
■ Cindy Archer: Archer was the head of theDepartment of Administrative Services and communicated often via her personalemail account about O’Donnell Park. Archer would often pose “breakfast topic”questions, such as whether Walker’s aides could affect the timing of reports onO’Donnell Park and the troubled Behavioral Health Division. Archer wondered ifthey should be released before or after the November 2010 election, thenconceded that they had no control over their release. Archer also wrote in an emailto Nardelli and Rindfleisch that she was “getting mixed messages from thecampaign side” about how the county executive’s office was handling openrecords requests.
Archer followed Walker to Madison when he waselected governor. State and federal law enforcement officers raided her home inSeptember 2011 and seized items including a computer hard drive. She wasn’tcharged with any crimes, nor was she granted immunity from prosecution. OnMonday, the Journal Sentinelreported, Archer began a job in the state Public Defender’s Office, where shewill earn a $101,510 salary.
Walker Aides’ War on Reporters and Transparency
When Walker’s campaign and county aides weren’tcomplaining about progressive members of the Milwaukee County Board ofSupervisors and, ironically, the “politicization” of the tragedy, they weremoaning about local reporters’ coverage of the O’Donnell Park investigation.They complained about Aaron Diamant at TMJ4; Brendan Conway, then at WISN andnow working as the spokesman for County Executive Chris Abele; Mick Trevey,then at TMJ4; and, not surprisingly, the Shepherd.
Not all reporters came under fire, however. Gilkesfrom the campaign instructed Rindfleisch to get a response to “talk radio ASAPto get our spin on it right away.” Right-wing talker Charlie Sykes emailedWalker’s campaign address about TMJ4’s coverage of the incident, which Walkerthen forwarded to his county and campaign aides. Tim Russell informed theothers that the Journal Sentinel’sJesse Garza had promised Walker “good ink” on the tragedy. And Aaron Rodriguez,then working for the Hispanic Conservative blog and El Conquistador, was given the kid-glove treatment when he askedMcLaughlin questions. He now blogs for the JournalSentinel and is one of Chris Abele’s favorite bloggers.
