David Wittwer, president and chief executive officer of TDS Telecom, the Madison-based parent company of TDS Metrocom, has resigned from the board of directors of the Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce (WMC), the state’s largest business lobbying group.
Wittwer and other members of the WMC board have been feeling pressure because of the partisan political stances and expenditures by the organization.
Critics say the WMC has bought the Wisconsin Supreme Court.
The WMC spent an estimated $2.2 million on television commercials that criticized former Wisconsin Supreme Court candidate Linda Clifford last summer. Clifford ultimately was defeated by the WMC-backed candidate, Annette Ziegler, who was then reprimanded for failing to recuse herself from cases involving companies with whom she had financial ties.
On Tuesday, challenger Mike Gableman won a narrow victory over Supreme Court Justice Louis Butler, who was the first African-American to serve on the court. The WMC spent more than $2 million for commercials that criticized Butler in a race that featured television commercials that drew national attention from news outlets such as The Wall Street Journal, Newsweek and The Associated Press.
The ads supporting Gableman and criticizing Butler were denounced as being misleading by several organizations, including the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign, the Wisconsin Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers and Common Cause Wisconsin.
Wittwer had been criticized by Waukesha resident Jim Bouman, a TDS customer who wrote a letter to Wittwer, threatening to cancel his service because of Wittwer’s affiliation with the WMC.
Bouman, who writes a blog titled, "Water Blogged in Waukesha," called Gableman an "utterly cluesess waterboy for the fat cats."
Wittwer responded with a letter to Bouman, telling him, "From your letter it is abundantly clear you hold sharp differences in opinion to some of those espoused by the WMC. Without question, you are entitled to share those viewpoints with me. TDS is the company you have entrusted to be your communications solution provider and we do our level best to maintain that level of trust in everything we do. Further, TDS takes our customers’ viewpoints and expressions of dissatisfaction seriously. With that in mind, I believe it important to share with you that, for personal and philosophical reasons, I have resigned my seat as a member of the WMC board of directors. It would be untrue for me to suggest that your letter was the catalyst for my departure form the leadership of this statewide trade association, but I wanted to personally make you aware of my decision."
Bouman then shared Wittwer’s letter in his blog and responded with the following comments: "I am sticking with TDS. Wittwer’s resignation and plea to retain my business speak eloquently of the influence we have with our consumer choices. I’m really happy to remain a customer, in touch with the TDS staff and professionals who have provided great service over the years. And my opinion of Wittwer is up more than a few notches -he operates a good business that provides really good service and he is personally pragmatic."
SBT received e-mails from several business leaders and some labor officials this morning, applauding Wittwer’s decision to resign from the WMC board.
However, Drew Peterson, director of legislative and public relations for TDS Telecom, told SBT that Wittwer’s decision to resign from the WMC board was not based on political heat generated by the criticism of the WMC’s tactics.
"It was purely a person decision on behalf of David Wittwer. It did not have anything to do with political issues," said Peterson, who acknowledged the national attention generated by the Supreme Court race.
The race continued to raise eyebrows when the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign reported that out-of-state interests poured in $50,000 to Gableman campaign on March 17, just two weeks before the election. The five $10,000 contributions came from Paul Singer, Gordon and Jenny Singer, Bonnie Loeb and Jay Newman with Elliot Management Corp., a New York hedge firm, according to the WDC.
In another Milwaukee Biz Blog entry today, Mike McCabe of the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign, which has been critical of the impact of large campaign donations by both right-leaning corporations and left-leaning groups such as the Wisconsin Education Association Council, says big money is soiling the Wisconsin Supreme Court.
Steve Jagler is executive editor of Small Business Times.
