When Indiana Governor Mike Pence signed the Right to Bigotry law on Friday, he set off of a firestorm he hadn't expected. The blow back has been fierce, with people, companies and other entities pulling out of the state or threatening to do so. The biggest of which - so far - has been from Angie's List, which is pulling out of a $40 million, 1,000-job expansion that they had planned for Indiana.
What Pence also did was take the heat off of Scott Walker, his bigotry and its high cost:
The State of Wisconsin's unsuccessful court battle to prevent gay marriage will cost taxpayers more than $1 million, under an agreement released Friday.
State Attorney General Brad Schimel, a Republican, and attorneys for eight gay and lesbian couples reached the agreement after the couples successfully sued to overturn the state's 2006 constitutional ban on same-sex marriage.
The couples were represented by the American Civil Liberties Union, which sought $1.25 million to cover its costs because the couples prevailed in their lawsuit. Ultimately, the ACLU will receive nearly $1.1 million, under the stipulation released Friday.
Carl Tobias, a law professor at the University of Richmond in Virginia who believes bans like Wisconsin's are unconstitutional, said that he wasn't surprised at the cost to state taxpayers and that it could have been worse. Gov. Scott Walker, one of the defendants, and then-Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen, both Republicans, opposed the same-sex plaintiffs at every level of the federal court system, he said.
"The state never seemed to appreciate how much taxpayer money is expended on this type of litigation in which it was pretty clear from the outset that Wisconsin was going to lose," Tobias said.
The article does not include the cost to taxpayers for the state's attorneys to fight this quixotic battle, the court costs, the loss in work hours for the scores of people that testified, etc., which would raise the cost easily over $2 million.
At least there's a chance that Pence will have to pay for his hatred politically. The only thing that Walker will have to face is the grumblings of some rabid, foam-at-the-mouth, uber conservatives that are mad that he gave up so soon.
