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Hannah Dugan Keeps License
Wisconsin’s liberal Supreme Court majority is not explaining why it did not suspend former Milwaukee County Judge Hannah Dugan’s law license.
The court on Wednesday refused to take action on Dugan’s license before a formal hearing.
"On July 21, 2026, the Office of Lawyer Regulation filed a motion for the summary suspension of the license of Attorney Hannah C. Dugan to practice law in Wisconsin pursuant to Supreme Court Rule (SCR) 22.20(1).1 The OLR stated the ground for the motion is Attorney Dugan’s conviction of a 'serious crime'," the court wrote in a two page order.
But the court said it doesn't think Dugan's license needs to be automatically suspended.
"Having considered the motion and the response, the court concludes, in the exercise of its discretion…that a summary suspension of Attorney Dugan’s license to practice law in Wisconsin is not warranted,” the court added.
The liberal majority, however, did not say what its discretion is or was, or explain why the justices don't feel a law license suspension is "warranted."
Dugan was arrested last year after she helped a wanted, illegal immigrant escape her courtroom to avoid ICE agents who were there to arrest the man. A jury convicted her of one felony count of obstructing a federal proceeding. The judge sentenced her to a $5,000 fine. State regulators then recommended Dugan's law license be suspended.
Conservative Justice Annette Ziegler vehemently disagreed with the decision to allow Dugan to keep her law license.
"The federal crime that Attorney Dugan was convicted of is 'corruptly endeavor[ing] to influence, obstruct, and impede the due and proper administration of the law under which a pending proceeding was being had before a department and agency of the United States'," she wrote. "More specifically, these charges concerned then-Judge Dugan, in her capacity as a circuit court judge, wearing a judicial robe, at the courthouse, obstructing federal agents. I am confounded by our court’s inaction."
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