Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Annette Ziegler announced Monday that she will not seek a third term, closing out a 30-year judicial career and opening her seat in 2027. Ziegler, 62, is the second conservative justice to step aside since the court's ideological balance tipped to a 4-3 liberal majority in 2023.
Her departure, combined with Justice Rebecca Bradley's earlier decision to bow out of the 2026 race, means both conservative justices who most frequently challenged the new majority's direction are now heading for the exits. The practical result: the liberal bloc that took control of Wisconsin's highest court will face even less institutional resistance going forward.
According to Courthouse News, Ziegler was first appointed to the bench by former Governor Tommy Thompson. She won election to the Wisconsin Supreme Court in 2007 with 59% of the vote, then ran unopposed for reelection in 2017. In 2021, her fellow justices elected her chief justice for a four-year term.
According to the court, Ziegler is the 80th justice and the sixth woman to serve since Wisconsin became a state in 1848. She was the first female jurist in Washington County, where she served on the circuit court for seven years before moving to the Court of Appeals District II.
Before taking the bench, Ziegler attended Marquette University Law School, worked in private practice representing businesses, and served as both an assistant United States attorney and a special assistant district attorney. In her statement, she made clear her support crossed party lines.
I am incredibly proud that in all my elections I had support from a broad spectrum of legal, civic, law enforcement and political leaders — both Democrats and Republicans — who believed in my commitment to fairness, ethics and the rule of law.
Off the bench, Ziegler served Washington County through the Boys and Girls Club, which awarded her its National Silver Medallion award in 2023 and inducted her into its hall of fame in 2024.
Since the liberal majority took hold in 2023 following Justice Janet Protasiewicz's election, Ziegler and Bradley frequently joined each other's dissenting opinions. Their most significant joint objection came in November 2025, when the court decided to appoint judicial panels to review two challenges to Wisconsin's congressional maps.
That decision gave circuit courts the authority to conduct fact-finding, meaning lower courts would determine whether the cases could legally be escalated to the Supreme Court. It did not go so far as to grant the high court direct review of the challenges.
Ziegler wrote a nine-page dissent accusing the majority of enacting a pattern of partisan judicial activism.
Today is not a good day for Wisconsin's judicial system."Justice Susan Crawford, the court's newest member whose 2025 win cemented the liberal majority for the first time in 15 years, offered a different view. Crawford told Courthouse News on the campaign trail that an activist judge is "simply one whose decisions you disagree with.
That framing tells you everything about the philosophical divide on this court. When the majority acts and the dissenters object, calling it activism, the majority's response is not to defend its reasoning on the merits but to dismiss the label itself.
Ziegler's career was not without controversy. Shortly after winning her Supreme Court election, she was publicly reprimanded by her fellow justices for willfully violating the judicial code of conduct by presiding over 11 cases in which she had a conflict of interest. The conflict stemmed from cases involving a bank in which she had an interest. A 60-page opinion found she did not gain financially from her decisions in favor of the bank. In a 2008 statement to the Wisconsin State Journal, Ziegler said she was happy the matter was concluded so she could focus on serving the people of Wisconsin.
Ziegler's term runs through July 2027. She said she intends to serve it out fully.
I look forward to finishing out the rest of my term on the court and handing the baton to a new justice in 2027.
Meanwhile, the race for Bradley's open seat is already down to two candidates: Wisconsin Court of Appeals Judge Maria Lazar and Wisconsin Court of Appeals Judge Chris Taylor. That April election will not alter the court's 4-3 liberal majority. But a win for Taylor could solidify that majority until 2030.
The 2027 race for Ziegler's seat will carry even higher stakes. Whoever wins it will determine whether the conservative wing retains any meaningful foothold on a court that has shifted decisively leftward since 2023.
Two conservative justices built careers defined by bipartisan election wins, disciplined dissents, and clear warnings about judicial overreach. Both are now walking away. Wisconsin voters will have to decide whether the court those justices are leaving behind still answers to the law or only to the majority that controls it.
