Over the weekend, Republican Eric Toney sat down for a debate with Wisconsin's incumbent Attorney General, Democrat Josh Kaul. Earlier this year, Kaul made the choice not to run for governor in favor of another term as Attorney General, and that may have been a mistake, because Toney embarrassed Kaul by bringing the receipts.
The Wisconsin DOJ has had a hiring freeze for years. While Kaul blames others for a lack of positions, he's the one deciding not to fill open jobs across the agency. The state crime lab has struggled with turnaround time for testing and there are other problems under Kaul's watch.
During the debate, Kaul accused Toney of lying about the hiring freeze. But Toney was ready and dropped the receipts.
Josh Kaul says I’m lying about his hiring freeze at DOJ. I brought the receipts to the debate. He’s blaming others for the problems he created because it’s an election year. pic.twitter.com/zVVQx767YF
— Eric Toney (@EricJToney) October 11, 2026
"We're going to make sure there's never a hiring freeze in place," Toney said. "And what we've seen, you know, these are emails from his own Department of Justice, if you'd like to look. 2022: hiring freeze. 2025: hiring freeze. More of those emails where they've had hiring freezes in place. These are emails his office provided to the state Senate that we got through a public records request. And so now what he's doing is playing a sleight of hand saying that well, now maybe they don't have a hiring freeze during an election year. And what he said in 2018 was that it shouldn't take an election year to get on top of the crime wave."
Here’s the proof: DOJ staff have been exchanging emails about hiring freezes for years. Kaul blames others for a lack of positions but he’s made the decision not to fill the positions he has across his agency. pic.twitter.com/3IgDXiPiTB
— Eric Toney (@EricJToney) October 11, 2026
Those notes from a September 18, 2025 meeting, say the "hiring freeze countdown" is "still underway" and another email from October 12, 2022, also noted the "year-end hiring freeze."
Kaul has no intention of fighting crime in the state. He's waged war on Catholic Charities and other religious charitable groups — trying to strip them all of the tax-exempt status related to unemployment. The Supreme Court smacked him down on that. He's also blocked the Trump administration from getting voter rolls and SNAP enrollment information. He also sued the Trump administration to keep mutilating children.
Kaul doe nothing for WI but lie. Certainly doesn’t prosecute criminals. Sues Trump so we can use Medicaid ( our dollars) for gender transitions. Who supports that crazy?
— jeanne Gill (@JeanneG89273658) October 11, 2026
He needs to be voted out of office.
From what I’ve heard, nobody wants to work for him. LE Officers don’t want to work for Kaul’s DOJ because they don’t trust him. Pretty sad.
— Chuckyoushoomer (@geturtweeton) October 12, 2026
That is sad.
Ha! I missed this over the weekend. During the WI AG debate (guess we had that on a Sunday?), our candidate put emails of a hiring freeze, repeatedly in front of AG Kaul. Absolutely hilarious. https://t.co/xswWeIMmBB
— Wisconsin’s Conservative Sponge (@wiz_political) October 13, 2026
And all Kaul could do was sit there and smirk.