As Wisconsin seeks to join the legal battle over the injunction halting federal funding for stem cell research, it seems Attorney General J. B. Van Hollen will be sitting this decision out.
Van Hollen will not be representing Wisconsin in its attempts to overturn the federal injunction, Adam Collins, spokesperson for Gov. Jim Doyle, said Sunday.
Instead, Doyle will appoint a special counsel to oversee Wisconsin’s role in the dispute and advise upon the issue. The special counsel will be pro bono and will be hired at no cost to taxpayers to handle the drafting of the brief, Collins said.
The state attorney general’s office is usually responsible for representing the state in legal matters, but Doyle’s office has apparently decided against this option.
Doyle’s office had previously asked Van Hollen to represent Wisconsin to overturn the injunction.
“The information that attorney general’s office wanted was what we were asking them to help address,” Collins said. “The governor was asking the attorney general to assist with the drafting of the brief, and they wanted a finished brief.”
Bill Cosh, spokesperson for Van Hollen, said in a statement the attorney general’s office had received no other information about the legal arguments of the case except a link to the decision and the request to represent the decision.
“It would be irresponsible for this office to step into a complicated, highly-charged dispute without having all the facts and information we require,” Cosh said.
The attorney general’s office will review the matter if the information they’ve requested is received, Cosh said.
These developments come amidst a recent appeals decision to lift the injunction on federal funding for embryonic stem cell research while a motion to stay is examined.
Chief Justice Royce Lamberth of the federal district court in Washington, D.C., halted all federal funding for human embryonic stem cell research Aug. 23, stating funding violated an appropriations rider prohibiting federal funding for research that knowingly destroys human embryos.
An appeals court temporarily lifted the injunction Thursday in order to examine the details of an emergency motion to stay filed by President Barack Obama.
Doyle announced Tuesday his office will file a friend of the court brief to assist in permanently overturning the injunction. Doyle also said he will help the U.S. Department of Justice in their attempts to reverse the funding halt.
The debate over stem cell research funding is especially compelling in Wisconsin because the state is home to 600 biotechnology companies, 11 stem cell companies and 34,000 jobs in the bioscience industry according to records from the governor’s office.
Even as various legal bodies work to hammer out a solution, the issue may most likely be resolved through legislative action.
“This case is procedurally complex and will likely continue for months, with many twists and turns before it is resolved,” Doyle said in a statement. “The best way forward is for Congress to take immediate action to definitively allow for the federal funding of stem cell research under the clear, ethically sound guidelines issued last year by the National Institutes of Health.”
