Minocqua Brewing Company owner arrested for defamation

The owner of Minocqua Brewing Company was arrested Tuesday in Oneida County on criminal defamation charges.

In a civil lawsuit last year, Kirk Bangstad was found to have defamed and fined the publisher of a Minocqua-based newspaper $750,000 after he falsely implied that the publisher allowed his own brother to die in order to preserve the family business inherit. Bangstad appealed the verdict, which was the largest in the state’s history. Bangstad settled the case this month for a total of $580,000, most of which was paid by his insurance company.

Bangstad was not charged by the Oneida County District Attorney. Bangstad’s lawyer, Frederick Melms, said he had no information about whom Bangstad had accused of criminal defamation.

But in a video posted to Facebook Tuesday evening from his car outside the sheriff’s department, Bangstad said he believes the arrest is related to the same case that led to the civil judgment. He said he believed Gregg Walker, who filed the case, “convinced” the sheriff to arrest him. Bangstad, who has been involved in a zoning dispute with local authorities in the past, said a network of conservatives in the area was working against him.

Walker, co-owner of the Lakeland Times, did not respond to a request for comment. His attorney in the civil case, Matthew Fernholz, said Bangstad’s claim was untrue.

“Gregg Walker is a private citizen who does not control anything that an elected official does, be it the Oneida County sheriff, be it a Oneida County judge, be it the Oneida County district attorney,” Fernholz said. “Gregg Walker obviously doesn’t control any of them or tell them what to do; they make their own decisions.”

Melms said he did not yet know what the next steps in the criminal proceedings would be or whether charges would even be filed. He said criminal defamation was a rare charge and argued that the law was unconstitutional and “criminalized speech that should be protected under the First Amendment.”

Bangstad built a progressive brand and super PAC

Bangstad, who lives in Madison, purchased Minocqua Brewing Company in 2016. A former Democratic congressional candidate who also ran for state Assembly in 2020, he started making what he calls “progressive beer.”

He has built a large email list for his regular newsletters about politics and a following for some of his products among Democratic Party supporters.

In 2021, he founded the Minocqua Brewing Company Super PAC, which has sponsored billboards promoting Democrats and attacking Republicans. It also funded lawsuits against Wisconsin’s school voucher programs and against school districts that abandoned COVID-19 protections. Both were rejected.

According to the Federal Elections Commission, the super PAC has raised about $355,000 and spent $392,000 this year through Sept. 30. Under federal law, a super PAC cannot donate directly to political candidates, but can spend unlimited amounts on “independent expenditures” to advocate for candidates or issues.

Bangstad’s super PAC has spent zero dollars on these independent expenditures this year, according to FEC data. Almost the entire organization’s budget is listed as “operating expenses,” which are not itemized.

Reasoned speech should be protected speech

According to court documents in the civil defamation case, Bangstad claimed in social media posts that Walker had abused his aging father, called Walker a “crook” and a “misogynist,” and claimed that he “allegedly stood by and did nothing while he was his father. “Brother accidentally fell from a tree stand and died” because Walker wanted to inherit the Lakeland Times.

This false claim stemmed from a hunting accident in 1987. Walker, then 17, was not present with his brother.

Bangstad argued that Walker was a public figure, which would impose a higher legal standard for proving defamation.

The American Civil Liberties Union has challenged criminal defamation laws, including in a New Hampshire case that was appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, which declined to hear it in October. The organization says such laws “have no place in a democracy” and that civil suits are “fully capable of redressing the harm caused by defamation.”