Tony Evers says GOP testing his civility with 'political assassination' of agriculture secretary

WISCONSIN DELLS - Gov. Tony Evers said Senate Republicans are testing his commitment to civility by what he described as a "political assassination" of one of his cabinet secretaries. 

Evers told employees at the state agriculture department the GOP move to fire his agriculture secretary was "amoral and stupid" and urged the staff not to "let the bastards keep us from doing our work."

That enraged Republican lawmakers, who said Evers had abandoned his campaign promise to unite the state rather than divide it. 

Evers told reporters Wednesday he doesn't think the GOP lawmakers are actually bastards but is still angry over their decision to fire one of his agency leaders for what he described as political reasons.

"Civility is in my core but at the end of the day when they decided to do kind of a political assassination of Brad Pfaff, that kind of pushed me to a different place," Evers said at a Wisconsin Dells hotel and water park after a bill signing ceremony.

"When we’re losing a couple farms a day and when we have a candidate that has complete competence and (he's fired) out of political purposes and amoral purposes — which means it’s not based on what’s right and what’s wrong — it’s based on what's expedient, that’s a bad thing. That’s a bad thing for the state," he said.

"We have to get our people in place and we have to run state government and we can’t run state government well if its leadership is continually under threat," Evers said.

RELATED: Dairyland in Distress

The episode has chipped away even more at an already fractured relationship between Evers and the Republican-controlled Legislature — a dynamic GOP Sen. Luther Olsen said he hadn't seen in the 24 years he has been in the Legislature. 

Olsen said Wednesday he hopes none of the other cabinet picks face Pfaff's fate.

"I'm hoping none of them are in trouble. I think there are some little hiccups and a couple of people have some issues but what I can see, they're doing a good job," Olsen said.

Evers' comments came a day after Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald called on Evers to say whether he stood by calling his members "bastards." Evers said he was invoking a well-known phrase used for decades, including during World War II.

“It’s a saying, it’s a thing. I don’t think they’re bastards but I do think they made a huge mistake doing what they did to Brad Pfaff," he said. 

A spokesman for Fitzgerald did not immediately have a response to comments by Evers and Olsen. 

Contact Molly Beck at molly.beck@jrn.com. Follow her on Twitter at @MollyBeck.