Madison — A federal judge on Wednesday kept alive a challenge to the state's gay marriage ban, but dismissed two prosecutors and the state's top tax official from the case.
Four same-sex couples sued Gov. Scott Walker, Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen and others in February in an effort to overturn the 2006 amendment to the state constitution barring gay marriage and civil unions. They also are challenging an obscure, long-standing "marriage evasion" law that makes it a crime for couples here to get married in another state if the marriage wouldn't be recognized in Wisconsin.