MADISON - A watchdog group on Friday called on Wisconsin Supreme Court justice-elect Michael Gableman to skip a prayer breakfast hosted by a sheriff's department.

The Freedom From Religion Foundation called the event a violation of the separation of church and state because it is hosted by the Burnett County Sheriff's Department.

Gableman, a Burnett County Circuit Court judge, is expected to be the featured speaker at the May 1 event at a restaurant in Siren. Gableman narrowly defeated Justice Louis Butler in the April 1 election and will join the Supreme Court on Aug. 1.

The Madison-based foundation, which opposes the mixing of religion and government, took issue with an invitation Burnett County Sheriff Dean Roland sent this week on his official letterhead.

Roland described the event as his department's "eighth annual Prayer Breakfast" and noted Gableman would be speaking.

"Judge Gableman is a man who is deeply committed to our Lord, his religion and his profession," Roland wrote. "I invite you to hear this year's prayer breakfast to hear the words of encouragement from Judge Gableman and to wish him well in his new position."

Foundation co-president Annie Laurie Gaylor said she has no problem with public figures attending prayer breakfasts as long as they are privately sponsored. She called on Roland to cancel his office's sponsorship of the event and Gableman to skip it if he does not.

"Gableman should not appear if the sheriff's department sponsorship is not ended very, very publicly. That would signal too much of a union between the courts and religion," she said. "Someone who is a Wisconsin Supreme Court justice-elect definitely should know better."

Gableman is honored to have been invited to the event and is "looking forward to sharing his faith and personal commitment with those in attendance," his campaign consultant Darrin Schmitz said.

"The anti-faith crowd will not be able to bully Justice-elect Gableman," Schmitz said. "The foundation's paranoia is sad and baseless."

Roland called the group's complaint "absurd" and said the annual breakfast started by his predecessor and typically attended by about 20 people would go ahead.

Roland said county lawyers were reviewing the group's complaint but he believes he did nothing wrong.

"I'm not only going to go forward with the event, I will wear my full uniform that says Burnett County Sheriff on it," he said. "I find this absolutely atrocious, but I guess they have a right to their opinion and I have a right to mine. This is my freedom of religion. This is my right."

Gaylor said her group, which is made up of atheists and agnostics, learned about the breakfast from a concerned taxpayer in Burnett County. She asked him to reimburse the county if any public funds were spent preparing for the breakfast. Roland said they were not.

"That your inappropriate government sponsorship of a religious event apparently has been going on for eight years only increases our dismay," Gaylor wrote.

The complaint comes in the aftermath of a campaign described as one of the nastiest in state history in which Gableman became the first candidate to knock off a sitting justice in 41 years.

The Wisconsin Democracy Campaign estimated Friday that special interest groups spent a record $4.8 million in the race, the bulk of which went to television advertising.

Pro-Gableman groups outspent groups supporting Butler, the Democracy Campaign said. The biggest spender was Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce, which ran a $1.76 million ad campaign to tout Gableman's law enforcement credentials and attack Butler as soft on crime.