Milwaukee reacted to a the New York Times investigation published Wednesday that details sexual misconduct allegations against  influential civil rights and labor activist Cesar Chavez. Ald. JoCasta Zamarripa, who represents parts of Milwaukee’s predominantly Latino south side, announced that an annual celebration of Chavez’s life will be canceled this year. 

Milwaukee is also considering renaming a street that honors Chavez, who is accused of assaulting girls as young as 13. Images of Chavez appear on  murals and statues around  Milwaukee. All of these sites are being re-evaluated as the community processes the impact the allegations have on the labor and Latino civil rights movements Chavez led.

In a statement, Zamarippa said that Chavez’s contributions “are a matter of historical record”  but so are the “devastating” accounts of his accusers, including Dolores Huerta, Ana Murguia and Debra Rojas.  Zamarippa said that “both things are true, and our community deserves leaders who will say so clearly rather than ask survivors to wait until we process our own grief.” 

The Times investigation focused on Ana Murguia who, alongside Debra Rojas, say that Chavez — then in his 40s — abused them for years when they were  young girls. Murguia decided to come forward after she  heard that a street near where she lives in California was being renamed after Chavez, who died in 1993 at the age of 66. 

Neither Murguia nor Rojas had publicly shared their stories before. The Times investigation found “extensive evidence to support their accusations and those raised by several other women” against Chavez. Both women were the daughters of longtime organizers who marched and rallied alongside Chavez. According to the Times, Chavez had known Murguia since she was 8 years old, and the repeated abuse she endured in his office traumatized her so much that she  attempted to take her life multiple times at the age of 15. 

The pattern of abuse extended beyond Murguia and Rojas. Dolores Huerta, an icon of the farmworkers movement, said that Chavez also sexually assaulted her. The Times’ findings are based on interviews with over 60 people, including Chavez’s top aides, relatives and former members of the United Farm Workers movement. The Times also reviewed hundreds of pages of union records, confidential emails, photographs and hours of audio recordings from the movement’s board meetings. 

Many of the women who say they were abused by Chavez waited decades to tell their stories due to the shame they felt and fear of going against a man who’d become a cultural icon. 

Zamarripa said in her statement,  “the farmworker movement was never one man. It was built by thousands of workers, organizers, and families who gave their lives to the fight for dignity and justice.” 

Darryl Morin, president of Forward Latino, like Zamarripa, said, “this movement has never been about any one individual; it has always been about the people. It is grounded in the dignity of all, for farmworkers in the fields to students in our schools, and in the ongoing pursuit of justice. Upholding these values requires recognizing that no one is above accountability, whether they lead a movement, major corporation, or a government.”

Mayor Cavalier Johnson called the accusations “extremely troubling” and added that “the victims, those who have come forward and those who are unnamed, deserve our compassion,” Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported. 

Milwaukee County Supv. Juan Miguel Martinez, a labor organizer, said that South Cesar E. Chavez Drive will be renamed “Dolores Huerta Way.” Martinez said in a statement that “too often, men of status abuse their power and use it for heinous acts towards women, and especially toward defenseless children…A union is built by people, not one person.”

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WASHINGTON — U.S. senators debated Wednesday whether the federal government should change how Americans register to vote and cast a ballot, with Republicans maintaining alterations are necessary to safeguard elections and Democrats arguing a new law would add unnecessary obstacles.

Tensions over the issue were on full display when Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said GOP lawmakers describing the bill as a simple voter identification requirement is “bullshit,” shortly before Utah Republican Sen. Mike Lee contended it would be “a suicidal move” for his party’s leaders not to find a way forward. 

The legislation, dubbed the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act, or the SAVE America Act, is unlikely to become law without bipartisan backing from at least 60 senators, who would be needed to move past a procedural vote. 

Democrats are not expected to help Republicans with that, especially after Schumer called the legislation “Jim Crow 2.0” and “evil” during a morning press conference with voting rights advocates. 

Georgia Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock said during that event GOP lawmakers are acting out of concern they will lose control of Congress following the November midterm elections, due to President Donald Trump’s actions during his second term.  

“The American people have had it with him and with his policies,” Warnock said. “He ran as someone who was going to lower costs, who was going to stay out of endless wars in the Middle East and he is failing. But instead of changing his policies, he’s trying to change the shape of the electorate.”

Problems with lack of birth certificate

New Mexico Democratic Sen. Ben Ray Luján said if the bill becomes law, it would create difficulties for anyone who doesn’t have access to their birth certificate or a passport, to prove U.S. citizenship when they try to register to vote. 

“What about my Native American brothers and sisters?” he said. “All my brothers and sisters from the First Nations that I’m proud to represent across New Mexico, who may have been born in their home generationally with other family members. They didn’t have a birth certificate.”

New Jersey Democratic Sen. Andy Kim said GOP lawmakers trying to change the voting process during an election year creates a pattern when combined with several Republican state legislatures redrawing U.S. House maps to benefit their candidates. 

“We see this being about having politicians choose the voters instead of voters choosing the politicians,” he said. 

Several Democratic state legislatures have responded to GOP redistricting efforts by redrawing their maps as well. 

Schumer, D-N.Y., said it’s unacceptable that Republicans want every state in the country to submit a list of registered voters to the Department of Homeland Security to run through a database, which he believes is flawed. 

“They’re trying to dupe America. They say, ‘Oh, this is just a voter ID law.’ Bullshit. It is not a voter ID law,” Schumer said. “It is a law that will kick millions of Americans off the voting rolls.”

‘Debate this as long as it takes to get it done’

Utah’s Lee said Republican leaders shouldn’t schedule the procedural vote that requires at least 60 senators to end debate on the bill until they have found some way to move past that step.  

“I think it would be a suicidal move for us as Senate Republicans, for Republicans in general, if we don’t put everything we’ve got into this,” he said. “I think we need to debate this as long as it takes to get it done. And if we’re not there yet, we need to continue debating.”

Lee contended that prolonged debate on the bill would give Republicans time to sway holdouts to their side. 

“This is going to become popular enough that a lot of our colleagues who currently oppose it, I believe, will start to get on board,” he said. 

Every Senate Democrat, along with Alaska Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski, voted against formally beginning debate on Tuesday. North Carolina Republican Sen. Thom Tillis didn’t vote.

Trump wants national limits on voting by mail

Senate debate on the bill dragging out in the days or possibly weeks ahead won’t be confined to what’s currently in the legislation, which the House passed last month.

Trump has asked senators to make three alterations, which they will attempt to incorporate through amendments. 

Missouri Republican Sen. Eric Schmitt said he plans to call for a vote to add nationwide restrictions on mail-in voting instead of leaving the issue to state governments. 

“If you have a hardship because of a disability, or an illness, or because of travel, or you’re a caregiver, or some other hardship the state can identify, you can vote by absentee,” he said. “You have to request it. Then you can vote by absentee.”

Schmitt said the carve-out would also include members of the military. 

Tennessee Republican Sen. Marsha Blackburn said she plans to call up an amendment that could create a nationwide prohibition on gender-affirming surgeries for transgender youth. 

Alabama Republican Sen. Tommy Tuberville, she said, would push for an amendment to block transgender women from competing in women’s sports.

Gov. Tony Evers signed SB 23, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 102 on Wednesday, officially making Wisconsin the 49th state to provide a year of coverage for postpartum mothers on Medicaid. 

“It’s been a long time coming, but I’m darn proud we got it done,” Evers, who signed the bill at Children’s Hospital in Milwaukee, said in a statement. 

Evers first proposed Wisconsin submit a waiver to the federal government to extend Medicaid coverage from 60 days to 12 months in his 2019 state budget, but years of legislative gridlock on the issue made Wisconsin the second to last state to make the change. 

According to KFF, the Medicaid program pays for about four in 10 births in the U.S. and federal law had required states to provide Medicaid coverage for postpartum mothers through 60 days. The American Rescue Plan Act gave states the option to extend Medicaid postpartum coverage to 12 months, and most states took steps towards expansion.

“We knew from the get-go that getting this passed was an uphill battle, but we also weren’t going to let partisanship or politics stop us from continuing our work to build support for this important proposal, because we know just how high the stakes are,” Evers said in a statement. 

Assembly Speaker Robin Vos (R-Rochester), who is retiring, was the main reason for the hold up. Articulating his opposition to the expansion, which he previously refused to bring to the floor, he said he was opposed to expanding “welfare.” A group of Republican lawmakers, including lead authors Sen. Jesse James (R-Thorp) and Rep. Patrick Snyder (R-Weston), lobbied for Vos to let the bill through as Democratic lawmakers applied pressure through procedural moves to try and force votes on the legislation. A breakthrough came the night before Assembly lawmakers’ final regular floor session this year. 

The bill passed in the Assembly 95-1. It passed the Senate 32-1. Rep. Shae Sortwell (R-Two Rivers) and Sen. Chris Kapenga (Delafield) were the sole opposing votes.

The expanded coverage, which will be available starting on July 1, means low-income mothers on Medicaid and their babies, who automatically get a year of coverage, will have Medicaid coverage for the same length of time. The only state in the U.S. left that has not implemented the expansion is Arkansas. 

According to the Wisconsin Department of Health Services, about half of pregnancy-related deaths occur in the postpartum period and 95% of those deaths are preventable. Black mothers are more than twice as likely as their white, non-Hispanic peers to die from complications of pregnancy and childbirth.

“Research has shown us that expanding postpartum coverage leads to improved maternal and birth outcomes, thanks to more folks being able to access the care they need when they need it — and without breaking the bank,” Evers said. “Now more than ever, we should be working to make healthcare more affordable and more accessible, not making it more expensive and harder for folks — including new moms and families — to get the care they need.”

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A bill barring Wisconsin’s nearly 700,000 Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) recipients from buying candy and soda with their benefits, while providing additional funding and positions to the Wisconsin Department of Health Services (DHS) is on its way to Gov. Tony Evers.

A provision in the federal tax and spending law signed by President Donald Trump last year penalizes states that have a SNAP payment error rate above 6%. The Evers administration has sought additional funding to increase staffing to keep Wisconsin’s error rate low. Evers estimates Wisconsin could lose up to $205 million annually from a penalty.

Evers had been requesting lawmakers to take action since August, just a month after the federal law was signed. After negotiations with Evers, lawmakers attached the money to AB 180, coauthored by Rep. Clint Moses (R-Menomonie) and Sen. Chris Kapenga (R-Delafield), that would prohibit recipients from using their benefits to buy candy and soda. 

The money will go towards a FoodShare employment and training program as well as covering administrative costs that have been shifted from the federal government to the state and creating quality control initiatives to help keep FoodShare error rates low. 

Evers did not mention the ban on candy and soda in his statement on the legislation, instead focusing on the new money and positions. 

“Unfortunately, thanks to changes under President Trump and Republicans’ so-called ‘Big Beautiful Bill,’ things could get a whole lot worse for folks across Wisconsin — and our state’s bottom line,” Evers said in his statement. “Wisconsin taxpayers are already on the hook for over $284 million in future state budgets because of the ‘Big Beautiful Bill,’ so it was important that we get this bill done to help make sure Wisconsinites don’t have to fork over hundreds of millions of dollars more in penalty fees to the Trump Administration every year.” 

Evers told reporters on Wednesday that he disagrees with the candy and soda ban and thinks “people should have the ability to make those choices when they’re getting their food,” but the other provisions were “really important.”

“It’s one of those things called compromise,” Evers said. “This definitely takes precedence, so it’s all good.”

The Trump administration’s Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has been encouraging states to institute candy and soda bans for SNAP recipients  with the stated goal of helping improve health and address chronic illness rates.

It is unclear whether the bill will have a demonstrable effect on people’s health.

UW-Madison food insecurity expert Judith Bartfeld told the Examiner in May 2025, as lawmakers were debating the bill, that the SNAP program was “intended to provide extra resources to support buying food at the store — and its effectiveness in reducing food insecurity is well documented,” but that there “have long been concerns that restricting how benefits can be used would make things more complicated for retailers, more stigmatizing for participants, unlikely to translate into meaningful health improvements, and would risk reducing participation and jeopardizing the well documented benefits of SNAP on food security.”

Another change to SNAP under the federal tax and spending law included the elimination of funding in September 2025 for the SNAP education program SNAP-Ed, which provided cooking classes and information on healthy eating to beneficiaries. According to FoodBank News, food banks, including the Hunger Task Force in Wisconsin which lost about $467,000 in federal funds, had to rethink educating their clients on nutrition.

According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, there are 22 states that have submitted waivers to the federal government to implement a prohibition on purchasing soda, candy and/or energy drinks using SNAP benefits. Colorado and Hawaii are the only other states with a Democratic governor that have approved a version of a ban.

In addition to the $69 million and 70 positions for the Wisconsin DHS to help ensure quality control of SNAP, the bill included $3 million in 2025-26 for the development of a FoodShare platform for product eligibility as well as $250,000 in each 2025-26 and 2026-27 to help with the administration of the platform.

The bill passed the Senate in a 25-8 vote. Sen. Jodi Habush (D-Whitefish Bay), Sen. Sarah Keyeski (D-Lodi), Sen. Brad Pfaff (D-Onalaska), Sen. Melissa Ratcliff (D-Cottage Grove), Jeff Smith (D-Brunswick) and Sen. Bob Wirch (D-Pleasant Prairie) joined Republicans in favor of the legislation. 

Some Democratic lawmakers criticized the provision during floor debate.

“Fundamentally, I have a problem with the idea that we need to be here, the Legislature, telling people who need money on their Quest card to put food on their table, that we need to micromanage what food they buy for themselves and their families,” Sen. Mark Spreitzer (D-Beloit) said. “You know what, kids from families that qualify for FoodShare might deserve a little candy and soda now and then, too. And ultimately, I think we all want to support health… but micromanaging the grocery purchases of low-income folks is not the way to accomplish that.” 

Spreitzer said many in the Senate Democratic caucus, whether they supported or opposed the legislation, were voting from “a place of frustration” due to the money being tied to the ban. 

“This is ugly, ugly politics in this building, and I wish it had not come to this,” he said. “I wish we could’ve all come together and said, ‘Let’s provide the money to the staff that is needed to run FoodShare, and then let’s debate separately this other bill.’”

During a Joint Finance Committee meeting on March 11 when the bill was discussed, Sen. LaTonya Johnson (D-Milwaukee) recalled her 10 years working as a child care provider in Milwaukee, serving “some of the state’s poorest kids” who were “also extremely bright, extremely talented and extremely resilient.” She said the bill should have focused on ensuring  that vulnerable people have resources to feed their families instead of monitoring the type of food in their carts. 

“Some of these kids, the vast majority of them don’t get to have these luxuries all the time at home. Their parents, regardless of what this body may believe, aren’t constantly supplying kids with soda and with candy,” Johnson said.

A 2016 USDA study found that “there were no major differences in the expenditure patterns of SNAP and non-SNAP households, no matter how the data were categorized,” and that SNAP recipients, similar to non-SNAP recipients, spent about 20 cents of every dollar on sweetened drinks, desserts, salty snacks, candy and sugar.

Johnson said she had an experience in 2013 that highlighted to her the decisions that some families were making when the daycare ran out of milk during the day. She said she went to the nearby gas station where a gallon of milk cost $5, a stark difference from a local grocery store in Wauwatosa where she would buy two gallons of milk for $5.

“After I bought that gallon of milk and I walked out, I realized why, in some cases, our poorer families were buying two liters of sodas versus a gallon of milk,” Johnson said. “Back then, a two liter of soda was $1.19 all day long. A gallon of milk was $5. It wasn’t about choosing unhealthy food. It was about making those food stamp dollars stretch as long as possible, so those kids could continue to eat.”

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WASHINGTON — U.S. Sen. Markwayne Mullin of Oklahoma, the president’s pick to lead the Department of Homeland Security, on Wednesday in his confirmation hearing was challenged with questions about his “anger issues” by the fellow Republican who heads the Senate committee that oversees the department.

Kentucky Republican Sen. Rand Paul, chair of the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, at the outset of the hearing recalled how Mullin called him a “freaking snake” and expressed sympathy for a neighbor who assaulted Paul in a 2017 dispute, breaking six of his ribs and damaging a lung.

“You have never had the courage to look me in the eye and tell me that the assault was justified,” Paul said to Mullin, nominated by President Donald Trump to replace Kristi Noem as secretary of the 260,000-employee agency. “Tell it to my face, if that’s what you believe.”

In a tense back-and-forth, Mullin defended himself and said he never “supported” that Paul was assaulted, but that he “understood” why the neighbor attacked Paul.

“I think everybody in this room knows that I’m very blunt,” Mullin, a former MMA fighter who physically challenged a witness testifying before Congress in 2023, said. 

Paul criticized him and “this machismo that you have” and raised concerns about how Mullin could lead a department and “why (the American public) should trust a man with anger issues to set the proper example for ICE and Border Patrol agents.” 

Noem was ousted from the job after a national uproar over the killing of two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis in January by immigration agents and public disapproval of aggressive enforcement tactics there and in Los Angeles and Chicago.

“I just wonder if someone who applauds violence against their political opponents is the right person to lead an agency that has struggled to accept limits to the proper use of force,” Paul said. 

Mullin did not apologize for his comments regarding Paul’s assault, and said that leading DHS is “bigger than the political differences we have.”

Mullin detailed his plans to senators, pledging to reverse several policies of his predecessor, including making sure “DHS isn’t on the news every day.” 

Mullin also promised to get DHS fully funded and continue to carry out the president’s mass deportation agenda. 

If confirmed, he will have access to a special funding stream of $175 billion for DHS included in 2025’s “one big, beautiful” tax and spending cut package, which Mullin backed as a senator. 

Post-Noem era

Trump shifted Noem, the former governor of South Dakota, into another administration position earlier this month. 

Her tenure drew bipartisan ire over her quick judgment to label the two U.S. citizens killed by immigration agents as domestic terrorists, her stalling of disaster relief grants for states, and the award of a $220 million no-bid contract for an ad campaign to a firm owned by a subordinate’s spouse. 

Paul said the committee plans to vote Thursday on whether to advance Mullin’s nomination to the Senate floor. Trump has said he wants Mullin on the job by the end of the month.

If the Senate confirms Mullin, he would be the first Native American to lead DHS. He is an enrolled member of the Cherokee Nation. 

Senate Majority Leader John Thune, Republican of South Dakota, told reporters Wednesday that he was confident Mullin could be confirmed as Homeland Security secretary. 

“Rand and Markwayne have some personal history which they’re going to have to work through,” Thune said. “But this is about the job, and it’s about who ought to fill that job. We all believe … that Markwayne is the right guy for the job.”

One Democrat already a yes

The junior senator from Oklahoma, who was elected to the Senate in a 2022 special election, does not need any Democratic support to be confirmed to lead the agency, since Republicans control the chamber with 53 seats.

And even without Paul’s support, one Democrat, Sen. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania, who sits on the committee, has already pledged his vote. 

Mullin, if confirmed, will take over a department shut down since early February, after Democrats refused to vote for fiscal year 2026 funding unless changes to immigration enforcement are made following the deaths of the two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis, Renee Good and Alex Pretti. 

The top Democrat on Homeland Security, Gary Peters, pressed Mullin about his previous comments about Good and Pretti. Mullin joined top Trump officials in accusing both of being agitators. 

Mullin admitted his mistake and said he was too quick to judge. 

“I shouldn’t have said that,” Mullin said. “I went out there too fast. I was responding immediately without the facts. That’s my fault. That won’t happen as (Homeland Security) secretary.”

Noem has never admitted she was wrong to label Good, a mother of three and poet, and Pretti, an intensive care unit nurse who specialized in care for veterans, as domestic terrorists. She was criticized by both Democrats and Republicans for her comments.

On Wednesday, Republicans on the panel largely praised Mullin, except for Paul, and criticized Democrats for not approving government funding for DHS.

House Democrats are trying to force a legislative procedure to bring a funding bill for DHS that does not include any appropriations for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection.

ICE questions

Michigan Democratic Sen. Elissa Slotkin pressed Mullin on reforms he would make to ICE. 

Sen. Richard Blumenthal, Democrat of Connecticut, asked Mullin about an arrest quota of 3,000 immigrants daily that White House senior advisor Stephen Miller, the main architect of the Trump administration’s immigration policy, has set for ICE officers.

“I can’t speak for Stephen Miller,” Mullin said. “No quota has been set for me.”

Blumenthal also pressed Mullin about concerns over violations of the 4th Amendment of the Constitution by federal immigration agents entering homes and businesses without a judicial warrant. 

He asked Mullin if he would “commit that ICE will no longer instruct agents to break into people’s homes without a judicial warrant?”

“Sir, you’re using the word ‘break into’ people’s houses loosely,” Mullin said. “We will not enter a home or place of business without a judicial warrant unless we’re pursuing an individual that runs into a business or resident.”

Blumenthal also addressed Noem’s award of the $220 million no-bid contract, which she was grilled about by unhappy Republicans in a congressional hearing shortly before Trump removed her as secretary of DHS.

Mullin said that he would let the inspector general, an independent agency within DHS, continue with an investigation. 

“I’ll leave that to the (Inspector General),” Mullin said.  

Detention warehouse purchases

Democrats pressed Mullin if he would keep certain policies in place made by Noem, whose last day is March 31, and questioned recent moves by DHS to purchase warehouses across the country for mass detention of immigrants in the country without legal status. 

New Jersey Sen. Andy Kim said a policy from Noem has led to a backlog in Federal Emergency Management Agency relief. Noem instituted a requirement that she had to personally sign off on any FEMA award totaling more than $100,000. 

Kim asked Mullin if he would consider getting rid of that policy.

“Absolutely,” Mullin said. “That is micromanaging.”

Kim also brought up a warehouse recently purchased by DHS in Roxbury, New Jersey, to detain up to 1,500 immigrants that has concerned local community leaders.

“Most municipalities don’t have the capacity and their infrastructure for waste and water” to handle a warehouse that is meant to detain people, Kim said. 

“This town has only 42 foot police officers, a volunteer fire department. Does that sound like the kind of town that has resources to take on a warehouse?” he asked Mullin.

Mullin did not say DHS would stop its warehouse initiative, but said he wanted to make sure that the local communities were on board, and pledged to personally visit that location with Kim to meet with leaders. 

New Hampshire’s Democratic Sen. Maggie Hassan also raised the issue of a warehouse location in her state. DHS initially planned to purchase a warehouse in Merrimack to retrofit the facility to detain immigrants, but backed off.

She asked Mullin if he would “ensure that the plan remains off the table?” 

Mullin said he wasn’t caught up on that specific facility, but that he would work to get the local community’s input.  

More FEMA questions

Fellow Oklahoma Republican Sen. James Lankford asked Mullin how he sees the future of FEMA. The president has expressed his desire to dismantle the agency, and a FEMA review council was formed to issue a report on its findings. 

Mullin said that FEMA should not be considered a first response agency, and that when natural disasters strike, it’s the state response that is first. 

“We can be more effective and be more direct and speed it up,” he said. 

Mullin added that he doesn’t believe FEMA should be dismantled, but that it could be restructured. 

Mullin’s overseas ventures

The top Republican and Democrat on the committee, Paul and Peters, grilled Mullin on his past comments on a 2016 international trip taken while he served in the House. During a Fox News interview, Mullin implied he had been on military missions and could “smell war.” Mullin has not served in the military.

Mullin declined to discuss those comments, arguing that the travel was while he was on official duty and classified. He described those trips as for training purposes.

Peters asked why the trip wasn’t included in his disclosure records to the committee, and Mullin argued that because it was considered official travel, he didn’t need to disclose it.

Paul said he would consider postponing the committee’s vote unless Mullin would agree to visit a secure facility where classified matters are discussed, known as a SCIF, to detail his international travel. 

Mullin said he would go to a SCIF with lawmakers ahead of the committee vote Thursday. 

Jennifer Shutt contributed to this report.

 

WASHINGTON — Two top Democrats on a U.S. House panel Tuesday pushed back against “unprecedented” Trump administration guidance that they said essentially encourages states to try to bypass requirements on how they spend federal money intended to help people find job training and support — potentially opening states up to lawsuits.

The Democrats, in a letter provided exclusively to States Newsroom, said the U.S. Department of Labor is urging states to use waivers provided under the main federal workforce development law to disregard statutory requirements on how they spend money for employment activities.

Reps. Bobby Scott of Virginia and Alma Adams of North Carolina — the respective ranking members of the House Committee on Education and Workforce and its Subcommittee on Higher Education and Workforce Development — urged Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer to “immediately revoke” the agency’s guidance, issued to state workforce agencies, administrators and other entities back in November. 

One of the main purposes of the workforce law, they observed, is to increase access to jobs for people with disabilities, older people and people who are homeless. The waivers suggested by the department would let states reel back their efforts to serve those groups of people, the Democrats said.

“We are deeply concerned that waiving these requirements under the guise of ‘innovation’ and ‘modernization’ will only incentivize the workforce system to stop doing what it is legally required to do: serve those with barriers to employment,” they wrote.

Five ‘strategic pillars’

The guidance from the department’s Employment and Training Administration calls on states to “request waivers of existing (Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act) statutory or regulatory requirements that can help overcome specific barriers to innovation and align with the five strategic pillars for workforce investment.” 

The 2014 law, known as WIOA, aims to boost the public workforce system and help those seeking jobs — particularly people who face barriers to employment — access training, employment and support services. The Labor secretary has the authority to waive certain statutory requirements under WIOA, though with certain limitations. 

Scott and Adams argued that many of the suggested waivers in the guidance “would allow states to reduce their efforts to serve individuals with barriers to employment, directly contradicting WIOA’s purpose.” 

President Donald Trump’s administration in August 2025 unveiled a workforce development strategy, through the departments of Labor, Commerce and Education, consisting of five “strategic pillars.”

The strategy stemmed from Trump’s April 2025 executive order, part of which sought to “consolidate and streamline fragmented Federal workforce development programs that are too disconnected from propelling workers into secure, well-paying, and high-need American jobs.” 

But the Democrats said the use of WIOA’s general waiver authority as a method for achieving the administration’s policy goals surrounding workforce development is without precedent.

“Upon review of all past approved waivers, it is clear that waivers were only used in response to discrete challenges that states or local areas faced in meeting some of the requirements stipulated under WIOA, either because of extenuating circumstances or for individual state efforts at reforms, not to achieve the Administration’s policy goals,” they wrote. 

Scott and Adams instead called on Chavez-DeRemer to work with Congress to pass a bipartisan bill that seeks to modernize WIOA. 

That measure would need to be reintroduced. The House passed it in April 2024, during the previous session of Congress, but the Senate did not.

The Department of Labor confirmed receipt of the letter Wednesday, but did not respond to a message seeking comment on its contents.

WASHINGTON — Arizona coffee roaster Gabe Hagen is wondering if he’ll ever recoup the tens of thousands of dollars he paid in tariffs to import beans from the world’s major coffee-growing regions in South America, Africa and the Indo-Pacific.

Weeks after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down President Donald Trump’s emergency tariffs as illegal, Hagen is among an army of small business owners who are unsure if they’ll be made whole after a year of increasing costs and uncertainty.

“I’m in the process right now trying to consolidate all of my invoices … because I need the money back — if they’re going to give it back,” Hagen told States Newsroom in an interview.

“A pallet of coffee would cost us 5 to 6 to $7,000 if we had a bag or two of really high-grade in there. Post tariffs, our cheapest pallet was around $8,000, and it went anywhere from 8 to $10,000 or $11,000 per pallet of coffee,” he said. 

How the government will refund the roughly $166 billion in tariffs Trump triggered under a 1970s emergency economic powers statute is slowly coming to light in court documents. 

Nearly 2,000 companies filed suit for tariff refunds in the U.S. Court of International Trade, with many lining up even before the highly anticipated 6-3 Supreme Court decision.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s four-step refund process for businesses is anywhere from 40% to 80% complete, depending on the step, according to a court-mandated update filed March 12 with the Court of International Trade. 

Justices leave it to the lower courts

The justices, not giving guidance on refunds, left the matter to the lower courts in their Feb. 20 ruling that invalidated the sweeping tariffs Trump unilaterally imposed under the 1977 International Emergency Economic Powers Act, or IEEPA. 

The president declared various emergencies under the statute during his first year in office. 

From fentanyl smuggling, to trade imbalances, to political disputes, he used each declared crisis to impose steep taxes on imports. 

Shifting sometimes day to day, tariffs reached as high as 50% on Brazilian and Indian goods after Trump declared emergencies over the prosecution of a political ally and over the use of Russian oil, respectively.

U.S. importers saw tariffs spike as high as 145% on Chinese goods during a tit-for-tat trade war sparked by Trump’s declaration of a trade imbalance emergency. The duties largely settled at a roughly 50% effective rate on several products after the trade war and negotiations with the world’s second-largest economy. 

The Trump administration has since sought different pathways to collect tariffs, including almost immediately instituting temporary import taxes under a different 1970s trade statute. 

The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative has also commenced widespread investigations into dozens of the largest U.S. trading partners that could trigger new tariffs, depending on findings.

‘Survived, but barely’

The rollercoaster ride was enough to almost bring down Busy Baby, a Minnesota-based baby product company that manufactures several patented designs in China.

Busy Baby owner Beth Benike, who shared her experience with States Newsroom in February, is now suing U.S. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Rodney Scott and U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent to recoup money lost.

Matthew Platkin, former New Jersey attorney general and Benike’s lawyer, said Benike’s business “survived, but barely.” 

“She had to keep merchandise overseas because she couldn’t afford to pay to bring them here. And when she didn’t get product, she wasn’t getting paid, she wasn’t making money,” Platkin said in an interview with States Newsroom.  

“She had opportunities lined up for expansion. She was going to hire new folks. That didn’t happen, and that was because of one thing: the president’s illegal tariffs,” he said.

Benike’s complaint does not specify a dollar amount, but Platkin said, “It’s substantial, especially for a business of her size.”

“We’re still going through and assessing the full impact of the tariffs on her, but rest assured, even for a small business, it’s tens of thousands of dollars at a minimum,” Platkin said.

“The federal government should just refund these folks their money with interest, period. Like, this shouldn’t even require litigation. They were caught taking illegal tariffs from millions of businesses,” he said.

$166 billion collected

Federal Judge Richard Eaton, who sits on the bench for the Court of International Trade, ordered administration customs officials in early March to stop collecting the tariffs deemed illegal under IEEPA, and to recalculate any past duties that included them.

Eaton granted the March 5 order in the tariff refund lawsuit brought by Atmus Filtration, a Nashville, Tennessee-based company. 

The judge, however, outlined that orders in the Court of International Trade are “universal” for all tariff refunds owed — meaning the trade cases are not subject to the Supreme Court’s 2025 finding in a separate immigration case that universal rulings are impermissible.

Businesses the size of Busy Baby to behemoths like Costco and FedEx have paid tariffs to the U.S. government. Many, but not all, have sued.

Customs officials, in a March 6 court filing, declared any refund process would take at least 45 days to be functional. According to the filing, as of early March the agency had collected approximately $166 billion in IEEPA tariffs from 330,000 American importers.

Alfredo Carrillo Obregon, research associate for trade policy at the libertarian Cato Institute, said as the clock ticks on tariff refunds, interest is accruing.

“The refunds are not necessarily coming soon and that has big implications, obviously, for taxpayers, but I think most importantly for the companies that are relying on this money to literally keep their doors open,” Obregon said.

He and colleagues calculated the government’s interest payments on the refunds owed totals about $700 million more with each passing month.

Barton O’Brien, who told States Newsroom last month his dog apparel company ate the tariff costs rather than raise prices, said he’s “certainly not counting on a refund anytime soon” as the administration “seems pretty dead set” on not giving them.

“I expect they will drag out the process in the courts for as long as they can,” he said in a written response to States Newsroom on March 9. “If we get one, great… It’s a bonus. But still won’t cover the hole left by the tariffs.” 

“Also, as a small business we’re not in a position to fight the administration, so I’m happy to sit back and let … other Fortune 500 companies with an army of lawyers fight this one out on our behalf.  If they win, we’ll all get refunds,” said O’Brien, who works with manufacturers in China and India.

‘Do the right thing’

Shawn Phetteplace, national campaigns director for the advocacy group Main Street Alliance, said his organization will continue to apply legal and public pressure to ensure small businesses recoup the money.

“I would just say that the administration should do the right thing and return the money, and they also should stop trying to find cute, creative ways to institute new tariffs that are also going to be illegal and struck down,” he said.

Two dozen Democratic-led states have already sued the administration in the Court of International Trade over the new tariffs Trump announced immediately after his Supreme Court loss. 

The lawsuit, led by Oregon, also includes Arizona, Colorado, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Virginia, Washington and Wisconsin.

Small businesses and Democratic-led states were instrumental in the Supreme Court’s February decision striking down Trump’s IEEPA tariffs.

States Newsroom reached out to the Trump administration for comment but did not receive a reply.

The potential for Republicans to lose the Senate majority in the next election cycle cast a shadow over the Wisconsin State Senate’s last regular day of work this legislative session. Senate Majority Leader Devin LeMahieu (R-Oostburg) faced criticism from his members for bringing bills to a vote without a majority of support from his caucus and one longtime Republican announced his retirement.

Wisconsin Republicans currently hold an 18-seat majority in the 33-seat state Senate. The 17 odd-numbered seats will be up for election this year for the first time under the new maps adopted in 2024, which puts the majority in play this November. Democrats have not been in the Senate or Assembly majority since the 2009-10 session. 

LeMahieu drew fire from members of his own party for allowing votes on bills supported by Democrats to legalize sports betting in Wisconsin and to provide funding to the University of Wisconsin to help pay student athletes for their name, image and likeness. Some Republicans who opposed the bills said it would lead to LeMahieu losing his leadership position and to Republicans losing their Senate majority in November.

Sen. Steve Nass (R-Whitewater), who is one of the most conservative lawmakers in the state Senate and is retiring at the end of his term, said voters will hold Republican lawmakers “to account for selling out their interests” in November.

“The passage of these two unpopular bills will help pave the way to minority status for Republicans come November,” Nass, who has served in the Legislature since 1991, said in a statement.

Over the weekend, Sen. Chris Kapenga (R-Delafield) suggested to WISN 12 that LeMahieu could lose his leadership position if the Senate passed the bills by relying on Democratic votes. He said it was “shameful” that the Senate planned to take up the bills and that he was concerned by the lack of a “coalescence of the Republican votes.”

“Historically, usually a majority leader does not come back if he breaks the rule of 17,” Kapenga said, referring to an unwritten rule that requires obtaining the votes of 17 Republicans or an all-GOP majority to pass any bill through the Senate. “So, I hope the majority leader takes that into account.”

Last month at a WisPolitics lunch, LeMahieu said that the “rule of 17” was just “essentially what members use to try to kill bills that they don’t like.” He previously broke that informal rule to pass the 2025-27 state budget with Democratic votes.

Assembly Speaker Robin Vos (R-Rochester), the longest-serving Assembly speaker  in state history, who is retiring at the end of his term, defended LeMahieu’s work as leader including his decision to bring the NIL and sports-betting bills to the floor. He told reporters at a Tuesday WisPolitics event that those suggesting that LeMahieu would lose his job over it don’t “really know how the world works.”

“Sometimes you have to have things pass because it’s in the best interest of the state, and sometimes if you can’t convince people, you gotta find out how to get there,” Vos said. “I feel like the members in our chamber are sometimes a little bit more open to being persuaded than some of the Senate Republicans are. I have said the hardest job in the Capitol is being the Senate majority leader. It was under [now-U.S. Rep.] Scott Fitzgerald. It was under Devin LeMahieu, so I hope that people will respect the fact that he’s doing what he thinks is right.”

Vos also said during the event that a lack of action on data centers could affect the Senate’s chances to win a majority. 

“I learned long ago, after many years of frustration, no matter how hard the Assembly tries, the Senate is its own body and we have to accept that they’re going to do what they’re going to do and it’s nothing we can do about it,” Vos said. He added that it is sad the Senate wouldn’t be doing anything to regulate data centers because they are a huge area of concern. He described data centers as “valuable” because of the rise of artificial intelligence but that people should be protected from higher energy costs that could result from their rapid growth. 

“The state Senate should vote on the bill, especially if they want to get back in the majority,” Vos said. “The only other thing that I worry about — and our members have already taken a look so you could say we thought as hard as we could at data centers — but for people who don’t have that vote, I think they’re going to regret it come October.”

Recent polling by Marquette Law School on data centers found that 70% of Wisconsinites say the costs of large data centers are greater than the benefits they provide, while 29% say the benefits outweigh the costs. 

The data center bill passed by the Assembly would have implemented some state regulations on data centers built in Wisconsin, though Democrats criticized the bill, saying it wouldn’t effectively hold companies accountable, hold down electric rates for Wisconsinites or protect the environment. The bill did not make it onto the Senate’s final regular session floor calendar.

Vos is hopeful that state leaders will be able to find a compromise on property tax relief and school funding before the upcoming elections. Legislative leaders and Gov. Tony Evers have been discussing finding a way to use the $4.6 billion budget surplus, though Vos said an actual proposal is still up in the air. Discussions prior to the Assembly adjourning for the final time last month included talk of rebates, investments in the school levy tax credit by Republicans and investments in special education aid and school general aid by Evers.

Vos said that “nothing is off the table” but that the bill will not become a “mini budget.”

“It’s a negotiation, so we have to say what does the Senate need to have enough votes to be able to pass it? What does the governor need to be able to sign it? And what do we need in the Assembly?” Vos said, adding that the Legislature would likely try to have an extraordinary session “on something that’s just on tax relief or something that’s just on property taxes.” 

Vos also rejected a proposal from Democratic lawmakers over the weekend to spend about $1.3 billion on special education and general aid to schools. 

“The challenge that the Assembly Democrats have is that it’s been so long since any of them have been involved in governing that they are only about one-sentence press releases, and that’s what their proposal was yesterday,” Vos said. “It wasn’t serious in my mind.”

Asked about the greatest challenge to Republicans’ ability to win in November, Vos named President Donald Trump. He said Trump is motivating for “40 to 45%” of voters who are dedicated Republicans, but state-level Republicans’ chances will rely on the other 10% of voters who will need to be persuaded. He said Republicans need to show them that they can listen to the other side and get things done, adding that lawmakers have been able to pass tax breaks for seniors and utility bills and make some investments in priority areas while remaining conservative.

“We have to be able to tell that story and make sure people understand that what goes on in Washington, where it seems like a whole lot of arguing and not a lot of doing, isn’t where we’re at,” Vos said. “Sometimes because Donald Trump is so all-present in every single news cycle, it makes it very hard for us to get our message through.”

Vos said this will also apply to U.S. Rep. Tom Tiffany, who is the only Republican currently in the primary for governor. With Trump’s endorsement and other challengers having dropped out, the 7th CD U.S. representative will likely make it to the November general election. 

Vos also took a shot at the seven Democrats running for governor, saying they are all “minor” and collectively calling them the “seven dwarves.”

“You have Tom Tiffany, who is better known in about half of the state but the other half from basically Green Bay to Madison… and that’s the election schedule you want, so he’s got to figure out how to spend enough time and get well known enough to be able to win,” Vos said.

Another Republican retirement 

The departure of longtime lawmakers will also shape the election chances for Senate Republicans. Wisconsin Democrats need to win two additional seats in November to secure a majority, and incumbency carries significant weight, meaning that seats that have long been represented by Republicans becoming open could help Democrats’ chances. 

Sen. Van Wanggaard (R-Racine) announced his retirement on Tuesday, marking the departure of a second incumbent in a district that will be key in determining control of the state Senate. 

Senate District 21 covers parts of Racine County, including the northern part of the city, and parts of Milwaukee County, including Franklin, Hales Corner, Greendale and Greenfield. According to an analysis by Marquette Law School fellow John Johnson, the district voted for former Vice President Kamala Harris, who lost the state of Wisconsin, by 1.2 percentage points and for U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin by 2.2 percentage points in 2024.

Wanggaard said in a statement he thought he would win in a reelection campaign and his heart “desperately” wants to run again, but his head is telling him “it’s time to retire.” He noted that he would be 78 at the end of the next term.

“My staff and colleagues worked with me to try to make something workable for the campaign and the next four years, but my health, and the health of my family will not allow me to put my all into this campaign, or serving the 21st District,” Wanggaard said. He said since his last election in 2022 he has lost three siblings, his daughter was diagnosed with Stage 4 cancer and his brother had a heart attack and has dementia. “That weighs on me more than you can know.”

Sen. Rob Hutton (R-Brookfield), who represents one of the Democrats’ other top targets this fall, announced his retirement last month, as did Nass.

Will Karcz, communications director for the State Senate Democratic Campaign Committee, which is the fundraising arm of the Democratic Senate caucus, said in a statement about Wanggaard’s departure that it is “clear that members of the Republican caucus would rather retire than risk losing their seats or serving in a Republican minority.”

Ahead of Tuesday’s floor session, Senate Minority Leader Dianne Hesselbein (D-Middleton) criticized Republicans for planning to wrap up their work without taking action to address the rising cost of groceries, medications, rents or health insurance.

“Today is the last gasp of what has been a failed and dysfunctional Republican majority in this state Senate,” Hesselbein said. “We know that Wisconsin Democrats can win a majority of seats, and when we do, we will roll up our sleeves, get to work and focus like a laser on the issues that Wisconsinites and Wisconsin families care about.” 

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(The Center Square) – The Wisconsin Legislature has approved sending $15 million each year to the Universities of Wisconsin for athletics facilities along with creating a sweeping public records exemption related to all spending and revenue within the athletic department.

(The Center Square) - Wisconsin got a step closer to legalized online sports wagering Tuesday when the Senate approved a bill that would allow the state’s tribes to offer sports wagering throughout the state with a bipartisan 21-12 vote.

(The Center Square) – Two of Wisconsin’s congressmen are asking for a full audit after a Green Bay-based non-profit reported a multi-million-dollar deficit.

Reading Time: 3 minutes

The Wisconsin Legislature sent a $133 million plan to combat contamination from so-called forever chemicals to Gov. Tony Evers for his approval Tuesday, promising an end to years of squabbling between the Democratic governor and Republican lawmakers over the issue.

Evers said immediately after the Senate approved the bills Tuesday afternoon that he would sign them into law. The rare bipartisan compromise offers at least some hope for the scores of Wisconsin villages, towns and cities grappling with PFAS pollution in their groundwater.

“Beautiful. This has been a long time coming,” Campbell Town Supervisor Lee Donahue said of the Senate votes. Residents of the town of 4,300 have been drinking bottled water since state health officials warned them in 2021 that more than 500 wells were contaminated. Donahue said state dollars would help the town transition from private wells to a municipal water system treated for PFAS.

“This is definitely a day for celebration,” she said.

Communities across the U.S. struggling with PFAS

PFAS — short for per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances — are manmade chemicals that don’t easily break down in nature. They’re found in a wide range of products, including cookware and stain-resistant clothing, and previously were often used in aviation fire-suppression foam. The chemicals have been linked to health problems, including low birth weight, cancer and liver disease, and have been shown to make vaccines less effective.

Communities located near industrial sites and military bases nationwide are grappling with PFAS contamination. Government estimates suggest as much as half of U.S. households have some level of PFAS in their water — whether it comes from a private well or a tap. While federal officials have put strict limits on water provided by utilities, those rules don’t apply to the roughly 40 million people in the U.S. who rely on private drinking water wells.

Municipalities across Wisconsin are struggling with PFAS contamination in groundwater, including Marinette, Madison, Peshtigo, Wausau, the town of Stella and Campbell. The waters of Green Bay also are contaminated.

In Stella, for example, private wells were badly contaminated by PFAS-laden fertilizer spread on farm fields. The state has had limited resources to help, struggling to provide widespread free testing, and officials have offered only a limited grant program for well replacements.

‘Some forward movement’

Tom LaDue, a Stella resident, lives on the shores of a highly contaminated lake. He said the Senate signing off on the bills was a rare bit of good news for his town of 670 people. Testing has shown very little PFAS in his private well, but LaDue sits on a town committee that tracks PFAS developments and he knows dozens of people are living on bottled water. He said he hopes the town will get enough money to at least test private wells for pollution.

“We’ve been waiting for it for a long time,” he said of releasing the money. “We’ll be letting everyone in the town know this has passed and we’ll finally see, hopefully, some forward movement in our small town.”

Evers and Republicans have been at odds for years over how best to address the pollution. The 2023-25 state budget created a $125 million trust fund to combat PFAS contamination, but the two camps haven’t been able to agree on how to spend it.

Two years ago the governor vetoed a GOP bill that would have spent the money on grants for municipalities, landowners and waste disposal facilities to test for PFAS in water treatment plants and wells. But Evers said the bill limited state regulators’ authority to hold polluters liable, and environmental groups urged him to kill the proposal.

Compromise bills unlock tens of millions of dollars

The fund has grown to $133.4 million during the stalemate, according to the Legislative Fiscal Bureau.

The chief sponsors of that original bill, Republican Sen. Eric Wimberger and Rep. Jeff Mursau, released two new proposals in January after discussions with the state Department of Natural Resources, an Evers Cabinet agency.

The first bill would spend $132.2 million from the PFAS trust fund for community grants, well replacements, airports and industrial properties and $1.3 million from the state’s general fund to cover 10 new state Department of Natural Resources positions to administer the spending.

The second proposal establishes a list of entities that would be exempt from liability for contamination, similar to the bill Evers vetoed in 2024. Included on the list are people who spread PFAS while in compliance with permits that did not address PFAS; landowners whose property was contaminated pursuant to a permit; owners of contaminated industrial property who didn’t cause the pollution; and fire departments that used PFAS in their foam. Businesses that own or operate facilities that currently or have used PFAS or have ever spread industrial waste could be held liable, however.

Bills generate overwhelming support

The Assembly passed both pieces of legislation unanimously on the last day of its regular two-year session in February. The Senate passed the bills overwhelmingly, approving one bill 33-0 and the other on a voice vote with almost no discussion.

“I’m incredibly proud we were able to work across the aisle to get this done — and get it done right,” Evers said in a statement.

Wisconsin Watch is a nonprofit and nonpartisan newsroom. Subscribe to our newsletters to get our investigative stories and Friday news roundup. This story is published in partnership with The Associated Press.

Wisconsin Senate OKs $133 million package to combat ‘forever chemicals,’ sends bills to governor is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

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All public employees in Wisconsin must retain records, per the state’s open records law. Except one group. The ones who wrote that law.

State legislators have exempted themselves from the retention portion of the law. Some want to change that.

“The public should not have to worry about legislators having secret conversations or deleting emails,” said state Rep. Clinton Anderson, D-Beloit, who is introducing a bill that would close this loophole despite the fact that the state Assembly adjourned last month for the rest of the year.

Anderson released the bill Monday because it is the start of Sunshine Week, a nonpartisan collaboration among groups in the journalism, civic, education, government and private sectors that shines a light on the importance of public records and open government.

In Wisconsin, state legislators must comply with a records request, but if they have destroyed the record, they have nothing to send.

“Obviously, it’s troubling,” said Bill Lueders, president of the Wisconsin Freedom of Information Council. “It allows legislators to make things go away that they would rather not see the light of day.”

State Rep. Rob Brooks, R-Saukville, told the Wisconsin Examiner in 2021 that his office “frequently deletes emails during the normal course of business each day.”

And he’s not the only one.

“My office does not delete records on principle, and we should make sure every elected official is held to that same standard,” Anderson said.

In 2025, Gov. Tony Evers stepped in to close this loophole – his 2025 budget proposal included a measure to “remove the Legislature’s exemption from open records law by requiring that records and correspondence of any member of the Legislature be included in a definition of a public record to provide greater transparency for the people of Wisconsin.” The proposal also would have allocated funds and opened a full-time position with the Legislative Technology Services Bureau to carry out this new requirement. But the Republican-controlled Joint Finance Committee removed it from the final budget.

State Sen. Chris Larson, a Democrat from Milwaukee, has introduced bills to close that exemption for state legislators multiple times and is doing so again in the Senate this week in tandem with Anderson.

Before his election to the state Senate in 2010, Larson served on the Milwaukee County Board of Supervisors. As a public official, he had to maintain all his records there and assumed the same when he arrived in the Legislature.

But as his email inbox filled up and ran low on space, Larson said he was told by IT staff to simply delete old messages.

“People often wonder why so many wildly popular policies go session after session without a vote or even a public hearing, while special interest slop rises to the top of the agenda,” said Justin Bielinski, Larson’s spokesman. “The Wisconsin Legislature’s exemption from record retention requirements creates a perverse incentive to do the people’s business in secret. If lawmakers aren’t going to be responsive to their constituents’ needs, the least we can do is allow people to find out who they are listening to, and whose voices they choose to ignore.”

Larson’s bills to close the loophole have been ignored by Republicans who control the Legislature, he said. The majority party generally pays little attention to bills from the minority.

But the fact the Wisconsin Legislature is even subject to the open records law, albeit with a caveat, makes it one of the more transparent states. Nearly a quarter of all states — 12 in total — do not even allow records from the Legislature to be accessed by the public, according to a study from The Journal of Civic Information. Congress has also excluded itself from open records requests under the Freedom of Information Act.

The exemption for legislators here “completely undermines Wisconsin’s public records law and the ability for citizens to trust their Legislature,” said David Cuillier, director of the University of Florida’s Brechner Freedom of Information Project. “It’s really quite bizarre and an outlier in the United States. The right thing to do is remove it and restore accountability and credibility to the institution.”

The Badger Project is an independent, reader-supported newsroom in Wisconsin.

This article first appeared on The Badger Project and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

A loophole lets Wisconsin lawmakers delete public records is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

Republican Assembly Speaker Robin Vos criticized his Senate GOP counterparts on Tuesday for letting a bill to regulate data centers die, calling the issue “bigger than most that I have seen in my 22 years.”

The post Vos warns Wisconsin Senate inaction on data centers could cost GOP votes appeared first on WPR.

Republican Senate Majority Leader Devin LeMahieu relied on help from Democrats Tuesday to pass legislation that would legalize online sports betting in Wisconsin.

The post Despite GOP defections, online sports betting bill passes Wisconsin Senate appeared first on WPR.

Sen. Van Wanggaard, R-Racine, announced his decision Tuesday on what could be the Senate's last session day of the year.

The post Republican Van Wanggaard retiring from Wisconsin Senate appeared first on WPR.

As Wisconsin’s Republican leaders and Gov. Tony Evers continue working to hammer out a deal to provide both tax relief and money for schools, the state’s legislative Democrats have come up with their own plan. 

The post Wisconsin Democrats float $1.3B school funding proposal amid tax cut negotiations appeared first on WPR.

After years of gridlock, the Wisconsin Senate passed two bills that set the framework for spending $133 million to address PFAS contamination.

The post After years of gridlock, Wisconsin Senate passes bills addressing PFAS appeared first on WPR.

Snowmobilers in the Northwoods are enjoying what could be their last rides of the season on fresh snow ahead of warmer temperatures in the forecast.

The post Snowmobilers squeeze in riding time as Wisconsin trails briefly reopen post-blizzard appeared first on WPR.

Communities are recovering after a major weekend blizzard, dropping record-breaking amounts of snow in some parts of Wisconsin. From the Northwoods to Milwaukee, snowfall shut down roads, caused power outages and challenged plow trucks and public services.

The National Weather Service, calling the snowstorm “historic,” said that in central Wisconsin, snow fell at a rate of 4 inches per hour. “Near-blizzard conditions developed Sunday afternoon, fueled by northeast winds gusting between 35 and 50 mph,” the weather service stated in an update. Windspeeds reached 59 miles per hour  at the Green Bay Airport, and 60 miles per hour in De Pere. “This combination of heavy falling snow and high winds created whiteout conditions and massive drifting,” the National Weather Service stated.

Historic amounts of snow reached approximately 30 inches in communities from Wausau to Marinette and Door County. In Green Bay, where 26.1 inches of snow fell as of Monday, the storm was the area’s largest in 136 years. By Sunday Green Bay had seen 17.1 inches accumulate, making it the city’s third-snowiest day and its heaviest day of snowfall since 1889. Over 11,000 people were reported to have lost power as well.

A “No Travel Advised” notice was posted on the Department of Transportation’s webpage as the storm loomed. “The heavy snow load and high winds caused widespread power outages, most notably in Door and Marinette Counties, and building collapses were reported in Sturgeon Bay and Kewaunee County,” the National Weather Services noted. “Many schools and businesses remained closed through Monday.” The snow was so overwhelming that snow plow operations halted in Marinette County, forcing the sheriff’s office to warn that emergency responses might also slow. That was an acute concern for people stranded in cars along the roadways.

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported that Sturgeon Bay in Dane County saw 33 inches of snow blanketing roads and neighborhoods over three days. The city of Madison recorded 5.6 inches on Monday. The state capital’s previous record was set in 2006 when 3.5 inches of snow fell. In western Wisconsin, the town of Montana received 26.5 inches of snow, more than any other area in the region. The city of Mondovi also may have broken a record with 16.5 inches the city’s unofficial record was 16 inches, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. 

Over the three-day snowfall event, Madison was covered in nearly eight inches. Some residents reported they were unable to open their front doors. 

Fallen trees and other damage was also reported as far south as Racine.

Waukesha County also struggled with the storm, after strong winds uprooted trees as early as Friday. The winds heralded an all-day rain storm which then turned into a blizzard. The shifting weather patterns meant that the county had to adapt rapidly. About seven inches of snow fell in Waukesha from Sunday to Monday. Crews with the Waukesha County Department of Public Works pulled 16-hour shifts. 

“In severe weather government services matter most,” Waukesha County Executive Paul Farrow said in a statement. “Waukesha County’s teams were out early, stayed out late, and worked around the clock so residents could reach essential services safely. Thank you to our crews and to the public for slowing down and giving plows the space they needed to do their jobs.” 

From 2 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday, Waukesha County’s 911 communications center received 47 calls for disabled vehicles, 25 for vehicles in ditches, nine reports of property damage, and three for traffic hazards. In many areas people struggled to dig their cars out, with Wausau residents reporting having literally not seen their cars for days until they were uncovered from the snow. Although temperatures were below freezing on Tuesday, the weather is expected to warm as the week continues. By the weekend, temperatures are expected to reach 70 degrees before tapering off again.

Researchers have long warned that extreme weather events would become more common due to climate change. Some of the communities recovering from the blizzard have yet to fully recover from record-breaking floods that occurred in August. In January 2025, extreme arctic cold enveloped the region, challenging communities with large numbers of people living unhoused on the street. This most recent snowstorm came as other parts of the United States dealt with rashes of tornadoes, heatwaves, and flooding. 

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