WASHINGTON — The 2026 tax filing season closed Wednesday with the Trump administration and Republicans on Capitol Hill hailing success under last year’s massive tax cuts law, while Democrats said any benefits have been wiped out by skyrocketing gas prices, inflation and more.

More than 53 million Americans claimed at least one new benefit, averaging a tax cut of $800, under the tax cuts and spending package passed by congressional Republicans and enacted by President Donald Trump on July 4, according to the Department of the Treasury.

Originally titled the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, but rebranded by Republicans as the Working Families Tax Cuts law, the measure made permanent Trump’s 2017 reduced tax brackets. 

It also quadrupled the state and local tax deduction cap and increased the child tax credit by $200.

Democrats marked Tax Day by criticizing the law and pointed to increasing inflation and tariff costs as wiping out the value of tax relief, as both sides try to gain the advantage in messaging ahead of crucial midterm elections that will determine control of Congress.

Tips, car loans, overtime

The new law cut taxes on tips until 2028 and on qualifying car loan interest until 2029. 

As for Trump’s campaign promise for no tax on overtime, the law applies the advantage on up to $12,500 in overtime earnings for individuals, and $25,000 for joint filers, through 2028. 

Additionally, eligible senior citizens can now deduct up to $6,000 for individuals, $12,000 for couples, until 2029.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in a Tax Day statement that Trump’s leadership upholds “the foundational principle that hardworking Americans should be rewarded, not punished with tax hikes, and the results of this tax season prove it.”

According to Internal Revenue Service statistics to date and made public Wednesday:

• Six million filers claimed no tax on tips, with an average deduction of $7,100.
• Twenty-five million filers claimed no tax on overtime, averaging a $3,100 deduction.
• Thirty million seniors claimed the enhanced senior deduction, receiving an average break of $7,500.
• One million Americans deducted car loan interest, getting a $1,800 break on average.

Bessent, acting IRS commissioner after a turnover of six IRS commissioners in 2025, said the agency has “worked tirelessly to ensure our tax system works for the people it is meant to serve.”

“From the shop floor to the kitchen table, taxpayers are feeling the difference of the largest tax cuts in our nation’s history, and millions of Americans are keeping more of what they earn and seeing their paychecks go further than ever before,” Bessent said.

The White House circulated a collection of statements from taxpayers Tuesday praising the new deductions. 

Trump also held a photo opportunity Monday, when he received a McDonald’s delivery from a self-proclaimed “DoorDash Grandma” who lauded tax relief on her tips in a planned event. Trump subsequently pulled cash from his pocket and handed it to the woman, Sharon Simmons of Arkansas, who represented the tech delivery service. 

Simmons, no newcomer to such GOP appearances, also testified before the U.S. House Ways and Means Committee in late July 2025, following the passage of the tax law, to praise the no tax on tips policy.

134 million income tax returns

Frank Bisignano, IRS chief executive officer, told Senate tax writers on Capitol Hill Wednesday that the 2026 filing season was the “most successful tax filing season in IRS history.”

Trump created the IRS CEO position last year. Bisignano also serves as the commissioner of the U.S. Social Security Administration.

“This landmark legislation forms the cornerstone of the administration’s growth agenda. The latest numbers tell the story,” Bisignano told the Senate Committee on Finance during the panel’s annual oversight hearing examining tax collection.

The agency to date has seen over 134 million income tax returns filed for 2025 earnings, with 98% of them done electronically, according to IRS data. Bisignano hailed the issuance of 80 million refunds that on average totaled $3,400, up by 11% compared to 2024. 

Senate Democrats on the panel panned the cost of the new tax regime and questioned whether a shrinking IRS staff will contribute to less enforcement. 

Sen. Michael Bennet, D-Colo., said “the lack of cops on the beat at the IRS is going to cost the Treasury in the United States $646 billion in unpaid taxes by the wealthiest people in America.”

According to reports, roughly 26,000 employees left the IRS last year as part of Trump’s civil service reduction incentives and firings.

“I remember you saying when you and I met before your confirmation that you are deeply concerned about the level of national debt in this country,” Bennet said to Bisignano. “It is $38 trillion and a lot of that is because of the completely unpaid-for tax bill that is the Trump tax bill.”

The cost of the tax bill will be realized in years to come, according to congressional scorekeepers.

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office and Joint Committee on Taxation estimated the law will cost $3.4 trillion over the next 10 years —  more than $4 trillion if accounting for interest that will accumulate on the nation’s debt.

An analysis by the Tax Foundation, which generally advocates for lower taxes, found tax revenue coming into U.S. coffers will drop by nearly $5.2 trillion over the next decade. Individual income taxes have been the government’s largest single source of revenue since 1944, according to data compiled by the Tax Policy Center, a partnership between the Urban Institute and Brookings Foundation.

How the tax cuts were offset

Lawmakers who wrote the massive tax law accounted for some of the lost revenue by overhauling eligibility and work requirements for government health and food assistance for low-income Americans. 

According to a recent report from the progressive Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, roughly 2.5 million Americans have lost Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, benefits since the tax law came into effect.

The CBO estimated the law’s changes to work requirements for Medicaid, the government’s low-income health care program, will result in millions of Americans losing health insurance. 

Senate Republicans defended the law, saying it helped Americans by avoiding “the largest tax increase in American history.”

“Had the 2017 tax cuts expired, taxpayers earning less than $400,000 would have faced a more than $2.6 trillion tax hike over the next decade,” said Senate Finance Committee Chair Mike Crapo, R-Idaho. 

Pilot program canned

The panel’s highest-ranking Democrat, Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., slammed the new law for terminating a free alternative for tax filing, IRS Direct File, enacted under former President Joe Biden’s own budget reconciliation megabill.

The limited pilot program offered a free filing portal directly through the IRS and was available to 19 million taxpayers in 2024.

“Direct File in America died on Mr. Bisignano’s watch,” Wyden said, adding the program’s termination again puts taxpayers at the mercy of “tax software giants who overcharge for a service that ought to be free.”

Rather, the IRS offers Free File, an option available to taxpayers under a certain income level, now capped at $89,000, via a handful of tax preparation software companies that contract with the federal government.

A 2019 Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration report described the program as “fraught with complexity and confusion.” Estimates show roughly 14 million free-file-eligible taxpayers were led to pages where they were prompted to pay for add-ons and extra services.

Taxpayers at any income level have the option to file for free via fillable PDF forms, but that option requires manual entry without guided prompts.

Wyden said the arrangement is a “multi-billion dollar rip-off.”

Bisignano called Direct File an “unnecessary and less popular duplicate of programs.”

Dems continue ‘affordability’ argument

The Democratic National Committee pounced on Tax Day to highlight Trump’s policies and use of taxpayer funds. Affordability is front and center in the upcoming midterm elections.

Though Trump campaigned on lowering prices and taxes, DNC Chair Ken Martin said in a statement the president has so far given Americans “a reckless trade war that has hiked prices, and a deadly and costly taxpayer-funded war with Iran.”

“This Tax Day, Americans are seeing lower-than-promised refunds hit their bank accounts that won’t even cover the higher costs Trump has forced them to shoulder. It couldn’t be clearer: Trump and the Republican Party are on the side of billionaires, big corporations, and wealthy special interests,” Martin said.

Wisconsin’s highest court ruled Wednesday that Pabst Brewing Co. owes millions in damages to the survivors of a worker employed by a second company who died from a cancer related to asbestos in the Pabst brewery in Milwaukee.

The deceased employee — a steamfitter hired to remove asbestos insulation from piping in the facility — worked for an independent contractor, not directly for Pabst.

But Pabst  was sufficiently aware of the dangers of asbestos on its premises to be held responsible under Wisconsin’s workplace safety law, known as the safe place statute, Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Rebecca Dallet wrote in the 5-2 decision. The ruling upheld the circuit court’s award of nearly $7 million to the estate of steamfitter Gerald Lorbiecki.

“As the owner of the brewery, Pabst owed a non-delegable duty under the safe-place statute to frequenters on the premises, a category that includes employees of independent contractors like Lorbiecki,” wrote Dallet. She was joined by Chief Justice Jill Karofsky and Justices Brian Hagedorn, Janet Protasiewicz and Susan Crawford.

Lawyers for Pabst had argued that the brewery wasn’t responsible for the hazard because Lorbiecki’s employer had directed the work, not Pabst. In a dissent, Justices Annette Ziegler and Rebecca Bradley agreed, writing that the Court majority “fails to correctly analyze the law regarding a building owner’s liability to an independent contractor’s employee.”

The asbestos only became a hazard because of the work that Lorbiecki and his coworkers were doing, Ziegler argued.

The repair work took place during the mid-1970s, according to the ruling. “At the Pabst brewery, steamfitters cut out existing insulated pipes and replaced them,” Dallet wrote — a procedure that involved “thousands of pounds of insulation” that would be torn off “many miles” of asbestos-insulated pipe, according to circuit court testimony.  The brewery closed in 1996.

Lorbiecki developed mesothelioma in 2017 and sued Pabst and several other contractors and businesses. After he died his widow and his estate took over as the plaintiffs. His widow later died and their son assumed that role.

By the time the case went to trial, claims against the other companies, including Lorbiecki’s employer, had been dismissed, leaving only Pabst.

Pabst asked the lower court to throw out the case on several grounds, including that Lorbiecki worked for an independent contractor rather than Pabst.

The judge denied the company’s summary judgment petition. The jury awarded $6.5 million for Lorbiecki’s injuries and illness. Jurors also awarded $20 million in punitive damages.

Under state law, a portion of the compensatory damages were capped. State law also caps punitive damages at twice the amount of compensatory damages.

After calculating that Pabst was responsible for 42% of the compensatory damages, the judge calculated the total award at $6,986,906, including $4,657,937 in punitive damages.

The Wisconsin 2nd District Appeals Court in Milwaukee held in a May 2024 decision that the punitive damages should be calculated based on the total amount of compensatory damages — $5.5 million — not just the portion applied to Pabst. That would result in punitive damages of more than $11 million.

The Supreme Court ruling Wednesday reversed that portion of the appeals court ruling, however. Punitive damages in the case should reflect only Pabst’s portion of the compensatory damages — $2.3 million — Dallet wrote, yielding the punitive damages as the lower court originally calculated them.

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U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin introduced a new bill Tuesday aimed at making it simpler and cheaper for people to watch professional sports. 

Currently, for a fan in Wisconsin to watch every Packers, Brewers and Bucks game in a year it costs more than $1,500 annually to purchase the necessary streaming services and subscriptions — a cost that Baldwin said Wednesday benefits league and streaming service executives, as well as the billionaire owners of sports teams, at the expense of fans. 

“This isn’t just a Packers or a Wisconsin issue. This has become an American issue,” Baldwin said during a Wednesday news conference. “What used to be grabbing the remote and hitting a button or two has turned into a maze of streaming subscriptions, unexpected blackouts or a sky high payment. To top it all off, there is no consistency, and it is flat out confusing for fans.” 

She said at the news conference she was introducing the bill without any co-sponsors specifically to start conversations in Congress about the issues in the bill. 

Baldwin’s For the Fans Act includes two major provisions meant to make it cheaper for people to watch their favorite teams. The first would prohibit league-owned streaming services, such as MLB.Tv or NBA League Pass, from blacking out games that are played locally or on a third-party streamer. The second would require the leagues to provide a way for local fans to watch all games for teams based in the state in which they live. 

The proposal comes after the Green Bay Packers v. Chicago Bears playoff game in January was only available on local TV in Wisconsin in the Milwaukee and Green Bay markets — meaning that in five of the state’s markets, fans were forced to subscribe to Amazon to watch the game. 

The bill would apply to professional sports teams playing baseball, basketball, football, basketball, hockey and soccer. Minor league teams and leagues with fewer than eight teams are exempted. 

Baldwin has also previously introduced the Go Pack Go Act, which aims to make sure the Wisconsin households assigned to Michigan or Minnesota television markets are able to watch Packers games.

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WASHINGTON — An effort to force President Donald Trump to seek congressional approval for further war actions in Iran failed in the U.S. Senate for the fourth time Wednesday, with all but one Republican continuing to support the president’s Middle East conflict.

Senators voted down the measure, 47-52, with a similar partisan breakdown as earlier votes that saw one Republican and one Democrat break with their parties.

Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., who previously sponsored one of the Iran War Powers Resolutions, again split with his party to oppose Trump’s military actions in Iran, which the president launched without approval from Congress. 

As he has previously, Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., was the only Democrat to support Trump continuing the war in Iran.

Sen. Jim Justice, R-W.Va., did not vote.

Senate Democrats have vowed more votes ahead to rein in Trump’s joint operations with Israel in Iran.

Wednesday’s War Powers Resolution was sponsored by Sens. Tammy Duckworth, D-Ill., Tim Kaine, D-Va., Chris Murphy, D-Conn., Adam Schiff, D-Calif., and Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis.

Fourth failed vote

Prior votes to cut off Trump’s unchecked military operations in Iran were held March 18, March 4 and June 27, when the U.S. and Israel bombed Iran’s nuclear facilities last year.

The U.S.-Israeli war in Iran has claimed the lives of 13 American troops, and as of Wednesday injured 395, according to the Pentagon. Thousands of civilians in Iran and across the Middle East have been killed and injured in the shelling on both sides.

Meanwhile, the war has set off an oil crisis across the globe as Iran and the U.S. vie for control of the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow passage connecting the Persian Gulf to the Arabian Sea that moves one-fifth of the world’s oil and liquid natural gas.

A gallon of regular gas peaked at $4.16 on average across the U.S. last week, while diesel reached nearly $5.97, according to AAA. As of Wednesday, a gallon of regular gas sat at $4.10 on average, and diesel at $5.63.

A Quinnipiac University poll released Wednesday showed voters held Trump responsible for the spike in gas prices by a nearly 2-to-1 margin.

WASHINGTON — The White House budget director on Wednesday defended the administration’s latest request for Congress, testifying before the House Budget Committee that a 43% increase in defense spending and a 10% cut to domestic programs is the best path forward. 

Democrats on the panel were highly critical of that proposal, which lawmakers will debate in the months ahead and is unlikely to be approved in full.  

Pennsylvania Democratic Rep. Brendan Boyle, ranking member on the committee, said the administration’s request to increase defense spending so significantly while not bolstering health care programs like Medicare and Medicaid or helping people pay for child care “is a reflection of priorities that are out of whack,” with what Americans truly need. 

Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought said during the three-hour hearing that the administration believes a significant boost to defense spending “is meant for significant paradigm-shifting investments.”

“For instance, the president and his Department of War are exhibiting tremendous leadership to build ships, planes, drones, munitions and satellites faster without the backlog of status quo,” he said. “For the industrial base to double or triple and build more facilities, not just add shifts, it requires multi-year agreements to purchase into the future. That cost has to be booked in this first year.”

Vought said the administration’s preference is that Republicans place about $1.15 trillion in the annual Defense spending bill, which will require bipartisan support to move through the Senate, and put another $350 billion in a budget reconciliation bill, which Republicans can advance on their own.

He believes that will avoid Democrats demanding that each $1 increase in defense spending be matched by a $1 increase in domestic spending. 

“This Congress has changed the way we can spend money through the reconciliation process to avoid the pitfalls that really caused two decades of not being able to accomplish anything,” he said. “And I think you should be commended for that.”

Republicans used the complex budget reconciliation process last year to enact their “big, beautiful” law and are looking to advance another reconciliation bill in the coming months that would further bolster spending on immigration enforcement activities. 

No numbers on Iran war spending

Vought testified before the committee that he isn’t yet able to provide a ballpark estimate for how much in additional defense spending the administration plans to ask Congress to provide for the war in Iran. 

“We’re not ready to come to you with a request. We’re still working on it,” he said. “We’re working through to figure out what’s needed in this fiscal year versus next fiscal year.”

The current fiscal year will end on Sept. 30. 

Both Republicans and Democrats on the committee raised concerns about what such a steep increase in defense funding would mean for a department that has consistently struggled to account for all of its spending during several audits. 

Washington Democratic Rep. Pramila Jayapal questioned whether the Trump administration was serious about addressing fraud in every department, given its proposal to bolster funding for the Defense Department by more than half a trillion dollars. 

Vought responded that the “department is making progress towards the audit.”

Wisconsin Republican Rep. Glenn Grothman was even more frustrated with leadership in the Defense Department, saying that there “is so much arrogance in that agency.”

“I keep holding my nose because defense is the most important thing. And they just say, ‘We don’t have to do an audit. We’re so damn important. We don’t care what Congress thinks,’” Grothman said. “I hope that they dial up this audit and have the guys work around the clock, complete an audit by July 31 or before we eventually have to pass this stuff.”

Vought sought to reassure Grothman and other lawmakers on the panel that the Trump administration does want to address how DOD spends money. 

“The notion that we’re not trying to find any kinds of inefficiencies at the Department of Defense is not true,” Vought said. “Our view is that we would want to plow those into being able to invest in procurement and research.”

What’s next

The House Budget Committee won’t actually draft the dozen annual government funding bills. 

That is up to the Appropriations Committee, which will hold hearings with Cabinet secretaries and agency leaders in the coming weeks to hear more about the president’s budget request for the fiscal year set to begin Oct. 1. 

The Appropriations subcommittees will then draft and debate the spending bills that account for a fraction of the $7 trillion federal budget. A much larger chunk of annual funding, about $4.2 trillion, goes to mandatory programs, like Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. Another $970 billion goes to interest payments on the debt. 

While defense spending predominantly goes to the Pentagon, with a bit going to the Energy Department for nuclear security programs, domestic spending that the administration wants to cut overall is allocated among dozens of agencies. 

The departments of Agriculture, Education, Health and Human Services, Homeland Security, Housing and Urban Development, Interior, Labor, Transportation, State, Veterans Affairs and numerous smaller agencies all share the total spending level for domestic programs.  

During fiscal year 2025, which ended last September, defense spending totaled $893 billion, while non-defense programs received $980 billion, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. 

The Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection has warned that the severe storms that brought tornadoes, high winds, flooding and hail to Wisconsin Tuesday evening could inspire “storm chasers” to come to the state to scam homeowners seeking repairs. 

DATCP said in a news release Wednesday that door-to-door repair crews travel to communities hit by severe weather, offering quick fixes only to do poor quality work or take money up front and perform no work at all. 

The agency said the best way to avoid these scams is to hire local workers, ask for recommendations from trusted sources and make sure there is a written contract and documentation of all transactions. 

The Wisconsin Builders Association made a similar warning Wednesday, saying in a news release that scammers often skirt state laws regulating contractors. Those include laws that prohibit contractors from offering to pay portions of a homeowner’s insurance deductible or from negotiating with insurance companies, and a law that forbids contractors from refusing to cancel parts of contracts if insurance claims are denied. 

“Severe weather can create urgency for homeowners, but that urgency can also make them targets for bad actors,” said Wisconsin Builders Association President Andy Selner. “Taking a few extra steps to verify a contractor can prevent costly mistakes and protect the investment made in your home.”

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Most Americans support banning members of Congress and their families from trading stocks in individual companies.

So says a 2023 University of Maryland study that surveyed about 3,000 registered voters.

Lawmakers in Washington are privy to information the general public may not be and can use it to make advantageous stock trades.

And “the problem is getting worse,” said Kedric Payne, director of the ethics program for the Campaign Legal Center, a government watchdog in Washington. His team focuses on enforcing existing ethics laws and advocating for tougher ones.

Payne believes the public should know “their elected officials are protecting the public interest and not their own personal interest.”

The STOCK Act, a federal law passed in 2012, requires members of Congress to disclose their trades within about 30 days of the purchase or sale. But the penalty for filing a disclosure report late is a meager $200.

Payne said his organization used to file ethics complaints for congressional stock trading. It’s rare that they file those complaints now since the most common violation is a late report, and the legal penalty for filing late is so insignificant.

While disclosure requirements can help reveal actual or perceived conflicts of interest, Payne said, disclosing conflicts of interest also lessens the public’s trust in government. In effect, the increased transparency doesn’t alleviate whether the trade looks corrupt or is corrupt.

U.S. Rep. Tony Wied, a freshman congressman elected to the Wisconsin 8th in 2024, is no stranger to stock trading. The Republican represents the northeastern portion of the state, and his investment activity consistently outpaces Wisconsin’s other congressional representatives.

A businessman from De Pere who was elected to his seat by a wide margin in 2024, Wied formerly owned a gas station chain in the Green Bay area. His district encompasses parts of Door County, Green Bay and Appleton. Like every other member of Congress, his seat will be up for grabs this year in the midterm elections. Wied has said publicly he plans to seek reelection.

Wied recently reported buying between $760,000 and $1.6 million in stock between Feb. 3 and Feb. 19, according to The Badger Project’s analysis of Wied’s periodic transaction report. The disclosure laws only require that members report ranges and not exact values. In the same time period, Wied also wholly or partially sold stock valued between about $600,000 and $1.5 million.

Members of Congress are required to file periodic reports with the Clerk of the House about 45 days after they, their spouse or their dependent children buy or sell a financial asset worth more than $1,000. Wied’s most recent report, filed in March, is five pages long and lists 25 separate transactions. His largest single transaction was a purchase of between $500,000 and $1 million in U.S. treasury bills, a low-risk, low-reward investment.

In comparison, no other representative among Wisconsin’s U.S. House members — Reps Mark Pocan, Gwen Moore, Scott Fitzgerald, Derrick Van Orden, Glenn Grothman, Brian Steil and Tom Tiffany — have filed periodic transaction reports in the last year.

Members must also submit yearly financial disclosures, which list their assets and liabilities.

The sum of Wied’s assets disclosed in his latest annual disclosure ranges from about $6 million to $13 million, according to a review by The Badger Project. U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson, who has millions in commercial real estate and stocks, is the only member of Wisconsin’s delegation in Washington to top that. Johnson reported assets ranging from about $17 million to $81 million in 2025.

Wied’s staff wrote in an email to The Badger Project in January that the congressman’s trades are solely managed by an independent financial advisor and that Wied complies with all ethics laws and guidelines.

Wied’s office did not respond to The Badger Project’s request for comment for this story.

Payne told The Badger Project that Wied isn’t on his group’s radar.

“We haven’t seen anything that would draw this congressman to our attention,” Payne said.

But a congressman’s trades can be aboveboard and still raise suspicion because lawmakers who trade at a high volume will eventually make a transaction that either overlaps with their professional duties or appears to, Payne said.

“It’s only a matter of time for him to have trades over his career that are gonna raise questions whether or not he did anything wrong,” Payne said about Wied. “And when people question if their elected official is prioritizing their interest or prioritizing the official’s personal interest, you have a problem.”

That’s why Payne and his organization have endorsed the bipartisan Restore Trust in Congress Act. The bill was introduced last September and has been stuck in committee since. Among the bill’s 131 co-sponsors are Van Orden and Pocan. If it passes, the proposed legislation would bar members of Congress as well as their spouses and dependent children from both owning and trading individual stocks. Further, members would be required to either divest their current holdings or place them into a blind trust.

“It is a real legislative solution to the problem,” Payne said.

The bill is facing competition as Democrats and Republicans have since introduced their own, “watered down” versions, Payne said. The Stop Insider Trading in Congress Act, introduced by Steil, a Republican, and mentioned by President Donald Trump in his State of the Union address, would prohibit members of Congress from buying individual stocks. But members could continue to own their stocks and sell them. The Restore Trust in Government Act, the Democratic version, would include the president and vice president in the members included in a stock trading ban.

Payne said he has faith that the original bill will pass eventually, but that it will take another scandal to get the public to pay attention and demand Congress to take action.

Tony Wied’s trades in February 2026

SALES
MIN	MAX	STOCK	TRADE DATE
$15,001	$50,000	Paycom Software Inc	2/12/26
$50,001	$100,000	Block Inc Class A	2/12/26
PARTIAL SALES
$15,001	$50,000	Fortinet Inc	2/19/26
$15,001	$50,000	Broadcom Inc	2/19/26
$50,001	$100,000	Western Alliance Bancorp	2/19/26
$15,001	$50,000	Salesforce Inc	2/17/26
$50,001	$100,000	Lam Resh Corp	2/12/26
$100,001	$250,000	Artista Networks Inc	2/12/26
$50,001	$100,000	Take-Two Interactive	2/11/26
$50,001	$100,000	Block Inc A Class	2/11/26
$50,001	$100,000	Western Alliance Bancorp	2/9/26
$50,001	$100,000	Lam Resh Corp	2/9/26
$50,001	$100,000	Take-Two Interactive	2/3/26
$15,001	$50,000	Artista Networks Inc	2/3/26
$50,001	$100,000	Lam Resh Corp	2/3/26
$15,001	$50,000	Ulta Beauty Inc	2/3/26
PURCHASES
$50,001	$100,000	Visa Inc Class A	2/19/26
$15,001	$50,000	Labcorp Holdings Inc	2/19/26
$50,001	$100,000	Charles Schwab Corp	2/19/26
$15,001	$50,000	Micron Technology Inc	2/19/26
$500,001	$1,000,000	U.S. Treasury Bills	2/13/26
$15,001	$50,000	ServiceNow Inc	2/4/26
$50,001	$100,000	Him & Hers Health Inc	2/3/26
$15,001	$50,000	Hubspot Inc	2/3/26
$50,001	$100,000	The Trade Desk Inc Class A	2/3/26

This article first appeared on The Badger Project, an independent, reader-supported news nonprofit in Wisconsin. It is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

WASHINGTON — Tucked into President Donald Trump’s new budget request is a plan that could dramatically change — and, critics say, slash — how much money and help states provide to people needing jobs and training.

Trump’s latest budget proposes a federal “Make America Skilled Again’’ grant that would combine a dozen current programs and provide $3.4 billion in spending for certain employment and training programs, down from $4.65 billion anticipated this fiscal year.

The president’s plan would fund block, or general, grants to states, which could then tailor the spending to employment and training needs.

There’s no formula in the budget proposal detailing how or where the money would be distributed, other than a requirement that at least 10% be spent on an apprenticeship program and 3% on innovations. The secretary of the Department of Labor could also reserve up to 0.75% on “program accountability” and technical support.

Congressional Republicans are moving ahead with other ways to fund, and in some cases revamp, federal job programs, though they showed little interest in Trump’s MASA proposal that was also in his budget request last year.

The Trump plan

The MASA effort is another in a series of administration initiatives aimed at streamlining job training programs’ administrative costs and making them more responsive to changes in the workplace.

The Labor Department referred questions about the plan to the Office of Management and Budget, which did not respond to questions.

At the National Skills Coalition, an advocacy organization for skills-based training, Megan Evans saw the MASA effort as a way of making deep cuts that ultimately hurt workers and employers, she said in an interview.

“The administration says it’s trying to streamline,” said Evans, the coalition’s senior government affairs manager. “But in reality it’s combining deep cuts with risky consolidations and rollbacks.”

The White House last year issued a detailed report and a video on its strategy, outlining how “workforce programs are fragmented across agencies, stifled by red tape, and too often misaligned with the skills employers need.”

These issues, it said, “pose particular risks as the United States advances toward a bold reindustrialization agenda and navigates the transformational impact of AI (artificial intelligence) on the workforce.”

In the budget released this month, the administration called the program “a key part of the administration’s strategy to fill the growing demand for skilled trades and other occupations,” along with some other programs, including the tax cuts enacted last year.

Changes in getting money and help

While MASA aims to reduce administrative costs, a long-sought goal of administrators across the country, popular programs would be consolidated under the block grant, including several with strong constituencies. 

Among them are programs for adult training and employment, youth training and employment, the Labor Department’s Re-integration of Ex-Offenders program, Native American programs and others.

The National Skills Coalition saw trouble in folding these programs into a single grant.

“These programs weren’t created in a vacuum,” it said in a blog post last year. “They each serve distinct populations.”

Merging them would be “making it harder for people to access training that fits their lives and needs,” the group said.

It also had doubts about whether block grants would in fact be more efficient.

“By combining multiple workforce programs into a single grant, it becomes significantly harder to track program outcomes, monitor equity and assess whether specific populations–such as veterans, youth, people with disabilities, or former incarcerated people–are being effectively served,” the coalition said.

Some state and local officials share the concern. 

“Washington state is already facing significant budget shortfalls, and this proposal would further widen that gap,” said Marisol Tapia Hopper, director of strategic partnerships & funding at the Workforce Development Council of Seattle-King County.

She said combining the programs into a block grant “functions as a reduction in workforce investment, applying a one-size-fits-all approach to a system that is already chronically underfunded.” 

The National Governors Association, a bipartisan group comprising all the nation’s governors, has taken no position on the proposal.

“Workforce training is a huge bipartisan priority for governors,” said Jack Porter, NGA program director for workforce development & economic policy.

“Federal support is critical to standing up effective workforce programs, but the federally funded workforce system as it stands now comes with a lot of red tape that shifts time and focus away from the goal, which is (to) provide workers with training,” he said.

Congressional reluctance

Congress has shown little enthusiasm for the administration’s consolidation.

Earlier this month, the Republican-led U.S. House Education and Workforce Committee proposed a comprehensive job training blueprint.

Among its ideas: providing funding for on-the-job learning and strengthening the system that holds state and local workforce boards responsible “for delivering positive outcomes for workers and job seekers.”

The bill would have adult education programs governed by the Labor Department. The aim would be to “connect adult education to apprenticeships, sector partnerships, and employer-led training especially as artificial intelligence reshapes skill demands.”

Included in the legislation, which a committee spokeswoman says is clearly “in line with the broad goals proposed in the president’s budget,” is a Make America Skilled Again pilot program.

It would permit states to apply to combine different workforce funding streams and then spend them on programs that best suit their needs.

The bill, said committee Chairman Tim Walberg, R-Mich., in a statement, “modernizes a struggling and underutilized workforce development system, delivering reforms that strengthen participant outcomes and ensure greater accountability for taxpayer dollars.”

In the U.S. Senate, Republicans began pushing changes that will help people get access to current programs.

The Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee Republicans’ aim is to “increase Americans’ access to job opportunities by eliminating red tape, increasing flexibility, and modernizing the workforce system.”

The goal is to create one-stop centers where people can get information about jobs and training. The measure would “help Nebraskans find great jobs more efficiently,” said Sen. Pete Ricketts, a Nebraska Republican who co-sponsored the bill.

Spending bill season

At the moment, Democrats and Republicans appear deadlocked on how to proceed. The House Appropriations Committee plans to write labor spending legislation in June. The Senate has not announced a schedule. 

The partisan lines are forming.

The Trump labor budget “attacks workers and small businesses by undermining workforce development programs at the Department of Labor,” said Rep. Bobby Scott, D-Va., top Democrat on the House workforce panel, in a statement.

Without the specific programs, he said, “many workers will struggle to provide for their families.”

Walberg sees a need for big change.

“The workforce is evolving rapidly, and legislation designed over a decade ago is no longer meeting today’s demands,” he said.

WASHINGTON — Republicans in Congress are once again looking toward the complex budget reconciliation process as a way to achieve some of their policy goals without Democratic votes. 

GOP leaders were able to use the special pathway last year to approve the “big, beautiful” law that extended tax cuts, overhauled and cut Medicaid, provided hundreds of billions in extra funding for the departments of Defense and Homeland Security, and raised the country’s debt limit by $5 trillion, among other provisions. 

Now, Republicans will try to use the process at least one more time to provide years of funding to the Department of Homeland Security amid a two-month shutdown, with none of the constraints on immigration enforcement that Democrats have sought. 

Democrats’ push to rein in enforcement after federal immigration officers shot and killed two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis led to a record-breaking stalemate over the annual DHS appropriations bill. 

The funding lapse hasn’t yet affected Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection, DHS agencies which Republicans bolstered in the last reconciliation bill. But it has had an impact on the Federal Emergency Management Agency, Secret Service and Transportation Security Administration.

Reconciliation will require Republicans in the House and Senate to be almost completely unified on their goals, especially if the party tries to include elements of a hot-button voter identification bill called the SAVE America Act or other policies that don’t have a significant impact on federal revenue, spending, or the debt limit. 

What goes in and what is kept out of another reconciliation package will become increasingly important to GOP leaders’ reelection message as the country moves closer to November’s midterm elections. 

Why use budget reconciliation? 

Regular bills need a simple majority vote to pass the House, but at least 60 senators need to vote to end debate in that chamber. This step, sometimes called the legislative filibuster, or cloture, forces bipartisanship on most legislation, unless it moves through the reconciliation process. 

Budget reconciliation bills are exempt from that Senate rule. 

So why haven’t Republicans used reconciliation to enact all of their policy goals and campaign promises since taking over unified control last year? 

Budget reconciliation bills must follow a specific process and meet strict requirements in the Senate, known as the Byrd rule, named for former West Virginia Democratic Sen. Robert Byrd.

Very simply, this requires reconciliation bills to address federal spending, revenue, or debt in a way that is not deemed “merely incidental” by the Senate parliamentarian. 

How complicated could reconciliation really be?

Very.

First, the House and Senate must adopt a budget resolution with identical sets of reconciliation instructions for committees. Those guidelines will give committee leaders either a minimum amount to spend during the next decade or a maximum amount they can add to the deficit during that window. 

The Senate cannot approve the budget resolution without going through a marathon amendment voting session referred to as a vote-a-rama, which typically lasts well into the night. 

A budget resolution is a tax and spending blueprint, sort of like a blueprint for building a house before you’ve actually gotten a mortgage or purchased any land. It’s a proposal, but it doesn’t actually change tax law or spend any money. 

Once the budget is adopted, the House committees that receive reconciliation instructions must draft, debate and vote to send their bill to the Budget Committee. 

Then, the Budget Committee bundles all of the reconciliation bills together in one package and sends it to the House floor, where lawmakers must vote to send it to the Senate, where things get even more complex. 

What happens next?

Before a reconciliation bill goes to the Senate floor, it moves through something referred to as the “Byrd bath,” where the Senate parliamentarian determines if each provision fits the strict rules. 

Senate leaders can take up the House-passed version of the bill or work through the committee process on their side of the Capitol. Typically, the upper chamber goes directly to the floor and amends the House-passed bill. 

The Senate then goes through another vote-a-rama session, giving the minority party, currently Democrats, the chance to put all 100 lawmakers in that chamber on the record about various proposals in the bill. 

That process will be especially challenging this year, with Democrats looking to institute guardrails on immigration enforcement activities and get Republicans up for reelection on the record over some of the most pressing issues facing the country. 

If the Senate makes any changes to the House-passed bill, it must go back to that chamber for final approval before it can go to President Donald Trump for his signature. 

If the Senate approves a bill identical to the one passed by the House, it would go to Trump without needing another House vote. 

What exactly is the Byrd rule?

Elements in the bill would violate that rule if they:

• Didn’t change revenue, spending, or the debt limit. 
• Change revenue or spending in a way deemed “merely incidental.”
• Change policy outside the jurisdiction of the authorizing committee.
• Didn’t comply with the committee’s reconciliation instructions in the budget resolution.
• Increases the deficit past the budget window (usually 10 years).
• Change Social Security in any way, shape, or form.

How many times can Republicans use reconciliation? Is it unlimited? 

They have two more chances during this Congress but are limited by how many budget resolutions they can adopt. 

GOP leaders used the fiscal 2025 budget resolution to set up passage of the “big, beautiful” law. They can write a fiscal 2026 budget resolution for one more round and then use the fiscal 2027 budget resolution to run through a third reconciliation process, if they want to. 

Fiscal years for the federal government begin on Oct. 1.

Republican lawmakers left open Gov. Tony Evers’ special session on gerrymandering on Tuesday, saying they want to have further conversations with Evers about the issue. Evers and Democratic lawmakers criticized the lack of action. In a statement, Evers said “there’s nothing to negotiate.” 

The open-ended special session began even as lawmakers and Evers continue to discuss a possible deal on property taxes and school funding.

Evers announced his intention to call the special session in February, urging lawmakers to pass a constitutional amendment to ban partisan gerrymandering. He officially ordered the session in March. The constitutional amendment would include language to expressly prohibit drawing districts that give a disproportionate advantage or disadvantage to any political party. It would not lay out a new process for drawing maps.

Wisconsin adopted new legislative maps in 2024 following a state Supreme Court decision that found the previous maps were an unconstitutional gerrymander. The maps will be in place until 2030 when redistricting happens again. Unless there is a change to the current process, lawmakers will again be in charge of drawing new maps in 2031.

Ahead of the noon start time for the session, Assembly Speaker Robin Vos (R-Rochester) and Assembly Majority Leader Tyler August (R-Walworth) announced their intentions to leave the session open in a statement. They said they did so in “an effort to continue meaningful dialogue.”

“We view the Governor’s proposal as a first step on which to build a more comprehensive, workable solution for Wisconsin,” the leaders said, adding that they want a face-to-face meeting with Evers to discuss ideas. “We’re committed to a transparent and balanced solution that reflects the interest of all Wisconsinites.”

Evers, who is serving his last year in office, has called special sessions many times over his two terms including on abortion, gun violence and the state budget. Republicans typically have gaveled in and out of them without taking action or have completely rewritten his proposals.

Senate Majority Leader Devin LeMahieu said in a statement that “any changes to the current process have to be made intentionally and specifically using normal legislative procedure” and that “leaving the special session open allows the legislature to gain public input in order to make an informed decision on how to proceed.” 

“In nearly every instance in which Republicans did not immediately gavel out of the governor’s special sessions, Republicans simply quietly gaveled out months later, largely to avoid press interest, bad headlines, and public scrutiny and accountability,” Evers’ spokesperson Britt Cudaback wrote in a social media post.

The Senate and Assembly adjourned until Thursday morning. 

Evers said in a statement after that there is “nothing to negotiate” and urged lawmakers to take action on the constitutional amendment. 

“Rigging maps so that one political party stays in power is wrong, it’s anti-democratic, and it’s un-American — there’s nothing to negotiate because there’s no room for compromise when it comes to making sure Wisconsinites’ voices matter and their votes count,” Evers said. “This is a first step — if we don’t get a ban on partisan gerrymandering put in Wisconsin’s constitution, lawmakers will never be forced to create the independent and nonpartisan redistricting process Wisconsinites deserve. Lawmakers either want to ban partisan gerrymandering in Wisconsin or they don’t.” 

As the Republican leaders in the Assembly and Senate gaveled in and adjourned the sessions, Democratic members remained on  the floor of each chamber to voice their opposition to Republicans’ lack of action.

Senate Minority Leader Dianne Hesselbein (D-Middleton) and Sen. Mark Spreitzer (D-Beloit) held a press conference to criticize Republican lawmakers for not showing up to debate the measure.

“It is a shame that Senate Republicans are refusing to do their jobs when the Senate Democrats are in the Senate chamber, ready to discuss, debate and pass the constitutional amendment banning partisan gerrymandering,” Hesselbein said. 

Hesselbein said every Senate Democrat would have voted in favor of the proposal. She also said that none of her Republican Senate colleagues had contacted her and she didn’t know whether they actually planned to come back. 

Spreitzer said that gerrymandering has led to elected officials ignoring issues that matter to voters. 

“We’re seeing the last vestiges of that right now, as lame duck Republicans who are afraid to run on fair maps aren’t even coming in to take up this issue ahead of this coming election,” he said. “We only have fair legislative maps now because of court action, but our work is not done. There will be another redistricting cycle after the next census after 2030, and we need to lock in constitutional protections to make sure that our maps are never gerrymandered again.” 

Spreitzer noted that the constitutional amendment would also provide legal grounds for a court challenge if there are gerrymander attempts in the future.

As a constitutional amendment, Evers’ proposal would need to pass in two consecutive sessions of the state Legislature before it would go to voters for the final say. 

Bianca Shaw, the Wisconsin state director for Common Cause, told the Wisconsin Examiner that the lawmakers subverted expectations for the session, but that she hopes it isn’t just about “optics” and that policymakers will take the time to listen to Wisconsinites about the issue. 

“I think that what the constituents want, what voters want, is most important,” Shaw said. “I think that it is constructive that it wasn’t outright dismissed but words alone won’t help reform, and so what I’m looking for is for legislative leaders to go into their communities and see what their constituents want.” 

Shaw said she thinks there are some shifts happening in lawmakers’ openness in part due to upcoming elections and as many are facing competitive races.

“I think that what is happening right now in the state of Wisconsin is our legislators, on both sides, on all sides, are understanding that they have to earn their votes.”

Shaw said the constitutional amendment would be a valuable signal, but not the full solution. Common Cause, which is a part of the Fair Maps Coalition, supports an independent redistricting commission proposal, which would take the job of drawing maps out of lawmakers’ hands. 

Negotiations on property taxes, school funding

Gerrymandering is not the only issue lawmakers and Evers are considering as they continue to seek a deal on tax relief and school funding. 

Wisconsin has a surplus of more than $2 billion and policymakers are seeking to tap it to provide property tax relief to citizens, who have seen large increases in their bills, as well as to  provide additional funding to school districts, which have seen a steady decline in state aid.

According to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Evers told reporters on Monday that he and lawmakers were still talking about a potential deal.

“Before they disappear completely from Madison we need to get that done,” Evers said. “So we’re still talking.” 

According to WisPolitics, Vos said in a social media post that he had been in discussions with Evers for nearly a month and “our proposal encompasses property tax relief, rebate checks, tax exemption on tips and overtime, and enhanced special education funding for schools.” 

Other members of the Assembly Republican caucus, including Rep. Calvin Callahan (R-Tomahawk) also posted about the framework for the deal. 

However, it is unclear whether Senate Republicans are part of those negotiations or whether they are close to agreeing. LeMahieu declared that he was excluded from previous negotiations and the Senate did not go along with what Vos and Evers agreed. 

“Let’s hope we can convene the Legislature (we need the GOP State Senate to agree) soon so we can get this package enacted,” Vos said.

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A sweeping reorganization of the U.S. Forest Service signals that the agency is planning to lean heavily on states to help manage millions of acres of federal land, foresters across the West say.

State officials and timber industry leaders say they’ve been given scant details about the plan, which will move the agency’s headquarters from Washington, D.C., to Salt Lake City, restructure its regional management, and close scores of research stations in dozens of states.

While they wait for the dust to settle, they’re preparing for the Forest Service — with its workforce slashed by the Trump administration — to ask more of its partners under the new model.

“The Forest Service itself is unable to uphold its mission and cannot alone manage the many challenges on these landscapes,” said Nick Smith, public affairs director with the American Forest Resource Council, a timber industry group. “The transition from regional offices to more state-level offices is a recognition that partnerships are the future for the Forest Service.”

But many forestry veterans fear the shake-up will cause more attrition in an agency that’s already shrunk because of Trump’s cuts to the federal workforce. Some see a clear sign that moving the headquarters to Utah — a state whose leaders are often hostile to federal land ownership — is designed to undermine the Forest Service’s management of its lands.

The closure of 57 research stations, some agency partners fear, will threaten critical science that states and other forest managers rely on to learn about wildfire behavior, timber production and a host of other issues.

Some observers noted that the agency is required to seek congressional approval to relocate offices, which could trigger legal challenges to the plan if lawmakers do not weigh in.

Meanwhile, some foresters feel the uncertainty swirling over the agency will cause chaos as the West heads into a dangerous fire season amid record temperatures and drought.

The plan announced on March 31 will relocate Forest Service Chief Tom Schultz and his headquarters staff to Salt Lake City. The agency will close its nine regional offices, each of which oversee national forests across multiple states. Replacing those offices will be 15 state directors, mostly in Western states.

Many state leaders, from both conservative and liberal states, say they welcome the opportunity to deepen their partnerships with the Forest Service and play a greater role on federal lands. But they’re still anxious to see more details about the agency’s new structure and concerned that national forests remain deeply understaffed.

“There are definitely a lot of vacancies in key positions that need to be filled,” said Jon Songster, federal lands bureau chief with the Idaho Department of Lands. “I hope that a lot of that remaining expertise is not lost, but shifted to the forest level where it’s desperately needed. Hopefully with all these changes there will be opportunities to put more people in some of those key gaps.”

Scarce details

The Forest Service manages nearly 200 million acres of land, mostly in Western states. With a mandate to manage the land for multiple uses, the agency oversees timber harvests, livestock grazing, outdoor recreation and wildlife habitat.

Under President Donald Trump, the Forest Service has lost about 16% of its workforce — nearly 5,900 employees — through buyouts, layoffs and early retirements. Trump’s proposed budget for 2027 would cut billions of dollars from the agency’s funding.

Many observers view the reorganization plan as an effort to force out more longtime agency leaders. The moves are expected to affect about 5,000 employees across the various offices that are relocating.

“If this were a stand-alone proposal where the American public and the public agency employees had trust in the administration, a lot of it makes sense,” said Mike Dombeck, who served as chief of the Forest Service under President Bill Clinton and remains a vocal conservation advocate. “But the level of trust is at rock bottom.”

In its announcement, the agency said that the new state-based model will bring decision-making closer to the forest level and reduce bureaucracy. The Forest Service did not grant a Stateline interview request.

State foresters, who are responsible for managing the forests in their states, say they’ve been given few details other than the new office maps released by the agency. They don’t know when the transitions will happen, which officials will be staffing the new offices or what authority they will have.

“They’ve made the statement that they need to rely more on states,” said Washington State Forester George Geissler. “If you’re going to lean on us, it might help us to know what that means.”

States’ role

In recent years, the Forest Service has increasingly partnered with states, tribes, counties and nonprofits to carry out projects on federal lands. Foresters say agreements such as the Good Neighbor Authority have become a critical tool, allowing more work to happen in national forests even as the feds’ own capacity shrinks.

“We’ve seen some of that institutional knowledge (at the Forest Service) dwindle a little bit,” said Utah State Forester Jamie Barnes. “Building these partnerships, if you do see a decline on one side or the other, you can bridge that loss. We’re working together, making joint decisions so we can get timber off the landscape here in Utah.”

Some foresters said they welcome the chance to work more closely with the Forest Service, but they’re concerned that the agency has not recovered from Trump’s workforce cuts. Reassigning hundreds of employees to new locations could lead to more attrition.

In Wyoming, state officials are excited to have Forest Service leaders working in close proximity. But State Forester Kelly Norris acknowledged that the move could be “bumpy,” given the lack of details and ongoing workforce shortages in the agency.

“The logistics of this may be a lot harder implemented than said,” she said. “We see this as a positive for us, but I do think that this is going to be a real long transition.”

Idaho, Utah and Wyoming are among the Western states that share the Trump administration’s goal of increasing timber production on federal lands. Trump has moved to limit environmental reviews and protections for endangered species to speed up logging projects.

Some Forest Service veterans feel the move to increase states’ role will prove destructive in some parts of the West.

“We’re putting the governance of the forests more subject to states’ interests,” said Kevin Hood, executive director of Forest Service Employees for Environmental Ethics, a nonprofit that advocates for civil employees. “I would be concerned that the values that don’t have strong lobbying groups, such as watershed integrity, may be subjugated to extractive values like timber, mining and grazing.”

Several agency veterans stressed that the Forest Service’s state directors should be career professionals, not political appointees.

HQ move

By relocating its headquarters to Salt Lake City, the Forest Service said in its announcement, the agency is moving leaders closer to the forests they manage.

But some are skeptical the move will bring stronger management to the West. During Trump’s first term, he moved the Bureau of Land Management headquarters to Grand Junction, Colorado. Only 41 of the 328 employees subject to the transition actually relocated.

“Shaking things up is going to get people to abandon their positions, and that’s the intent,” said Chandra Rosenthal, Western lands and Rocky Mountain advocate with Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, a group that defends whistleblowers in the federal service. “It’s a long-term dismantling of the scientific backbone and staff. The theory is that the federal government will abandon a lot of the public lands and then states will be forced to fill in those gaps.”

Rosenthal and others noted that Utah’s political leaders are hostile to federal land ownership. U.S. Sen. Mike Lee, a Republican, led an effort last year to sell off millions of acres of federal land, which drew widespread backlash before it was withdrawn. Utah’s state government has also sued the federal government, seeking to claim control of 18.5 million acres of federal land managed by the Bureau of Land Management.

“Why would you move the headquarters of a public lands management agency to the state that is the most anti-public lands in the country?” said Dombeck, the former Forest Service chief.

Dombeck also noted that the Forest Service chief frequently reports to the White House, testifies in congressional hearings and coordinates national policy with other agency leaders. Moving the position out of D.C., he said, makes little sense.

In a webpage set up to respond to news coverage of the move, the Forest Service said it is a “myth” that the transition is designed to reduce its workforce or transfer federal lands to the states.

But some agency veterans are skeptical.

“It’s hard not to reach the conclusion that this is an effort to weaken federal agencies and federal management of these lands,” said Robert Bonnie, who served as undersecretary of agriculture for natural resources and environment during the Obama administration. “You’re going to lose some good staff as part of the reorganization, as they move chairs across the deck of the Titanic.”

Meanwhile, some state leaders are concerned that the uncertainty caused by the reorganization and Trump’s staffing cuts could lead to chaos as wildfire season approaches. With record temperatures and drought drying out much of the West, foresters expect a challenging fire season this summer. The Forest Service remains the nation’s largest wildland firefighting agency, even as the Trump administration seeks to consolidate wildland fire operations into a separate service under the U.S. Department of the Interior.

“I’ve got federal firefighters, fire managers, and all they’re talking about is what’s happening at (the Forest Service),” said Geissler, the Washington state forester. “I don’t feel like having a bunch of distracted firefighters on my hands going into a summer fire season.”

Stateline reporter Alex Brown can be reached at abrown@stateline.org.

Wisconsin Sen. Jesse James (R-Thorp) is dropping his challenge to Sen. Jeff Smith (D-Brunswick) — making him the fifth Senate Republican to announce his retirement from office.

James had initially announced that he would be running for reelection in October in Senate District 31, which is currently represented by Smith, saying that he would be coming “home.” James and Smith were drawn into the same district under the legislative maps adopted in 2024, and James moved to continue to represent Senate District 23.

James’ retirement announcement comes after his daughter was charged with stealing funds from his campaign. He turned in his daughter to police in 2024, after discovering that, while  working as his campaign treasurer, she withdrew $32,000 from the campaign account over the year without authorization. She had withdrawn the funds to help with her small business.

James, who was first elected to the Senate in 2022, said in a statement that it has been the “opportunity of a lifetime” to serve in the Legislature, but “this role came at a price, a price of being away from my family.”

“For this reason, and for other personal reasons I have decided to retire from the Wisconsin State Senate,” he said.

James’ departure from the race means Republicans are losing the advantage that comes with having an incumbent candidate in yet another key state Senate district.

Sen. Rob Hutton (R-Brookfield) and Sen. Van Wanggaard (R-Racine) have both announced their retirements, and Sen. Howard Marklein (R-Spring Green) is the only incumbent Republican running for reelection in one of the four Senate Districts that Democrats are targeting as a part of their plan to win a majority.

Senate District 31 includes the entirety of Eau Claire County and parts of Dunn, Trempealeau and Chippewa counties. It’s one of 17 odd-numbered districts that will be up for election for the first time under new maps.

Other Republicans not running for reelection include Senate Majority Leader Devin LeMahieu (R-Oostburg) and Sen. Steve Nass (R-Whitewater).

According to a Democratic Party of Wisconsin analysis, Senate District 31 voted in April this year for Justice-elect Chris Taylor, who was backed by the party, by 30 percentage points.

According to an analysis by John Johnson, a research fellow at Marquette University, the current 31st Senate district leaned Democratic in the 2024 presidential election by 2.2 percentage points and went Democratic by 4.7 percentage points in the 2024 Senate race. 

Devin Remiker, chair of the Democratic Party of Wisconsin, said in a statement that Republicans “know that they’re in big trouble without rigged maps designed to protect them from the outrage voters have about rising prices and the disastrous Trump administration.”

“With last week’s blowout victory, the likes of which this state has not seen for over a decade, we will double down to ensure we can deliver real change for working people in November,” Remiker said. “For the Republicans who are staring down the most competitive elections of their lifetimes, with their leaders and colleagues continuing to flee the sinking MAGA ship, I would urge you to join them in retirement before the wave hits this November.”

Another Assembly Republican declines to run 

Rep. Scott Allen (R-Waukesha) also announced his intentions to not run for reelection on Tuesday, saying he would be taking a “sabbatical” from elected office. Allen lost his bid for the office of mayor of Waukesha last week to Alicia Halvensleben, a Democrat. 

“We are blessed with living in the greatest country of all time. Service is the rent that we pay for such privilege,” Allen, one of the most right-wing members of the Assembly, said in a statement. “Protecting our freedoms and opportunities takes work and when we begin to take them for granted, we run the risk of losing them.”

His campaign statement noted that “this action by Rep. Allen may be the only thing that he has ever done that will thrill liberals.”

Allen joins six other Assembly Republicans, including Assembly Speaker Robin Vos (R-Rochester), in not running for reelection.

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The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources held a public hearing Tuesday on a request from the AI data center company Vantage for an air quality permit to operate 45 diesel backup generators at the company’s proposed hyperscale data center in Port Washington.

The department has already granted a preliminary approval to the permit request. Members of the public complained at the virtual hearing that the DNR chose not to conduct a full environmental impact assessment — despite southeastern Wisconsin’s existing classification as a high air pollution region. 

Michael Greif, an attorney with Midwest Environmental Advocates, said that all 45 generators operating at once for one hour would emit the same amount of nitrogen oxides as more than 5 million cars driving over one mile of nearby Interstate 43 — or seven times the hourly nitrogen oxide emissions for all of Ozaukee County. Exposure to nitrogen oxides have been tied to respiratory issues such as asthma. 

“It is also one of the first hyper scale AI data centers proposed in Wisconsin,” Grief said. “So it raises new and unreserved questions about energy use, climate impacts, air pollution and public health, and for all those reasons and more, DNR is legally required to prepare an EIS for the Vantage data center.”

Residents of the area put it more simply, complaining about the air pollution they’re already dealing with every day. 

“Our lakeshore is at capacity,” Sheboygan resident Rebecca Clarke said. 

Many speakers also expressed frustration at their lack of a voice in the state’s surge in data center development and proposals. 

“This community has not been given a fair process,” Port Washington resident Carri Prom said. “We’ve been speaking about this process for months. We’ve largely been ignored, and yet, here we are.”

The air pollution permit is one of the DNR’s few chances to weigh in on a data center proposal that has drawn widespread opposition in Port Washington and across the state. The Public Service Commission, the agency that regulates utility companies in Wisconsin, has given the public little confidence it will do enough to prevent electric bills from increasing.

Local zoning boards and city councils, enticed by the promise of property tax revenue, have often signed off on data centers after agreeing to non-disclosure agreements to keep the details away from their constituents. 

“I think things are very backwards, and that we’re proceeding with all of these projects before we even have any idea of how to protect residents,” said Sarah Zarling, an environmental organizer who’s been involved in the data center fight. 

Over the past year, as the number of data centers operating, under construction or proposed has continued to increase, public opposition has grown. Multiple pieces of legislation for regulating data centers were proposed by lawmakers of both parties, yet none passed  before legislators adjourned for the year. Data centers have become a big issue in the Democratic primary for governor and a number of environmental groups have called for a moratorium on data center development until stricter regulations can be put into law. 

Brett Korte, a staff attorney at Clean Wisconsin, told the Wisconsin Examiner in a statement after Tuesday’s hearing that the disconnected government approval process only highlights Wisconsin’s lack of a coherent plan.

“One of the pressing issues related to the data center boom currently underway in Wisconsin is that there is no overarching plan to ensure they don’t harm communities in our state,” he said. “Nor is there even an effort to fully understand the harm they will cause. Local governments make zoning decisions, the PSC approves the construction of power plants and transmission lines, and the DNR implements water regulations and issues air permits.” Yet no state office is responsible for looking at all of the issues raised by data centers at once.

Korte added that a better process for planning future renewable energy sources, stronger carbon emission standards and a more concrete plan for achieving Gov. Tony Evers’ goal of powering the state with 100% clean energy by 2050 would help the state better manage data center growth. 

“No one is asking: Do the benefits of data centers outweigh their environmental harm?” he continued. “That is why Clean Wisconsin continues to call for a pause on data center construction until the state has a comprehensive plan to regulate their development.”

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WASHINGTON — U.S. Senate Majority Leader John Thune said Tuesday he plans to use the complex reconciliation process to fund immigration enforcement for the next three years, though it wasn’t immediately clear if House Republicans were on the exact same page.

The plan to fund Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the Border Patrol with only Republican votes could end the two-month shutdown at the Department of Homeland Security when combined with the regular funding bill for that department, which the Senate already approved but is stalled in the House. 

Thune, R-S.D., said during an afternoon press conference that House GOP leaders “could” add additional provisions to the reconciliation bill, but said he would like it to remain narrow. 

“My hope would be that if we can execute on getting that done here in the Senate, the House would be able to follow through,” he said. 

Thune said the Senate could vote as soon as next week on a budget resolution with reconciliation instructions. That is the first step of the complicated process. But the House must vote to adopt that budget resolution before Republicans can pass the funding bill for ICE and the Border Patrol.  

Speaker Mike Johnson’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. 

Homeland Security shuttered

The Department of Homeland Security has been shut down since Feb. 14, after Democrats insisted on new guardrails for immigration enforcement following the fatal shootings of two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis by federal immigration officers.

Without any bipartisan consensus on how to do that, Republicans have instead decided to use the same reconciliation process they used last year to enact their “big, beautiful” law to approve funding for Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Border Patrol. 

The House would then likely pass DHS’ spending bill without those two line items, which the Senate has already approved. That would provide funding for the other agencies within the department, including the Coast Guard, Federal Emergency Management Agency, Secret Service and Transportation Security Administration.

Safeguards demanded

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said during a separate press conference that Democrats have repeatedly asked for “common sense” safeguards that would require immigration agents to show identification, prevent them from wearing masks and require judicial warrants to enter someone’s home. 

“The bottom line is these are simple. These are common sense,” he said. “They’re what every police department uses and when you ask the American people, they’re on our side. It’s the intransigence, particularly of the hard right, who seem to like what ICE is doing.”

Schumer said Democrats would use the marathon amendment voting session on both the budget resolution and the later reconciliation bill to hold Republicans’ “feet to the fire on DHS, on the war, on so many other issues.”

Thune said he has been “trying to figure out exactly” what Democrats have gotten out of the DHS shutdown, especially considering that immigration enforcement operations haven’t been affected since there was funding for that in last year’s reconciliation bill, exempting those programs from the funding lapse. 

“All of the things that the Democrats made this about, which was supposed to be reforms to the way that ICE and CBP operate. They got none of that. Zero,” he said, referring to Customs and Border Protection, the larger agency that includes the Border Patrol. “And now we’re going to fund those agencies for three years into the future.”

The Department of Justice’s stated reason for obtaining sensitive personal data on millions of voters masks the Trump administration’s true intention for obtaining state voter lists, Michigan’s top election official asserted in federal appeals court Monday.

Attorneys for Michigan Democratic Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson made the allegation in a brief in the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The argument reflects a concern broadly held among Democratic state election officials that the Trump administration wants to compile voter data in an effort to influence the upcoming midterm elections. 

The Justice Department, under President Donald Trump, is suing 29 states for refusing to provide voter information. It says it needs the data to evaluate efforts to clean and maintain voter rolls, including whether noncitizens are registered to vote.

But Benson’s brief says that “appears to be a pretext for improper purposes.”

Michigan and other states argue the Trump administration is instead effectively building a nationwide voter registration list — a move not authorized under the 1960 Civil Rights Act, a federal law to combat voting discrimination that the Justice Department has cited in demanding states turn over voter data.

“Collecting Michigan’s voter data to conduct its own list maintenance and to use Michigan’s list as part of creating a national voter file is not encompassed within the purpose stated in DOJ’s demand, which is simply ‘to ascertain Michigan’s compliance with the list maintenance requirements’” of federal election laws, Benson’s brief says.

“Moreover, creating a national voter file of U.S. Citizens is beyond any purpose contemplated by the (Civil Rights Act).”

After U.S. District Court Judge Hala Jarbou ruled in February that the Justice Department isn’t entitled to Michigan’s unredacted voter list containing driver’s license and partial Social Security numbers, the department appealed to the 6th Circuit.

Trump priority

Over the past year, Trump has attempted to exercise greater power over federal elections, which, under the U.S. Constitution, are run by the states.

“Trump does not have the authority to create a Trump voter list,” Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold, a Democrat whom the Justice Department is suing for not providing voter data, said in an interview earlier this month.

Studies have shown noncitizen voting is extremely rare, though Trump has long fixated on the prospect of noncitizen voting and other forms of election fraud. Last year, Trump signed an executive order that would have unilaterally required voters to provide documents proving their citizenship. The order was struck down in court, but Trump is pressuring the U.S. Senate to pass the SAVE America Act, which would implement similar proof of citizenship rules.

Michigan state officials and other critics of the Justice Department’s voter data effort point to actions by Trump and remarks by a DOJ attorney as evidence that the Trump administration is already compiling a national voter list.

Trump’s recent executive order to restrict mail-in ballots directs the Department of Homeland Security to build lists of voting-age citizens in each state and then share those lists with state officials. Homeland Security operates a powerful computer system, called SAVE, that can verify citizenship by checking names against information in federal databases.

And at a federal court hearing in Rhode Island in late March, Justice Department Voting Section Acting Chief Eric Neff said his department intends to share voter lists with Homeland Security, according to a transcript. He said DOJ and DHS have already entered into a use agreement to govern the sharing of data, though he didn’t detail its requirements.

Mail ballot order an ‘iceberg’ to DOJ case

A DOJ attorney, James Tucker, has denied any effort to create a national voter file. 

“There is not going to be a national voter registration database,” Tucker said at a hearing in Maine on March 26 — less than a week before Trump signed the executive order.

But David Becker, executive director of the nonpartisan Center for Election Innovation & Research, likened the Justice Department’s litigation strategy to a legal Titanic and the executive order to an iceberg: The order effectively creating a nationwide voter list could sink a strategy that denies such a goal exists.

“The DOJ … has been trying to assure the courts that this data is not going to be used to create a national voter list,” Becker said during a press briefing this month.

The Justice Department didn’t respond to a request for comment Tuesday.

Civil Rights Act argued

The Justice Department has so far failed to persuade any federal judges that it’s entitled to state voter data. Judges have dismissed the DOJ’s lawsuits against California, Massachusetts, Michigan and Oregon. 

At least a dozen states, all Republican led, have voluntarily provided their voter lists. The Justice Department has also reached a settlement agreement with one state, Oklahoma, to obtain its data. 

When Jarbou, a Trump appointee, dismissed the Justice Department’s lawsuit for Michigan’s voter roll, she ruled that the Civil Rights Act doesn’t require the disclosure of the information. The law, signed by President Dwight Eisenhower, empowered federal officials to investigate state and local discrimination against Black voters.

The law requires states to preserve election records for at least 22 months after a federal election, including any documents that come into the possession of an election official. Jarbou wrote in her decision that the state’s voter registration list is created by election officials but isn’t a document, such as a voter registration application, that comes into their possession.

When the Justice Department filed its brief in March, it argued that Jarbou misinterpreted the Civil Rights Act. “The CRA’s text … does not exclude self-generated documents,” the department’s brief says.

The Justice Department’s appeal of the Michigan loss has advanced the furthest, with state officials filing their brief on Monday. The DOJ has pushed for quick timelines in the appeals, arguing that court rulings are needed ahead of the midterms to ensure the fairness of elections.

Local officials back states

Regardless, 18 local election officials from across the country, including seven in Michigan, on Monday filed a brief in the case arguing that the Justice Department hasn’t provided a legitimate basis to obtain election records under the Civil Rights Act.

As election misinformation has proliferated in recent years, local election officials face increasing requests for information, the group wrote. They are accustomed to providing public voter registration information, with steps in place to exclude sensitive, nonpublic data.

Courts act as a “backstop” to enforce bans on disclosing sensitive information in response to records requests from the public, the local election officials argue.

“Courts should perform that same function for requests for records under the CRA,” the group said.

Kris Seals, a Brookfield alderman, has resigned following public outcry over anti-Muslim social media posts he made. Though Seals initially resisted calls for his resignation, he has since backpedaled and apologized for his comments, which discussed violence against Muslims. 

“I would like to apologize to the Muslim community for my insensitive and inappropriate statements I made online,” Seals said in an emailed statement which was shared by Brookfield City Attorney Jenna Merten, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported. 

Shortly after Seals was reelected in an uncontested race on April 7, Fox 6 Milwaukee reported on numerous posts the alder made on LinkedIn. “They will take over your country with out (sic) one shot,” read one of Seals’ posts. “They will out vote you in less then (sic) 30 years and then you will be living under Sharia Law.” Fox 6 Milwaukee said the posts were first noticed by a local resident who shared them with the TV news station. “They are a sick religion,” Seals wrote in  another post. “This must stop. deport them all.” In yet another post Seals wrote “It’s time to wipe out the immigrants from Britain and all of the EU.” Another of his  posts referred to shooting Muslims and Somalis with  “bacon rapped (sic) bullets,” topped off with laughing emojis. 

Seals had also made a post reading “Obummer is not the President anymore! So Presidential immunity is Mute. Hang him for treason,” and another one suggesting that criminals should be shot twice in the head to save “the people tons of money in court cost and prison cost, also eliminating the dems from becoming involved in trying to save their voter base.” Images of another post have been shared with the Examiner, with the posts alleging that “every blue state has Billions in fraud” which Seals re-posted and commented that, “I think it’s way past time for Public Executions.”

Fox6 Milwaukee reporters questioned Seals at his home. Seals said “it’s obnoxious, these people,” referring to what he called “extreme Muslims” and asking the reporter to “put that word in there, because it’s not all Muslims.” Grinning, Seals admitted to making the posts about bacon-wrapped bullets, a discriminatory trope mocking the Muslim prohibition on eating pork. Seals told the reporters that the only post he regretted was the one calling for criminals to be shot. “Sometimes we say a lot of things online that we don’t necessarily mean,” Seals said. He later claimed that his LinkedIn posts were  bringing attention to important issues. “Those are problems,” said Seals. “I have a right to say how I feel.”

The comments caused an uproar and Muslim community organizations called for Seals to resign. “Public officials take an oath to serve all constituents, not to demonize them,” said Robert McCaw, government affairs director for the Council on American-Islamic Relations. “Seals’ violent and dehumanizing remarks targeting Muslims and immigrants are not just offensive, they are dangerous. This rhetoric fuels hate, legitimizes discrimination, and puts real people at risk. It is fundamentally incompatible with the responsibilities of public office.” 

Seals said in his resignation statement that he spoke with a member of the Muslim community. “I appreciate they are willing to forgive me for the rude statements I made,” he said. “I look forward to meeting with them and to get an even better understanding of the Community.”

The common council will now need to determine how to fill Seals’ empty seat. It wasn’t the first time Brookfield’s common council had to contend with inflammatory comments made by Seals. 

In 2023, Seals drew attention for speaking against a proposed affordable housing development in his wealthy, mostly white suburb. “The problem that I have is the future of Brookfield,” said Seals. “What we are trying to do is step down to a West Allis or a Wauwatosa. No, we’re Brookfield. We don’t step down to allow the people who can’t afford to live in Brookfield to come in, because then we become West Allis, then we become Wauwatosa. This is not what Brookfield is. I’ve been here 60 years, this is not Brookfield.” Seals also said people who want to live in Brookfield need to “put your nose to the grindstone” until they can afford to live there. 

An attempt to censure Seals for his comments on affordable housing failed, with 16 local residents appearing to speak in support of the alder. One woman called his opposition to the housing project “exemplary.”

Brookfield Ald. Michael Hallquist pushed for Seals’ censure in 2023. In an emailed statement to Wisconsin Examiner, Hallquist applauded his common council colleague’s resignation over three years later.

“First and foremost, I want to reassure the Muslim members of our community that you belong here, you are loved, and you are every much as Brookfield as my family is,” said Hallquist. “You are our neighbors and we will continue to show up for you.”

Hallquist said that Seals “represents an ever-decreasing attitude of hate and intolerance in our community. While I appreciate his apology, I hope he sincerely intends to learn more from his neighbors on his pathway to forgiveness, and I wish him well on that journey. It speaks volumes to the kindness of our Muslim community to offer him the opportunity to do-so.” Hallquist concluded that, “Brookfield is what we make it, so I hope we continue to create a culture for our city where everyone feels safe, appreciated, and welcome.”

This article has been updated with comment from Ald. Michael Hallquist.

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Wisconsin lawmakers agree on the importance of providing public access to state government meetings through livestreams, but they finished their work this year without an agreement on a short-term or long-term plan to fund the Capitol livestreaming service WisconsinEye. The nonprofit organization faces an uncertain financial future. Jon Henkes, president and CEO of WisEye, now says the organization is hoping for further action in a special or extraordinary session.

Henkes, who was not available for an interview, said in a statement that WisconsinEye “remains hopeful of some level of support from the state, but right now that’s a big question given both houses of the legislature adjourned without agreement on a plan to be supportive.” 

WisconsinEye was started as an independent nonprofit in 2007 to livestream and archive government meetings and legislative sessions. For most of its history, WisconsinEye has relied on donations and is run independently from the state Legislature, but since the pandemic, Henkes has said the organization has had trouble raising funds for its operations. It has a budget of about $900,000 a year. 

The organization, which shut down it operations and pulled its archives offline for several weeks in December and January, turned to state lawmakers for help at the end of last year, but the path to a solution reached a halt as lawmakers deadlocked on what to do.

On March 23, WisconsinEye released a public statement saying that “access to the WisconsinEye archive may be curtailed to facilitate needed preparations for a possible permanent shutdown of the network.” It also said on its GoFundMe that “coverage of upcoming events is being reduced due to funding constraints.”

“There was much hope as leadership of both parties and houses energetically expressed support and gratitude for the mission and work of WisconsinEye,” Henkes wrote in his April message. “Bringing their good intentions across the finish line can still happen but it’s going to take an extraordinary or special session of the legislature, and the support of Governor Evers to come through for us. And by ‘us’ I mean all citizens who care about transparency and access, and who appreciate the network’s 18 years of exceptional public service.”

Gov. Tony Evers and lawmakers have talked previously about taking additional action in a special or extraordinary session this year, but those discussions have been centered around property tax relief and school funding, not WisconsinEye. It’s unclear whether additional issues could become wrapped up in those negotiations, though one Republican leader previously said a bill would focus on taxes and wouldn’t be a “mini budget.” 

There were two legislative efforts to address the crisis at WisconsinEye leading up to the final regular floor session this year.

A bipartisan Assembly bill would have placed $10 million, which had already been set aside in the form of matching funds for WisconsinEye, in a trust fund to accrue interest that the nonprofit would then be able to use for its operational costs, without the requirement that it match those funds. WisconsinEye still would have needed to raise a few hundred thousand dollars each year for its operations. 

The Wisconsin Senate passed a separate bill, which was amended to provide some stopgap funding for WisconsinEye and would have opened up the possibility of replacing WisconsinEye with another streaming service, launching a “request for proposals” (RFP) — or a bidding process for the job of livestreaming government proceedings. 

Neither body took up the other body’s proposal.

Other states have also navigated conflict over livestreaming government proceedings, including disagreements over funding, what is shown and how it is shown, according to a 2016 Stateline report. There are two legislative chambers in the U.S. that don’t livestream floor proceedings: the North Carolina Senate and the Missouri Senate. The latter has been debating allowing video livestreaming.

It’s unclear whether there is enough of an appetite from Wisconsin lawmakers for further action this year to ensure continued streaming into the future. The state Legislature finished its regular session business this year in March, meaning that action from lawmakers will be limited for the remainder of the year as many turn their attention to running for reelection.

Sen. Mark Spreitzer (D-Beloit), who voted for the state Senate proposal, told the Wisconsin Examiner in an interview that he is open to exploring a long-term solution over the next nine months. 

“We’re not back in session till 2027 and so the opportunity really to implement the results of an RFP wouldn’t really be there, and so I have no objection to spending the next nine months exploring, what might be out there to provide this service through an RFP,” Spreitzer said, “The real question… is what are we doing between now and next January? Are we providing some funding to keep WisconsinEye going?”

Spreitzer voted for the Senate proposal after amendments addressed some of his key concerns including providing stopgap funding to WisconsinEye to get it through the next year and the inclusion of some accountability measures. He said the sense of urgency to come to a solution faded after the session came to an end.

“I mean to be really blunt there was a sense that perhaps the only reason that they got stopgap funding for the month of February was that [Assembly] Speaker [Robin] Vos wanted his farewell address to be on WisconsinEye,” Spreitzer said. “I think once the legislators, who want their own speeches to be televised aren’t in session anymore, even though there are other government meetings, I think the urgency does fade, which is a problem.”

Assembly Speaker Robin Vos (R-Rochester), who is retiring at the end of his term, said at a WisPolitics event last month that he prefers having an independent organization responsible and that he thinks the Assembly proposal is the better option. 

“The idea that we’re going to go out to bid for a money-losing proposition that requires you to cover every hearing for free… doesn’t seem to be one that’s workable,” Vos said. “I don’t think that’s going to happen, but I don’t know.”

The bill’s lead author Sen. Julian Bradley (R-New Berlin) did not respond to requests for an interview. Spreitzer noted that Bradley has said he is open to providing state funding, but it would be open to those submitting proposals to speak to that. 

Senate Majority Leader Devin LeMahieu (R-Oostburg), who is also retiring at the end of his term, also did not respond to a request for comment. 

Vos said that while he hopes WisconsinEye will “survive” and “make it to the next budget cycle,” after that, “frankly, I’m gone” next session. 

Spreitzer said there should be some urgency attached to the recent update provided on March 23 from WisconsinEye. He said maintaining access to the archives is important, even when there are fewer legislative meetings going on to be livestreamed. 

“People don’t just want to watch meetings live. They want to be able to go back and see what happens,” Spreitzer said. “There’s an election coming up, and voters want to see what their elected officials were actually saying and doing during the session, and to not be able to go back and do that and have that accountability, I think would be a huge loss.”

In February, the Joint Committee on Legislative Organization voted to provide $50,000 to WisconsinEye to resume coverage, but the organization hasn’t received additional funds in the following months despite saying that it needed them. 

Spreitzer said he would support providing a “minimal monthly amount” to WisconsinEye to keep operations going until at least 2027, whether that has to be done through committee action or through a special session as suggested by WisEye. The Senate bill would have set aside over $580,000 and, if approved by JFC, the money would be paid out to WisconsinEye in monthly payments of about $48,000.

“That’s, you know, obviously up to Republican leadership,” Spreitzer added.

Spreitzer said taking the time to think through the long-term solutions is important, especially with a number of concerns about WisconsinEye and how it has navigated its advocacy efforts. He noted that the organization appears incapable of doing the fundraising that it has done in the past. 

“I did not feel like they were as up front or direct in communicating about that as they should have been, particularly with the Legislature,” Spreitzer said, adding that he received no direct communication and only saw press releases and messages posted to WisconsinEye’s website. “I just found that really inappropriate. We’d go on their website and we’d see — “if we don’t get money by this date we’re going to turn the archives off,” then they did turn the archives off. It felt more like extortion than somebody actually coming forward and saying, ‘Here’s our business model, here’s what’s not working, please help us.’ I just am not a big fan of handing a check to somebody that acts that way, at least not without accountability measures to make sure that doesn’t happen in the future.”

Ahead of the temporary shutdown in December and January, WisconsinEye said it had raised no funds for the year. It then launched a GoFundMe for small-dollar donations, and as of April 13, the nonprofit’s GoFundMe has raised over $94,000. The amount is less than half of WisEye’s $250,000 goal, which would cover three months of its operating budget.

The organization has said that coupled with a “solid state commitment” that raising the additional funds for its operating budget would be achievable, and donors view that approach with “confidence.” 

While he wants to see a short-term solution to continue access, Spreitzer said he thinks the conversation about a long-term solution should not be led by LeMahieu or Vos. 

“Speaker Vos and Majority Leader LeMahieu are not going to be the two people in charge next session,” Spreitzer said, adding they have been “running point” on the issue and were incapable of finding an agreement. “We should let them provide some gap funding to get us to next year, but I don’t see any reason why they should be part of a long-term conversation here when they’re not going to be here next year.”

Democratic Gov. Tony Evers, who would need to sign off on any legislation, is also on his way out of office at the end of his term. 

Spreitzer said he thought his bill was a good starting point for the conversation, but he didn’t know whether he would pursue creating a state-run public affairs network next year. Democrats are putting their efforts towards winning the Senate majority, which would put them in a better position to shape legislation.

“That’s a conversation we would all need to have as Democrats if we’re in the majority again — whether you do something fully public, or you do something that is more similar to the Assembly bill this session [and] WisconsinEye makes some changes to its board and how it operates in order to get public money,” Spreitzer said.

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Some anti-abortion state lawmakers are pushing to revise the definition of “abortion” so abortion bans don’t apply to cases in which the death of an “unborn child” is the result of medical care provided to the pregnant woman.

In the four years since the U.S. Supreme Court allowed states to ban abortion, stories continue to emerge of women with doomed pregnancies who developed life-threatening infections, had to travel to another state, or even died because doctors were afraid to provide what was once considered standard pregnancy-loss care.

Thirteen states have abortion bans, and all of them include a medical exception that allows abortions to protect the life of the pregnant woman. Some, but not all, of the bans also have exceptions to protect the health of the woman.

But patients and providers have argued in lawsuits challenging the bans that such exceptions are too ill defined to give doctors and hospitals the confidence to provide timely care. As a result, they say, providers end up denying care until the woman’s condition deteriorates to a point where the exceptions definitely apply, jeopardizing her health and future fertility.

Last year, states including Texas, Kentucky and Tennessee enacted laws designed to provide additional clarity. Confusion persists in those states and others, however, and research has linked abortion restrictions to higher rates of maternal death and injury.

The latest measures, crafted and promoted by national anti-abortion groups, would redefine “abortion” as the intentional ending of the life of the “unborn child.” Supporters say they would clear the way for doctors to manage miscarriages, ectopic pregnancies and other pregnancy-related emergencies.

“No one wants a physician to hesitate or pause and further endanger the life of the mother,” said Ingrid Duran, director of state legislation for the National Right to Life Committee, which has advocated for all of the measures, in a written statement. “This is why providing clearer language in defining terms can be beneficial.”

But reproductive rights advocates and many OB-GYNs say the real purpose of the bills is to fortify abortion bans that are broadly unpopular, even in states with full bans, and under legal challenge in multiple states. They argue the new measures are still too vague because they hang on the intentions of individual physicians, and many of the same procedures and medicines used in abortions are used to treat miscarriages.

They also say the language in the bills could grant embryos legal rights, thereby making some fertility treatments illegal.

“If you’re trying to define what is and is not an abortion, and you’re creating really specific, narrow guidelines, it could really unintentionally classify some pregnancy-related procedures as abortion care, and therefore within the law not medically necessary,” said Elias Schmidt, state legislative counsel for the Center for Reproductive Rights, an advocacy group.

South Dakota is first

In March, South Dakota became the first state to enact such a law. Its measure states that the state’s abortion ban only applies to “the intentional termination of the life of a human being in the uterus,” and not to medical treatment that results in “the accidental or unintentional death of the unborn child,” treatment to resolve a miscarriage or ectopic pregnancy, “the removal from the uterus of a deceased unborn child,” or a medical procedure that aims to save the fetus.

To the concern of fertility-treatment advocates, the law also defines “human being” as “an individual living member of the species of Homo sapiens, including the unborn human being during the entire embryonic and fetal ages from fertilization to full gestation.”

A similar bill introduced in Missouri defines abortion as “the act of using or prescribing any instrument, device, medicine, drug, or any other means or substance with the intent to destroy the life of an embryo or fetus in his or her mother’s womb.” It explicitly exempts miscarriage management and treatment for ectopic pregnancies from the definition.

And a bill in Utah, where abortion is still legal up to 18 weeks’ gestation, would regulate how an abortion procedure is recorded in a patient’s chart, distinguishing between an elective abortion and a medically indicated abortion. It defines the latter as an abortion “to remove a deceased fetus,” resolve an ectopic pregnancy, or to avert the death or “serious physical risk of substantial impairment of a major bodily function of a woman.”

Wisconsin’s legislature recently voted not to advance a similar bill this past legislative session.

Blame for the confusion

Anti-abortion groups blame doctors and abortion-rights advocates for creating the confusion around the medical exceptions in abortion bans, insisting it is clear what is a medically indicated abortion and what is purely elective.

“The fact that we’re in a place now that states actually have to define (abortion) is a result of my field, particularly (the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists) not clarifying it,” said Dr. Susan Bane, vice chair of the board of the American Association of Pro-Life Obstetricians and Gynecologists, which is made up of about 7,500 physicians and other medical professionals who oppose abortion.

The organization has launched a medical education and messaging campaign arguing that abortion bans do not prevent necessary health care.

According to Bane, the main difference between an induced abortion and medically indicated termination is that in the first case, “you want a dead baby at the end of whatever you do.”

The author of the South Dakota law, Republican state Rep. Leslie Heinemann, said he sponsored the measure to quell some of the criticism that the medical exceptions in his state’s ban were ill defined. He admitted he underestimated how difficult it would be to codify in law when care for a miscarriage is necessary.

“Even the medical community had trouble with helping define some of the issues,” he said.

The version of the bill that became law names only a few conditions and leaves the rest up to the discretion of physicians, who must exercise “appropriate and reasonable medical judgment that performance of an abortion is necessary to preserve the life of the pregnant female” to avoid felony charges.

Heinemann insisted his measure would not restrict fertility treatments or birth control. But reproductive health and legal experts say that by defining the beginning of human life as “the entire embryonic and fetal ages from fertilization to full gestation,” it could have that effect.

“Embedding personhood language into state laws does really bring up concern around contraceptive access and IVF access,” said Kimya Forouzan, principal state policy adviser for the Guttmacher Institute, a think tank that supports abortion rights.

“As personhood provisions grow in the state code, it brings up the question: At what point are we granting the legal rights of a person and placing those rights above the individual themselves?”

Dr. Amy Kelley, an OB-GYN in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, who was the chair of the South Dakota chapter of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists from 2023 to 2025, said lawmakers ignored her and other doctors’ concerns that the amended abortion ban is still too vague.

“The whole point of medicine is to prevent people from becoming on the brink of death, right? So are they expecting us to wait until that?” Kelley said. “It’s still not very clear, and the definition for miscarriage and ectopic is also not the one we wanted. It’s just not helpful.”

Kelley said that since her state enacted an abortion ban, she often waits longer to terminate a pregnancy for medical reasons, and will sometimes send patients out of state for care. She noted that the new law doesn’t explain what level of risk to the pregnant woman justifies terminating a pregnancy.

“They want to say elective abortions are not allowed. But what do they consider elective?” she said. “Let’s say they have a heart condition and their risk of dying in pregnancy is 40%. Is that an elective abortion because their risk is not 100%?”

Stateline reporter Sofia Resnick can be reached at sresnick@stateline.org

Sen. Howard Marklein (R-Spring Green) announced his reelection bid on Monday — seeking a fourth term in the state Senate as other longtime Republicans are opting out of running.

Marklein was first elected to the state Senate in 2014 after serving two terms in the Assembly. He last won reelection in 2022 with 60% of the vote. This will be his first time running for reelection to the redrawn Senate District 17 under new voting maps adopted in 2024. 

“I am running again to keep investing in our shared priorities, protect Wisconsin’s checkbook, continue working across the aisle to solve problems, and move Wisconsin forward,” Marklein said in a statement. “We have made a lot of progress, but there is more work to do.” 

The district includes Crawford, Grant, Green, Iowa and LaFayette counties as well as the southwestern corner of Dane County. According to an analysis by John Johnson, a research fellow at Marquette University, the district leaned Democratic by 1 percentage point in the 2024 presidential election and by over 4 percentage points in the 2024 U.S. Senate race.

Marklein’s decision to run again could help Republicans defend their majority in the state Senate, since his incumbency gives him an advantage, especially as other Republicans, including leaders and longtime incumbents in critical seats opt out of seeking another term. 

Republicans currently hold an 18-15 majority in the state Senate, meaning they can only afford to lose one seat as they struggle to hold control of the chamber.  The GOP has held the Senate majority since 2011.

The retirements of Sen. Van Wanggaard (R-Racine) and Sen. Rob Hutton (R-Brookfield) could diminish  Republicans’ chances of holding the Senate majority as the party loses the advantage of incumbency in two key districts. 

Senate Majority Leader Devin LeMahieu (R-Oostburg) and Assembly Speaker Robin Vos (R-Rochester) are leaving at the end of their terms.

Last week, Rep. Rob Brooks (R-Saukville), who has served in the Assembly since 2015, and Rep. Jerry O’Connor (R-Fond du Lac), first elected in 2022, both announced they won’t seek reelection this fall.  

“While I am stepping away from office, I still care deeply about the future of Wisconsin,” Brooks said in a statement. “Strong leadership in Madison matters, and it is important that we continue to elect people who understand our communities and are willing to stand up for them.” 

Other announced retirements include Sen. Steve Nass (R-Whitewater), Rep. Kevin Petersen (R-Waupaca), Rep. Dave Murphy (R-Hortonville) and Rep. Rick Gundrum (R-Slinger).

Marklein is the co-chair of the powerful Joint Finance Committee, a position that has given him a hand in writing Wisconsin’s two-year state budget for the last three sessions, deciding which state programs receive funding. He pointed to his work on the committee in his statement, saying it has given him a “a front-row seat in shaping Wisconsin’s budget and priorities.” 

“I have always used that position to ensure that our communities are well represented when decisions about state spending are made,” Marklein said. “I am proud to have led three successful bipartisan state budgets that have made historic investments in our K-12 schools, local governments, and infrastructure, strengthened our hospitals and healthcare system, and returned billions of dollars to taxpayers through tax relief for the middle-class and retirees. We accomplished this all while putting Wisconsin in one of the strongest fiscal positions in the country, boasting record surpluses and continuing to pay off debt and invest in the rainy day fund.” 

Marklein could face one of three Democrats, who are competing in a primary: Rep. Jenna Jacobson, who has the backing of the State Senate Democratic Campaign Committee, Corrine Hendrickson, a child care advocate and Lisa White of Potosi, a small business owner.

While he didn’t launch his campaign until Monday, Marklein had been fundraising and reported in January that he raised $194,137 during the most recent six-month period, a number that tops what any of the Democratic candidates raised.

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A legal brief filed late last week seeks to have a Dane County judge declare that an 1897 law banning the practice of fusion voting is unconstitutional because it restricts the rights to a “free government,” equal protection and freedom of speech through a law that was passed to explicitly create a partisan electoral advantage. 

The motion was filed on Friday in a lawsuit brought last year by United Wisconsin, a nascent centrist political party hoping to offer voters an alternative to the “duopoly” of the Democratic and Republican parties. The group is represented by the voting rights focused firm Law Forward. 

Fusion voting is a practice through which multiple political parties can nominate the same candidate to the ticket. Under the system, a minor party such as United could choose to nominate its own candidate, but more often the party would endorse one of the major party candidates. Voters would be able to cast their votes for the same preferred candidate under either party line. 

At a conference on fusion voting hosted at UW-Madison last year, political scientists and proponents of the system said that in theory it can give minor parties more influence. A third party candidate under the current system is unlikely to win, but a minor party’s policy preferences are harder to ignore if the party has just enough sway to swing an election result in either direction.

The brief describes a hypothetical congressional race in which United cross-endorses the Democratic candidate, given the name Olson. After the hypothetical votes are counted, the Republican candidate has earned 48.2% of the vote on the Republican ticket while Olson has earned 45.9% of the vote on the Democratic ticket and 4.9% on the United line. When added together, this gives Olson the win with 50.8% of the total vote. 

In Wisconsin, where elections are often decided by single digit margins, this could result in meaningful considerations of the desires of the minor party voters — rather than the current system under which third party candidates, such as Ralph Nader in the 2000 presidential election, are seen as spoilers who can pull enough support away from the closest ideological major party candidate to help the other side win. 

“That is fusion voting in action. United Wisconsin will claim, with merit, to have helped her over the finish line,” the brief states. “No doubt Olson will be more attentive to her ‘home’ party, but if she’s a competent politician, she won’t ignore the priorities of the moderates and centrists in the United Wisconsin Party. If she does, United Wisconsin, and its key bloc of voters, might cross-nominate her opponent in the next election.”

Fusion voting is often considered alongside ideas such as ranked choice voting and multi-member congressional districts as a reform proposal that could help prevent the country from sliding into an authoritarian government. 

“Fusion offers the opportunity to create meaningful new political identities,” the legal brief states. “It allows voters of all ideological stripes to vote for their values without having to support a rival or opposing party with a mostly intolerable program.”

In the 19th century, fusion voting was used across the country. The practice was phased out in most of the country but exists currently in New York and Connecticut. The brief, which includes as many examples from history and political science as it does legal citations, states that Wisconsin’s fusion voting ban was enacted by the Republican Party in 1897 as it surged to become the state’s dominant political force in a direct effort to limit the ability of the Democratic Party and other minor parties to win. 

“History shows the ban was enacted as a form of invidious political discrimination,” the brief states.

The lawsuit argues the state has no direct interest in maintaining the power of the Democratic and Republican parties, so the law must be put under “strict scrutiny” for fundamentally restricting the speech of Wisconsinites. 

“When political parties cannot nominate their candidates of choice, they cannot effectively organize, campaign, advance priorities, or exercise political power,” the brief states. “They are relegated for perpetuity to a spoiler role, whereby any electoral effort they make is not only futile in advancing their own candidate and platform, but also seriously risks helping their least-favored major-party candidate win the race and get to govern. While the ban still allows political parties to nominate most candidates, it prohibits them from nominating the only candidates who can win; and while it allows political parties some degree of speech, it constrains their speech in the context for which political parties exist — the ballot.”

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