Fox Lake Correctional Institution was the site of a meeting the Wisconsin Department of Corrections held this week with friends and family of incarcerated people. (Wisconsin Department of Corrections photo)

The Wisconsin Department of Corrections held its first friends and family forum at Fox Lake Correctional Institution on Wednesday. The event was closed to the press, but multiple attendees shared their reactions with the Examiner. 

DOC Secretary Jared Hoy and much of the department’s leadership team met with over 40 friends and family members, according to a DOC press release. 

“Family and friends play a huge role in determining whether an individual succeeds in the community,” Hoy said. “With DOC’s mission of safety and rehabilitation, we need to partner with families and friends throughout the process. Their support is crucial to success with rehabilitation.”

Rebecca Aubart, executive director of the prison reform advocacy group Ladies of SCI, said the event gave her hope. 

“We have been a lost, hopeless group of people without a voice for decades,” Aubart said. “And they acknowledged us, they were respectful and kind and compassionate to us. And they gave us hope. The dangerous thing about this is, if you crush our hope, we are going to be devastated and come in full force with whatever we could possibly do to make sure that everybody knows they did not follow through on anything.” 

The prison system has faced scrutiny amid deaths of incarcerated people, lockdowns at state prisons and criminal charges against the former Waupun Correctional Institution warden and members of his staff. In November, the DOC signed a contract with a management and consulting firm for a third-party review. 

People who attended the event broke into small groups to talk about topics such as strengthening families, treatment and health care, classification and life in DOC facilities, complaint systems and reentry, the DOC’s statement said. DOC staff were there to listen and take note of suggestions. 

Amy Rolack said her husband is incarcerated at Fox Lake Correctional Institution. She said she told DOC staff at the forum that her husband was told it would be a year and a half before he would be seen for dental care. 

“I think that it was a really good meeting as far as who all attended it and who were all able to hear all of these loved ones talking about their experiences in each different facility,” Rolack said. 

Betty Ziehme described it as a successful first meeting. 

“I don’t think they were shocked by what they heard,” Ziehme said. “I think that they are aware that there’s issues, and I think they’re looking for input, and that they want to make some corrections. And I have to be hopeful.”

People who attended the event “made valuable suggestions” regarding visiting experiences and helping support families new to the Department of Corrections, Hoy said, according to DOC. 

In an interview with the Examiner, Aubart mentioned the idea of having family orientations. She also pointed to neighboring Minnesota, where the Office of the Ombudsperson for Corrections (OBFC) — a prison oversight body — collaborated with the Minnesota Department of Corrections on a pilot project intended to strengthen loved ones’ support of incarcerated people.

The project included virtual meetings for family and friends of incarcerated people for two prisons. One of the prisons was an intake facility where most incarcerated people would only stay a few months before being transferred to a different facility. In that group, OBFC presented on topics families identified as being helpful, and afterward, staff members gave updates related to the facility and participants asked questions. 

An OBFC report found the meetings were a helpful resource for families and facility staff developed a better understanding of difficulties experienced by families navigating the correctional system.

Prior to the pilot project, a 2021 Minnesota OBFC report found that families “face a wide array of barriers in supporting and staying connected with their loved one while they are incarcerated.” 

After the small groups, Hoy answered some of the questions friends and family had submitted in advance. The answers to additional questions will be available on the DOC’s friends and family webpage in the coming days.

Hoy said it is important for the department to consider the opinions, ideas and feelings of people directly impacted by their work. 

Attendance at forums is limited to friends and family members of people who are currently incarcerated or on active community supervision, a DOC webpage says. The DOC’s website includes an email where questions could be submitted virtually. 

The forum was “the first in a series of efforts designed to continue improving communication” between the department and the loved ones of incarcerated people and people on supervision, according to DOC. 

The department stated that it will continue to receive feedback from attendees for potential forums in the future or other events. Hoy said the department wants to know what family and friends want from events like this. 

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State Superintendent Jill Underly said in a statement about the response that Wisconsin schools need support, not threatened cuts to federal funding. Underly at a rally for 2025 Public Schools Week. (Photo by Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner)

The Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction is resisting the Trump administration’s threat that it certify that local school districts put an end to diversity, equity and inclusion programs or lose federal funding.

State Superintendent Jill Underly said in a statement about the response that Wisconsin schools need support, not threatened cuts to federal funding.

“We cannot stand by while the current administration threatens our schools with unnecessary and potentially unlawful mandates based on political beliefs,” Underly said. “Our responsibility is to ensure Wisconsin students receive the best education possible, and that means allowing schools to make local decisions based on what is best for their kids and their communities.”

The federal directive comes as a part of the Trump administration’s crack-down on diversity, equity and inclusion efforts across the country and in K-12 as well as higher education. 

Wisconsin joins several states, most led by Democrats, that are rejecting the demands from the federal government. 

In the letter sent to state agencies last week, the Department of Education told state education departments that they needed to certify their compliance with Title VI of the Civil Rights Act and Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard — the landmark Supreme Court decision that found consideration of race in higher education admissions violate the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. 

Acting Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights Craig Trainor said in a statement that the request includes ensuring that schools aren’t “using DEI programs to discriminate against one group of Americans to favor another based on identity characteristics in clear violation of Title VI.” Trainor said the government has seen “too many schools flout or outright violate these obligations.” The federal agency gave state agencies 10 days to respond and warned that federal funding could be at risk if there was continued use of “illegal DEI.” 

In a response letter to the U.S. Department of Education, DPI said it has already provided the federal agency with compliance assurances required by federal law, including those related to nondiscrimination. It said that it was unclear why the federal agency is requesting another certification and noted that the agency itself had said that recent guidance “does not have the force and effect of law and does not bind the public or create new legal standards.” 

“At best, the [directive] appears to be redundant. At worst, the [directive] appears to be unauthorized, unlawful and unconstitutionally vague,” Wisconsin DPI General Counsel Benjamin Jones wrote in the letter. “We are deeply concerned that the [request] allows the federal bureaucracy to threaten the loss of crucial education funding in order to dictate local education agency policies and decisions on what is best for kids.” 

The state agency asked the federal agency to answer a series of questions before it complies with the request, including the specific purpose of the certification, whether the requested certification seeks to enforce any requirement beyond what is required by federal law and regulation and what legal authority the Education Department is using to make the request a condition of federal aid.

DPI said that while it waits for a response, it will not collect certifications from local education agencies and will not send the requested certification to the U.S. Department of Education.

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Mickey Rottinghaus, 70, of Iowa, told a crowd of protesters she's afraid of her adult son losing Medicaid benefits. The demonstrators, organized by the national advocacy group Fair Share America, protested congressional Republicans' proposed spending cuts outside the U.S. Capitol on Thursday, April 10, 2025. (Photo by Ashley Murray/States Newsroom)

WASHINGTON —  Hundreds demonstrated outside the U.S. Capitol Thursday, urging congressional Republicans to rethink cutting programs vital to millions of Americans as a way to help extend President Donald Trump’s 2017 tax cuts.

The previously scheduled rally, organized by the advocacy coalition Fair Share America, occurred less than an hour after House Republicans, by a narrow margin, adopted a budget resolution that paves the way for negotiations on deep spending cuts as Congress works on an extension of the 2017 tax law.

The advocates, who flew and bused in from 30 states to rally and meet with lawmakers on Capitol Hill, say the cuts would be devastating for low-income Americans who rely on government health care, nutrition and early education programs, among other benefits.

A state-by-state report from Democrats last month projected up to 25 million across the country could lose access to Medicaid, a health program that covers medical costs for some low-income people as well as nursing home care, if Republicans successfully pass their proposed cuts to make room in the budget for a roughly $4.5 trillion tax cut extension.

“This is personal to so many of us, and many of you are here from all over the country, Utah, Iowa, Florida, Georgia, Wisconsin, Michigan,” Fair Share America Executive Director Kristen Crowell told the crowd. “This is a national movement where we are the people we’ve been waiting for.”

Lawmakers “need to look us in the eye while they do harm,” Crowell said.

Medicaid ‘was my lifeline’

Cadon Sagendorf of Salt Lake City, Utah, told his story of relying on Medicaid while growing up in the foster care system. Foster youth are automatically eligible for the federally funded health care program administered by the states.

“I was placed into the foster care system at birth and spent 10 days in the NICU withdrawing from meth, marijuana, heroin and cocaine. I was then later adopted seven months later, but at the age of 15, my adoption failed and I was placed back in the foster care system,” said Sagendorf, who is now 23 and studying psychology at the University of Utah.

“Medicaid was not just a policy, it was my lifeline,” Sagendorf said.

In most cases, foster youth who age out of the system at 18 can remain on Medicaid until age 26. Over 100,000 former foster youth received Medicaid in 2023, according to the Government Accountability Office.

Mickey Rottinghaus, 70, of Center Point, Iowa, said she’s scared that her adult son Tucker could lose his Medicaid benefits if Congress follows through with deep spending cuts.

The program pays for a nurse and home health aide to assist him every morning, seven days a week.

Tucker, 50, was left paralyzed after being shot with a .22 caliber handgun at a friend’s apartment in 1994.

“Our family was changed in a matter of moments,” Rottinghaus told the crowd.

For three decades she’s been arranging his care, patching together a daily schedule of nurses paid for by Medicaid, supplementing with care paid for out of pocket and a circle of friends who volunteer to help.

For the past two years, she’s been staying with her son in Waterloo, Iowa, to feed him in the afternoon and get him into bed at night.

“I know that if he didn’t have Medicaid, he wouldn’t be able to have a nurse and a home health aide in the morning,” she told States Newsroom in an interview following her speech.

The ‘hell, no’ Congress

Several House and Senate Democrats spoke to the demonstrators, who wielded signs bearing the messages “Tax the Rich” and “Fair Taxes Now.”

Sen. Jeff Merkley of Oregon borrowed a sign from the crowd that read “Dangerous Oligarchs Grab Everything,” referring to billionaire White House adviser Elon Musk’s DOGE cost-cutting agenda.

“Well, I’ll tell ya, I’m a member of the ‘hell, no’ Congress. Are you a member?” he yelled to the crowd.

“When Republicans say, ‘We are going to slash Medicaid,’ we say, ‘Hell no,’” he said, prompting the crowd to say it with him.

Sen. Raphael Warnock of Georgia said “a budget is not just a fiscal document, it’s a moral document.”

“Show me your budget and I’ll show you who you think matters and who you think is dispensable. Show me your budget and I’ll show you what you think about children, what you think about workers, what you think made America great. And if this budget that they are trying to pass were an EKG, it would suggest that the Congress has a heart problem and is in need of moral surgery,” Warnock said.

On the hunt for spending cuts

House and Senate Republican leaders announced Thursday they agreed to find $1.5 trillion in spending cuts over the next decade. GOP House lawmakers have been instructed to find $880 billion in cuts to programs under the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, which holds jurisdiction over Medicaid, among other areas.

The budget instructions that will guide the coming months of negotiations also direct the House Committee on Education and Workforce to find $330 billion in cuts, and the Agriculture Committee, which has jurisdiction over government food programs, including SNAP, to find $230 billion in cuts.

House Speaker Mike Johnson hailed the passage of the budget blueprint Thursday morning as “a big victory” and “a big day for us.”

Johnson, a Louisiana Republican, maintains that letting the 2017 tax cuts expire would allow “the largest tax increase in U.S. history all at once.”

“We have a responsibility to get our country back on a sound fiscal trajectory and also make sure that we ensure and protect those essential programs,” he said.

Prisoners look out of their cell as Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem tours the Terrorist Confinement Center, or CECOT, on March 26, 2025 in Tecoluca, El Salvador. (Photo by Alex Brandon-Pool/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Supreme Court Thursday ruled the Trump administration must “facilitate” the return of a Maryland man to the United States after he was wrongly deported to a notorious mega-prison in El Salvador, but stopped short of requiring his return.

The high court said the Trump administration must try to bring back Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, of Beltsville, who was deported due to an “administrative error” admitted by the Trump administration.

The high court did not give the administration a date by which to return Abrego Garcia, saying the deadline in a District of Columbia court order has expired. The Supreme Court said the district court also needs to clarify what it meant by saying the administration must “effectuate” the return of Abrego Garcia and the scope of that term is “unclear” and may exceed the district court’s authority.

The Trump administration has repeatedly rejected retrieving Abrego Garcia from prison.  President Donald Trump and other high-ranking officials have alleged Abrego Garcia is a MS-13 gang member, but produced no evidence and have defended his deportation, despite admitting his removal was a mistake.  

“We don’t want them back,” Trump said April 8, referencing the case. “Can you imagine, you spend all of that time, energy and money on getting them out, and then you have a judge that sits there… (saying), he said, ‘No, bring him back.’”

It’s unclear how long Abrego Garcia will remain in the prison unless he is returned to the U.S., but El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele said based on the $6 million agreement between his country and the U.S., those men at the prison will remain there for at least a year.

Bukele is scheduled to meet with Trump at the White House Monday.

Effect on other prisoners

Thursday’s decision may have ramifications for the 238 Venezuelans who were deported to the same prison, Centro de Confinamiento del Terrorismo, or CECOT.

They were sent there under the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, a wartime law their attorneys say denied them due process because those subject to it were not able to challenge their removal in court.

The Supreme Court will allow, for now, the continued removal of Venezuelans under the Alien Enemies Act, but those subject to a presidential proclamation issued by Trump citing the Alien Enemies Act must be given notice of their removal under the wartime law and a court hearing. The court action also must be in the locations where they are incarcerated.

Arrested while driving son

The Abrego Garcia case garnered national attention when he was arrested by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement while driving his 5-year-old son home. Abrego Garcia was not charged with an offense, but was apprehended by ICE because his “status had changed.”

In 2019 Abrego Garcia was given a final order of removal, but an immigration judge granted him protection from removal to his home country because it was more “likely than not that he would be persecuted by gangs in El Salvador” if he was returned, according to court documents.

But on March 15 he was placed on one of three deportation flights to El Salvador.

The Trump administration has argued that Abrego Garcia is no longer in U.S. custody and therefore cannot be returned to the United States.

There is precedent from the U.S. government to return an immigrant accidentally deported, including U.S. citizens. Between fiscal year 2015 and fiscal year 2020, ICE accidentally deported 70 U.S. citizens who needed to be returned, according to a 2021 U.S. Government Accountability Office report.  

Voters cast their ballots at Fairmont Junior High in Boise during the Idaho primary on May 17, 2022. (Otto Kitsinger for Idaho Capital Sun)

The U.S. House passed a bill Thursday to require voters to provide proof of U.S. citizenship when registering to vote, approving a Republican priority over the objections of Democrats who said the bill would only create hurdles for eligible voters without actually improving fraud protection.

The 220-208 vote sent the measure to the U.S. Senate, where it faces an uphill road to overcome the chamber’s 60-vote requirement for most legislation. If enacted, the bill would require states, which are responsible for administering elections, to obtain from people registering to vote in federal elections documents that prove U.S. citizenship.

Acceptable documents under the act include any valid photo ID issued by the federal government, a state or tribe that shows the applicant’s place of birth was the United States, or a combination of a valid government-issued photo ID and another document proving citizenship such as a birth certificate or certificate of naturalization.

Four House Democrats – Jared Golden of Maine, Marie Gluesenkamp Perez of Washington, Ed Case of Hawaii and Henry Cuellar of Texas – joined all Republicans present to vote in favor of the bill.

Supporters of the bill say it is needed to keep immigrants in the country without legal status from voting.

It is already illegal for noncitizens to vote in federal elections, though some local governments allow noncitizen residents to vote in local elections.

GOP priority

By tackling fraudulent voting and targeting immigrants in the country illegally, the bill addresses two planks of the Republican platform under President Donald Trump. Trump has consistently positioned himself as a hardliner on immigration and continues to voice the debunked claim that fraud caused his 2020 election loss.

During floor debate this week, the bill’s sponsor, Texas Republican Chip Roy, said the measure, titled the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility, or SAVE, Act, responded to the message voters sent by electing Trump and Republican majorities in both chambers of Congress last year after inaction from Democratic President Joe Biden.

“Republicans are responding to an American people who are tired of the previous administration that was allowing illegals to come into our country, kill our citizens, vote in our elections, undermine our country,” Roy said. “And we are addressing their concerns and our colleagues on the other side of the aisle don’t want to address it.”

Hurdle for citizens

Democrats, though, said the measure was unnecessary to prevent the exceedingly rare cases of noncitizens voting in federal elections and would only make voting harder for citizens who are eligible, including married women who may have changed their name but have not updated their documents.

“I think the gentleman from Texas will be happy to learn that it already is the law that only American citizens can vote in federal elections,” Rep. Jim McGovern, a Massachusetts Democrat, said following Roy’s remarks. “Our problem with the SAVE Act is that it is an attempt to make it more difficult for women in this country, women who are U.S. citizens, to be able to vote.”

At a virtual press conference Thursday, Democratic secretaries of state – the office in most states responsible for elections administration – highlighted the difficulties it could create for eligible voters.

“Losing your driver’s license or birth certificate, letting your passport expire or even getting married and taking your partner’s last name could all prevent a voter from making their voice heard in free and fair elections if the SAVE Act passes,” Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold said. “Replacing just one of those documents – let alone multiple documents that would be needed to register – takes time and money that not every American has.

“Women who are citizens – who are eligible to vote – should not be stopped at the ballot box by (House Speaker) Mike Johnson and Donald Trump.”

Democratic Party of Wisconsin Chair Ben Wikler said he is not running for a fourth term on Thursday. Wikler speaks at a climate rally outside of Sen. Ron Johnson's Madison office on June 8, 2021. (Henry Redman | Wisconsin Examiner)

Democratic Party of Wisconsin Chair Ben Wikler, who is credited for rebuilding the state party over the last six years, announced Thursday that he will not run for another term in the leadership position, saying it is time for him to “pass the torch” and find a new way to contribute to the “fight.”

The announcement comes a little over a week after a crucial Wisconsin Supreme Court election where the party’s preferred candidate, Justice-elect Susan Crawford, prevailed over Waukesha Judge Brad Schimel, who had the backing of Republicans and billionaire Elon Musk. 

Wikler said that the party is in “extraordinarily strong shape” with a liberal majority on the state Supreme Court for at least the next two years and Democrats in the position to potentially win a both houses of the Legislature and retain the governor’s office in 2026. 

“Now is the right time for me to take a breath, and to find new ways to advance the fight for a country that works for working people, and one that honors every person’s fundamental freedom and dignity,” Wikler wrote in a letter. “When my third term as chair ends this June, I will be passing the torch.” 

Wikler said he would be taking some time to “figure out what’s next” and to spend time with his family. 

The prospect of Wikler stepping down was broached earlier this year as he ran for Democratic National Committee chair. But he lost the race to Ken Martin, who was serving at the time as the Minnesota DFL Party chair. 

Wikler, who grew up in Wisconsin, moved back to the state in 2018 and started volunteering on campaigns. He was elected to be chair in 2019 in a moment where Democrats hadn’t had consistent success in the state for many years, but had just elected Gov. Tony Evers, putting a Democrat in the governor’s mansion for the first time in eight years.

Under his leadership, Democrats reelected Evers in 2022 by a bigger margin of votes than his first term, clawed back seats in the state Legislature under new legislative maps and flipped control of the state Supreme Court. 

In his letter, Wikler noted that the statewide races the Democrats have lost have been “agonizingly close.” This includes former Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes’ loss by one percentage point to U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson in 2022 and former Vice President Kamala Harris’ loss in Wisconsin by less than 30,000 votes  to President Donald Trump last year.

Wikler also helped grow the state party’s fundraising efforts during his time at the helm, including raising more than $63 million during the 2024 election cycle — the most of any state party across the country. 

“This is a wrenching time for our country,” Wikler wrote in his announcement. “But in Wisconsin’s path over the last 15 years, we can see what we need to do to fight through it. It’s on all of us to find ways to contain the damage, look out for one another, and build the strength to end the destruction — and then rebuild. I’ll be looking for new ways to contribute to that vital work. As I do, I know the labor of building a great Democratic Party — the last line of defense of our battered but immeasurably valuable democracy — will continue. We will not let our country fall, and we will continue to write the story of Wisconsin’s resurrection as a bastion of progress.” 

Wisconsin Democrats acknowledged Wikler’s impact on the party after his announcement. 

Senate Minority Leader Dianne Hesselbein said in a statement that “nobody could have dreamed about the lasting, meaningful infrastructure he would go on to build at WisDems.” 

“Through innovation, grit, and a ton of hard work, he transformed our State Party into a national powerhouse – with the results to show for it,” Hesselbein said. 

During Wikler’s time in office, Wisconsin implemented new legislative maps that have given Democrats a chance to control the Senate and Assembly for the first time in 15 years. “While he won’t be at the helm in 2026 when we flip the Legislature, it will be because of Ben’s efforts that we are able to do so,” Hesselbein said.

New chair will be elected in June 

The next chair will be chosen at the state party’s convention in June in Wisconsin Dells and will lead the party through a number of crucial elections, including the 2026 gubernatorial election, another round of state legislative elections and another state Supreme Court race. Some Democrats are already throwing their hat into the ring or announcing that they’re considering a run. 

Devin Remiker, the former executive director of the Democratic Party of Wisconsin, quickly announced his campaign for the top position, saying that “now isn’t the time to hit pause or rebuild, it’s time to fight tooth and nail.” Remiker said in a statement that he is grateful for Wikler’s leadership and that he has learned from him and hopes to build on his legacy. 

“I will be ready on Day One to double down on our successes and make needed changes,” Remiker said. “I have the experience working with local party leaders and grassroots activists to provide the partnership they desperately need on the frontlines of this fight.”  

Remiker, a Two Rivers native, has worked for the state party since 2018, including as executive director and currently as a senior advisor. He previously managed western Wisconsin U.S. Rep. Ron Kind’s reelection campaign in 2016.

Democratic strategist Joe Zepecki, a Milwaukee native, said in a statement that in conversations about the party’s future he has heard that “Democrats have got to do better when it comes to how we communicate our message.” 

“We need more effective communicators, period. I’ve given long, serious thought to how we do that and up our game,” Zepecki said. He said he will spend the next week speaking with party members and leaders “about that vision to see if they’re ready to shake things up.” 

Zepecki founded his own company, Zepecki Communications, in 2016, and has worked on three presidential campaigns as well as statewide campaigns for governor and U.S. Senate.

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People demonstrate in support of federal workers outside the main campus of the Centers For Disease Control and Prevention on April 1, 2025, in Atlanta, Georgia. (Photo by Elijah Nouvelage/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — Fired federal probationary workers saw setbacks this week, as the U.S. Supreme Court and an appeals court dealt blows in two separate cases, leaving the newly hired or recently promoted employees hit by the administration’s mass firings once again in limbo.

In a case that affected up to 24,000 fired probationary employees across 17 federal agencies, the U.S. Appeals Court for the 4th Circuit on Wednesday blocked a lower court order requiring the government to rehire the workers.

A three-judge panel ruled 2-1 to stay the order, writing that the Trump administration is “likely to succeed in showing the district court lacked jurisdiction over Plaintiffs’ claims.”

Judge Allison Rushing, appointed by President Donald Trump in 2019, directed the order, with Judge James Wilkinson, a President Ronald Reagan appointee, concurring. Judge DeAndrea Benjamin, appointed by President Joe Biden in 2023, dissented.

The case centered on a lawsuit filed by the Democratic attorneys general for 19 states and the District of Columbia, who allege economic harm because the federal government did not provide legally required warning ahead of an influx of unemployed state residents.

Federal Judge James Bredar for the District of Maryland issued a preliminary injunction on April 2 requiring the government to rehire thousands of workers who either lived or reported to work only in the 19 plaintiff states and the District of Columbia while the case moved forward. They included:

• Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont and Wisconsin.

The affected agencies included:

• The departments of Agriculture, Commerce, Defense (civilian employees only), Education, Energy, Health and Human Services, Homeland Security, Housing and Urban Development, Interior, Labor, Transportation, Treasury and Veterans Affairs, as well as the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, Environmental Protection Agency, Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, General Services Administration, Office of Personnel Management, Small Business Administration and the U.S. Agency for International Development.

The case marked the first time the government provided the number of probationary employees fired at each agency.

Bredar required the figures from the government to show compliance with his mid-March emergency order that the agencies reinstate the workers. The documents showed that the majority of the employees were not recalled to active duty, but placed on administrative leave.

Supreme Court action

In the second case bearing on fired federal workers, the Supreme Court on Tuesday blocked a lower court order mandating the federal government reinstate the jobs of 16,000 fired probationary federal workers across six agencies.

The unsigned two-page order stated the nine nonprofits that brought the case do not have legal standing. The justices did not address the question at the center of the lawsuit: whether the firings were illegal.

The Trump administration had escalated the case to the Supreme Court’s emergency docket after the U.S. Appeals Court for the 9th Circuit denied the government’s request to block the agencies from rehiring the employees.

U.S. District Judge William Alsup for the Northern District of California extended his temporary emergency order on March 13, mandating the departments of Agriculture, Defense, Energy, Interior, Treasury and Veterans Affairs reinstate employees who were fired under a directive from the Office of Personnel Management as part of an agenda by President Donald Trump and adviser Elon Musk to slash the federal workforce.

As the case continues on the lower court track, lawyers for the American Federal of Government Employees, AFL-CIO faced the Trump administration in court Wednesday before Alsup, a Clinton appointee. Alsup ordered both to provide more information by the end of the day Friday, including a comprehensive list of those fired and statements about economic harms. 

The Lyndon Baines Johnson Department of Education Building pictured on Nov. 25, 2024. (Photo by Shauneen Miranda/States Newsroom) 

The U.S. Education Department has agreed to delay for nearly two weeks enforcement of a disputed directive seeking to ban diversity, equity and inclusion practices, according to a court filing Thursday in the case challenging the order.

The agreement between the department and the groups suing it over the order pauses enforcement until after April 24. According to the agreement, states and local education agencies until then cannot be investigated or asked to provide certification that they are not using DEI, a term for race- and gender-conscious practices, in admissions, programming, training, hiring or scholarships.

Education Department spokeswoman Madi Biedermann said the department and the groups reached the agreement Monday.

An April 3 letter from the department demanded states and districts provide certifications they were complying with the order within 10 days or risk losing federal funding. That letter followed a February missive introducing the order.

The National Education Association and the American Civil Liberties Union sued in New Hampshire federal court last month to block enforcement of the directive.

“This pause in enforcement provides immediate relief to schools across the country while the broader legal challenge continues,” the NEA said in a Thursday statement.

In a written statement, Biedermann said the extension was due to what the department saw as states’ efforts to comply with the order.

“The Department extended the certification requirement on Monday in response to states’ good-faith inquiries to ensure compliance,” Biedermann wrote. “Having voluntarily extended the deadline, commonsense would dictate the Department would not take enforcement action until the deadline had passed.”

Court battle

The groups asked the court to issue an emergency ruling to block enforcement of the department’s order while the case is ongoing.

The agreement effectively grants that request without a court order.

“No school district, state agency, or higher education institution will face investigation or penalties for failure to return the challenged certification that diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts do not exist within their curriculums,” the NEA said.

The underlying lawsuit remains ongoing.

The suit challenges the department’s authority to impose restrictions on state K-12 curriculum and says the order limits academic freedom and restricts educators’ ability to teach.

Trump and DEI

President Donald Trump campaigned against progressive cultural positions, including how race, gender and sexuality are handled in public schools.

In the early months of his second presidency, the entire executive branch has moved to restrict DEI initiatives and education policy, which has long been a battleground for such issues, has been a focal point.

The administration has used antidiscrimination requirements to pursue restrictions on DEI initiatives in education, arguing that DEI discriminates against white students.

DEI programs “discriminate against one group of Americans to favor another based on identity characteristics in clear violation of Title VI,” Craig Trainor, the Education Department’s acting head of civil rights, said in an April 3 statement.

U.S. Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., right, and Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, R-La., hold a press conference on the Republican budget resolution at the U.S. Capitol on April 10, 2025 in Washington, D.C. (Photo by Kayla Bartkowski/Getty Images)

This story was updated at 11:54 a.m. EDT.

WASHINGTON — U.S. House Republicans adopted a budget resolution Thursday, clearing the way for both chambers of Congress to write a bill extending 2017 tax cuts and bolstering funding for border security and defense, though the blueprint set vastly different targets for spending cuts.

The cliff-hanger 216-214 vote followed a tumultuous week on Capitol Hill. Far-right members of the GOP Conference said repeatedly they wouldn’t accept the outline, since it requires the House to write a bill that cuts spending by at least $1.5 trillion, while senators set themselves a floor of $4 billion in cuts.

Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., was forced to postpone a floor vote on the budget resolution on Wednesday evening. But Johnson was able to secure the votes needed after he and Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., announced Thursday morning that they were in agreement about meeting the higher threshold for spending cuts.

Johnson said both chambers of Congress “are committed to finding at least $1.5 trillion in savings for the American people, while also preserving our essential programs.”

“Many of us are going to aim much higher and find those savings because we believe they are there,” Johnson said. “We want to make the government more efficient, effective and leaner for the American people. And I think that will serve every American of every party. And we’re happy to do that.”

Despite the difference in reconciliation instructions, Thune said the Senate is “aligned with the House” when it comes to cutting spending over the next decade.

“The speaker has talked about $1.5 trillion,” Thune said. “We have a lot of United States senators who believe that is a minimum.”

Thune added he believes it’s time for Congress “to get the country on a more sustainable fiscal path and that entails us taking a hard scrub of our government and figuring out where we can find those savings.”

Democrats, and some centrist Republicans, have expressed deep concerns the House’s instructions require the Energy and Commerce Committee, which oversees Medicaid, to cut at least $880 billion.

The panel, which also oversees Medicare and other programs, could not recoup that level of spending without pulling hundreds of billions from Medicaid, the state-federal program for lower-income Americans and some people with disabilities.

The budget resolution has been endorsed by President Donald Trump, who’s repeatedly urged the House to adopt the measure. “Great News! “The Big, Beautiful Bill” is coming along really well. Republicans are working together nicely. Biggest Tax Cuts in USA History!!! Getting close. DJT,” Trump posted on social media Thursday morning prior to the vote.

Kentucky Rep. Thomas Massie and Indiana Rep. Victoria Spartz were the only members of the Republican Party to vote against approval.

“If you were trying to hasten financial collapse of our country and bribe voters to go along with it, the strategy wouldn’t look much different than what Congress is doing today,” Massie wrote on social media. “The big beautiful bill cuts taxes while keeping spending on an increasingly unsustainable trajectory.”

Spartz wrote in a social media post of her own that the reconciliation instructions “we voted on today are still setting us up for the largest deficit increase in the history of our Republic, & opening up a ‘pandora’s box’ by changing accounting rules to hide it.

“In good conscience, I couldn’t vote YES.”

Only a beginning

The House adopting the 68-page budget resolution only marks the start of the months-long journey of writing and voting on the reconciliation package.

Republicans hope to use that bill to permanently extend the 2017 tax law, increase spending on border security and defense by hundreds of billions of dollars and rework energy policy.

The budget resolution includes different budget targets for many of those goals, and for raising the debt limit. It calls on the House to increase the country’s borrowing authority by $4 trillion, while the Senate’s instructions say that chamber would lift the debt ceiling by up to $5 trillion.

Writing the various elements of the reconciliation package will fall to 11 committee chairs in the House and 10 committee leaders in the Senate, as well as Johnson, Thune and a lot of staffers.

In the House, the Agriculture Committee needs to slice at least $230 billion; Education and Workforce must reduce spending by a minimum of $330 billion; Energy and Commerce needs to cut no less than $880 billion; Financial Services must find at least $1 billion in savings; Natural Resources has a minimum of $1 billion; Oversight and Government Reform has a floor of $50 billion; and the Transportation Committee needs to reduce deficits by $10 billion or more.

Four Senate committees — Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry; Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs; Energy and Natural Resources; and Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, or HELP — must each find at least $1 billion in spending cuts over the 10-year budget window.

House committees that can increase the federal deficit include the Armed Services Committee with a cap of $100 billion in new spending, Homeland Security with a $90 billion ceiling for new funding for programs it oversees, Judiciary with a maximum of $110 billion and Ways and Means, which can increase deficits up to $4.5 trillion for tax cuts.

Senate committees also got instructions for increasing the deficit, which will allow them to spend up to the dollar amount outlined in the budget resolution. Those committees include Armed Services at $150 billion; Commerce, Science and Transportation with $20 billion; Environment and Public Works at $1 billion; Finance with $1.5 trillion in new deficits, likely for tax cuts; Homeland Security at $175 billion and Judiciary with $175 billion.

The back story

If the process to reach agreement on a final reconciliation package is anything like the path to adopting the budget resolution, it will be long, winding and filled with drama.

The Senate voted for a completely different budget resolution in February that would have set up Congress to enact Republicans’ agenda in two reconciliation bills instead of one.

Budget Chairman Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., referred to the reconciliation instructions in that budget proposal as “Plan B.”

That tax-and-spending blueprint would have had lawmakers first write a bill increasing funding for border security and defense, and rewriting energy policy, before debating another bill later in the year to extend the 2017 tax law and cut federal spending.

The House voted about a week later to approve its original budget resolution, but not without a bit of theatrics.

Johnson didn’t originally have the votes and opted to recess the chamber before calling lawmakers back about 15 minutes later to approve that version of the budget resolution.

The Senate made changes to its reconciliation instructions in the House-approved budget resolution, before voting to send it back across the Capitol for their colleagues to vote on final approval, which they did Thursday.

Politically difficult votes ahead

Each time the Senate voted on a budget resolution it undertook a marathon amendment voting session, known as a vote-a-rama, where lawmakers stay on the floor overnight to debate various aspects of the outline.

Senators will need to undertake one more of those when they debate the actual reconciliation package later this year, though the stakes will be much higher.

The budget resolution is a blueprint for how Congress wants to shape tax and spending policy during the 10-year budget window. It’s not a bill so it never becomes law. And it contains no actual money, it’s simply a plan for how lawmakers want to structure policy.

The reconciliation package, once written, will have the chance of becoming law, so any amendments offered during the Senate’s vote-a-rama will carry greater weight than the proposals voted on when the chamber took up the two budget resolutions.

Democrats will have an opportunity to challenge centrist GOP senators on whether they support or want to remove every single policy that Republicans put in their reconciliation package.

That could create real issues for GOP leadership if they include tax policy or spending cuts that cannot garner the backing of senators like Alaska’s Lisa Murkowski, Kentucky’s Mitch McConnell, Maine’s Susan Collins and others.

The final reconciliation package will need support from nearly every Republican in Congress. GOP leaders will not be able to lose more than three House lawmakers or three Republican senators, under their very slender majorities. 

Four or more Republicans opposing the reconciliation package in one chamber, either because it cuts too much spending or doesn’t cut enough, would likely prevent it from becoming law. 

Some of the 40 residents of New London who came out Wednesday morning to support migrants, many of whom work at Tyson Foods across the street from where they held a rally. (Photo by Jason Kerzinkski for the Wisconsin Examiner)

In 2023 a group of Haitian immigrants began arriving in the central Wisconsin community of New London.

The Haitians were admitted to the U.S. through a humanitarian parole program in response to lawlessness and deadly violence in their homeland. The newcomers became part of the community, said immigration attorney Marc Chistopher, a New London resident whose law offices are in Appleton and Milwaukee.

“Their children go to school with our children,” Christopher told the Wisconsin Examiner Wednesday morning. “They worship in the same churches. They eat at the same restaurants. They join the same civic organizations. They’re in the gyms. They’re our friends, more importantly, and they’re our co-workers. So they’re a part of our community and part of our fabric and we welcome them.”

The legal refugee program through which they were admitted includes a work authorization. More than 100 of the new immigrants  ended up working at a Tyson Foods plant in New London, processing and packaging chicken. Others went to work at stores in the community or in other jobs.

In late March, however, the Trump administration told more than a half-million people from Haiti, Cuba, Nicaragua and Venezuela that they were no longer welcome. The order from the Department of Homeland Security, terminating humanitarian parole for about 532,000 refugees from the four nations, is one of a flurry of orders targeting millions of immigrants in the U.S. since President Donald Trump took office.

Haitians in New London were among those covered by the March 25 order. They were notified through an online account assigned to every  humanitarian parole refugee, Christopher said.

 “Your parole will terminate upon the earlier of (1) your original parole expiration date or (2) April 24, 2025,” states a Homeland Security message to one of Christopher’s clients, shared with the Wisconsin Examiner. “You should depart the United States now, but no later than the date of the termination of your parole. Failure to timely depart may have adverse immigration consequences.”

Since the notices arrived, Christopher has been scrambling, trying to help a handful of people who hope they might qualify to stay in the U.S. Other New London residents have been organizing on behalf of their new Haitian neighbors. 

On Wednesday morning Christopher and his wife, Eloise DeLeon, also an immigration attorney,  joined about 40 residents of New London gathered across the street from the local Tyson plant, carrying signs advertising their support for the Haitian workers there and hoping to send a message to the community.

“The message is intended for everyone,” said one participant, Sue Krejcarek. “There are people who maybe were Republicans, voted Republican, but don’t agree with this. It’s OK to protest against things you don’t agree with, whether you voted Republican, Democrat. When something is wrong, you stand up for it.”

Emily Tseffos helped organize  the demonstration along with a group of New London activists.

“These folks have established life here because they were expecting to be able to stay here,” Tseffos said. “They came here through legal means. And they are working and paying taxes and they are going to schools and they are dreaming of starting businesses.”

School officials have been working closely with the Haitian families, Tseffos said, and teachers who have the children of Haitian parents in their  classrooms participated in the Wednesday morning rally. Community volunteers have been offering financial help with bills and groceries as the immigrant families grapple with the sudden command to go or face deportation.

“They were not planning on having 30 days notice to leave,” Tseffos said. “And so it’s really sad to see that these folks that are doing everything right and everything they’re supposed to be doing are now facing deportation in a couple weeks here.”

In addition to the notification from the federal government, Tyson plant employees who were permitted to work under the humanitarian parole program have received letters from the company telling them that their employment authorization will expire April 23 — the day before their deadline to leave the U.S.

Christopher said that he has sought to put together applications for a small number of people for whom he could make a case for asylum.

“An asylum claim is one of the more difficult and time-consuming things I do as an attorney,” he said. Asylum claims are decided on a case-by-case basis and require extensive factual details. Claims perceived as frivolous can meet with severe penalties.

An asylum applicant cannot get a work authorization for six months, however, Christopher said. That means even if the application is granted, “if they lose their work on April 24, those families have no means for supporting themselves,” he said.

Both DeLeon and Christopher are former prosecutors, and DeLeon is a former municipal judge. “So I understand the rule of law, following rules, right?” DeLeon said. “But this [following rules] is what our clients did.”

Christopher remains outraged at the way his neighbors’ lives have been overturned. “They’ve been promised they could stay here,” he said. “They came through legally, and they’ve been vetted.”

To be suddenly ejected “is not good for them,” Christopher said. “And it’s not good for our community, either.”

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Jennifer Williamson said she enjoyed the class sizes in Dodgeville. (Photo by Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner)

The effects of a second failed referendum at Dodgeville School District became immediately apparent this week with the district announcing that 13 staff members along with some programs, including electives and extracurriculars, are to be cut. The April referendum failed last week by 109 votes with 2010 people voting against and 1,901 for.

Ainsley Anderson, a social studies teacher at the middle school, and Ian Sullivan, a third grade teacher at the elementary school, said they heard concerns from voters about there not being an end date to the referendum. 

The school district’s request was for a $2.49 million recurring referendum, meaning it would allow a permanent increase to the amount the district can raise through property taxes annually. It was going to be used for operating costs, filling a gap between the district’s revenue and expenses. The annual cost of the request was more modest than the district’s nonrecurring request in November, which would have allowed an increase of $2.99 million annually for four years, but failed by 113 votes.

“People are scared right now with the economy and everything,” Sullivan said. “It’s a very interesting stock market, and… I mean, eggs are $8.”

The educators said they knew the cuts were a possibility if the referendum failed. 

“The administration and the school board have been very clear… it wasn’t a shock that this was going to happen,” Anderson said. 

“It’s difficult,” Sullivan said. “There’s a lot of emotion, even with it being communicated well to us.” 

“You never want to hear about your colleagues losing their job,” Anderson added. 

The pair of educators met Tuesday with about 10 Democratic lawmakers, including members of the Joint Finance Committee, and about 20 other community members, including parents and school board members, at a community center in Dodgeville. They discussed the situation and the potential for lawmakers to act in the state budget to ease the financial challenges the district and others across the state are facing.

Dodgeville’s situation is a familiar story in Wisconsin as school districts have been relying on property tax hikes that need to be approved by voters for everyday costs while state funding has not kept pace with inflation for the last decade and a half.

“We know that so many families have been forced to raise their own property taxes in order to support their public schools, and that’s a difficult choice,” Rep. Tip McGuire (D-Kenosha) said at the start of the event. 

Democratic lawmakers used the event as a moment to highlight Gov. Tony Evers’ plan for helping school districts escape this trap. His plan would tap the state’s $4 billion budget surplus to increase special education funding by reimbursing public schools for 60% of costs — almost double the current reimbursement rate of 32%, to increase per pupil funding and to invest in other programs, including free school meals and mental health programs. 

Rep. Deb Andraca (D-Whitefish Bay) emphasized that lawmakers wanted to hear about people’s specific stories as a way to help inform their work on the budget committee.

“We know how many referendums there are. We know that some succeed and some fail,” Andraca said. In April, voters approved 52 referendum requests for a total of $952 million in new money for Wisconsin school districts that is funded through property taxes. There were 37 failed referendum requests, including Dodgeville’s. “We want to know the impacts that it’s having with you and your families and your schools on the ground,” Andraca added, “because that’s what makes our work more meaningful.” 

At a table with McGuire, a couple of parents spoke about their concerns about the ways the district will change.

Jennifer Williamson said she has two children in the school district and they’ve appreciated the small class sizes of between 14 and 18 children. Those class sizes on average will grow by four to five students due to financial constraints.

Stephany Marten told the table that she and her husband debated over whether to send their child to the local school district or to a local private school. They decided on Dodgeville. She said she learned more about the district and what it had to offer, including smaller class sizes, reading specialists and opportunities for students that need additional support. 

“It’s accessible and it’s affordable to all families,” Marten said. “Our public school funding is being cut. What are we spending it on?”

McGuire, throughout the conversation, emphasized people should reach their Republican lawmakers. The Democrats brought their conversion about education funding to a school district and area of the state represented by Rep. Todd Novak (R-Dodgeville) and Sen. Howard Marklein (R-Spring Green) — cochair of the powerful Joint Finance Committee.

Republicans hold the majority in the state Senate and Assembly and Marklein has served as cochair on the committee since 2021, meaning he plays a large part in shaping the budget bill that will eventually be sent to Evers if approved by the full Legislature. Marklein said at a recent public hearing on the budget that lawmakers haven’t discussed specifics on education funding in the budget, but will likely take into account what the public shares.

“Your state senator, Howard Marklein, has a tremendous amount of influence,” McGuire said. “So we have to continue to reach out to him.” He added that people should speak with their neighbors as well to encourage them to reach out to the lawmakers.

One person asked McGuire what is keeping Republicans from dedicating more funding to schools.

“I wish I knew,” McGuire said. “If I knew what levers to pull, I would’ve done it four years ago.”

The impacts of the failed referendum in Dodgeville could likely go beyond those announced by the school district administration, Anderson noted. Some staff will say, ”I can’t work with the district that has two failed referendums because of pay cuts, health care,”  he suggested, adding, “We’ve lost people to going elsewhere.”

The Dodgeville educators also participated in a conversation with Sen. LaTonya Johnson (D-Milwaukee), Rep. Randy Udell (D-Fitchburg) and Rep. Andrew Hysell (D-Sun Prairie). 

Another educator at the table, Tom Butusov, formerly taught at the Dodgeville School District but left for a job at Mount Horeb Area School District — a community about a 20-minute drive away — about three years ago.

“When I got a job teaching in Dodgeville, I was very excited,” Butusov, who taught at the district for about three years, said. He grew up in the community and his mom also taught in the district. “But I learned pretty early on that because of just what the district can offer… I had to go elsewhere to best serve my family,” Butusov said. He said Mt. Horeb could pay more and it was close to a new house his family was purchasing. “It made sense, but I still love this community.” 

Butusov said the failed referendum is “heartbreaking.” He said he doesn’t blame the community because they’re being asked to pay for something they’ve already paid for and he isn’t mad at the district because he feels the state has put the district in the spot. 

“We have an entire district that’s falling through the crack and the state is doing nothing — nothing for us, and that’s what’s so frustrating is to see representatives that just aren’t doing anything,” Butusov said.

Anderson and Sullivan, who are also co-presidents of the Dodgeville teacher’s union, have children who go to the district as well. Anderson said she knows that even as budgets have shrunk, teachers are still working to provide a high quality education to students and are going to continue to work to do that even as some opportunities may be cut.

Sullivan said he and his wife have had discussions about whether they’ll leave the district. 

“We’re getting rid of field trips. We’re getting rid of after school clubs, opportunities at the high school and stuff. Do we want that for our kids?” Sullivan said. He added that the community is a big reason he was there and that it is “fighting to get more funding and give more opportunities not only to our own kids,” but to other students, especially those dealing with poverty and other challenges at home. 

Anderson said she would love to have a conversation with “Mr. Marklein and Mr. Novak about what they envision as the future of education in their districts.” She said she was feeling inspired to contact the local lawmakers and to encourage other members of the Dodgeville education association to do the same.

“Obviously, we’re doing everything that we can,” Anderson said. “What are they doing?” 

Sullivan said that he appreciated hearing specific budget plans from Democrats.

“I have not heard that from the other side. I would love that opportunity to hear it,” Sullivan said. “At the moment, I’m only hearing one side. The other is just saying no to everything, which I don’t think is OK.”

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Wisconsin State Flag | Getty Images

The co-founder of Wisconsin’s progressive, pro-democracy law firm is not ignoring the tsunami of bad news out of Washington. He’s just not letting it drown his optimism. 

“I don’t think any of us fully anticipated how heavy, broad, fast and extreme the onslaught was going to be,” Jeff Mandell concedes, referring to President Donald Trump’s moves to seize unprecedented power, weaponize the federal government against his political enemies, defy court orders, deport people without due process and throw the entire global economy into chaos.

“Some of what we are seeing and hearing is so contrary to our most fundamental understanding of what we believe about our government, I have to believe this is temporary and that people won’t stand for it,” Mandell says.

Since its founding in October 2020, Law Forward has pursued high-profile lawsuits that have helped claw back democracy in Wisconsin. The firm challenged the state’s now-defunct gerrymandered voting maps and uncovered the details of the fake electors scheme that originated here — forcing the Republican officials who posed as members of the Electoral College and cast fraudulent votes for Trump in 2020 to admit they were trying to subvert the will of the voters. On the public website it created to display the details of the scheme, which it obtained as a condition of a settlement, Law Forward stated that it wanted to show “how close our democracy came to toppling and how the freedom to vote must continue to be protected, not taken for granted.”

This week, Law Forward’s grievance against former Supreme Court Justice Michael Gableman for misconduct in his ill-conceived “investigation” of voter fraud in the 2020 election led to the suspension of Gableman’s law license.

As a Wisconsin-based organization, Mandell says Law Forward looks for opportunities to pursue cases that are of particular importance to the state and that shine a light on threats to democracy.

“The rest of the time we don’t sit in paralysis because of the news,” he adds. Whatever fresh hell is erupting across the country, “we continue to work here so people see an alternative.” 

“I think building a stronger, more resilient democracy in Wisconsin is its own form of resistance,” he adds.

“When things feel most shocking and unstable at the federal level,” at the state and local level, Mandell says, “we can show our institutions still work and provide some reassurance.” 

Even before Susan Crawford defeated Brad Schimel last week in the Wisconsin Supreme Court race — despite the heavy-handed intervention of Trump and Elon Musk — Mandell was feeling hopeful. He felt Wisconsin showed a “silver lining” after the November 2024 election, despite Trump’s narrow win in the state.

Among his reasons for optimism: New, fair voting maps that replaced the old Republican gerrymander, creating a more balanced Legislature; a governor who supports voting rights and democratic institutions; extraordinarily high voter engagement, with Wisconsinites turning out in bigger numbers than in other states in 2024 and overwhelmingly rejecting the MAGA-backed Supreme Court candidate in 2025. 

With Crawford’s win, “Wisconsin will continue to be a place where we can rely on the courts to protect our fundamental freedoms,” Mandell says.

The 10-point margin in last week’s election also “reinforces my conviction that the majority of Wisconsinites really do believe in democracy,” Mandell says.

All of those things position Wisconsin to be a leader in the struggle to protect democracy from the Trump onslaught.

Wisconsin’s long march to recovery from misrule by Gov. Scott Walker and the rightwing billionaires who backed him has been taking us in the opposite direction from the rest of the country.

Along with his union-busting Act 10 — challenged by Law Forward and soon to be taken up by the Wisconsin Supreme Court — Walker took a sledgehammer to funding for public education, long before Trump and Musk arrived with their chainsaws. Voters here have been pushing back against the billionaire-financed destruction of civil society for more than a decade. Recently, they’ve been gaining traction. Law Forward has played an important role in that fight.

It’s not just that Democrats will pick up more seats in the state Legislature as the un-gerrymandered maps go into full effect next year, Mandell has hope that our closely divided state will maintain its longstanding independence and commitment to bipartisan institutions. He draws encouragement from the fact that Republicans on the Joint Finance Committee are holding budget hearings around the state, even as Republicans in Washington ram through a budget based on Trump’s demands, ignoring the public and ceding their power as members of Congress.

Wisconsin’s long tradition of good government includes a host of bipartisan commissions, a decentralized elections system that is hard to hack and a great university that has managed to survive waves of attacks by McCarthyites and budget cutters for 176 years.

That tradition extends to a bipartisan nominating commission for federal judges, which ought to choose a replacement for 7th Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Diane Sykes, who announced in March that she is taking semi-retirement. Democratic U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin’s office reports it has been in contact with Republican Sen. Ron Johnson’s office to reconstitute the charter for the bipartisan nominating commission, as they have done in every Congress under both Democratic and Republican administrations. Trump could still ignore the process and nominate someone on his own. But three weeks after Sykes’ announcement, he hasn’t done it yet.

If Trump wrecks the economy and steers the whole country into a recession, Wisconsin won’t be spared. Nor can we avoid all the shocks of a national authoritarian regime. But our state’s independent democratic institutions leave us well situated to recover, and to help the rest of the country remember what civil society looks like.

“There is no one silver bullet,” says Mandell. “But the goal is to continue to tend the lamp here in Wisconsin, to shine a light that illuminates the path to balance, order and democracy.”

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The Bear River flows out of Flambeau Lake. Photo by Frank Zufall/Wisconsin Examiner

Tuesday afternoon, April 8, T.J. Bill, chief of police for the Lac du Flambeau (LDF) Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Indians, said his department and other agencies had spent over 1,000 hours in the search for Melissa Beson, 37, a tribal member who has been missing since March 17.

As the snow melts under rising temperatures, the plan for Saturday, April 12, is to continue an organized ground, air and water search in and around the surrounding vast forest, thousands of acres where one could quickly become lost.

Beson was last seen between 4:30 and 5 p.m. on March 17 on the outskirts of the Town of Lac du Flambeau, by Indian Village Road and Chequamegon Forest Trail, near the Bear River. Early in the search, the LDF Tribal Police Department flew a drone over the river’s open water and sent a submersible drone under the ice.

A search of the area forest, which covers most of Vilas County, was impeded by  snow cover.

After Beson was last seen on March 17, there was a heavy snowfall of over 6 inches, and then after her family reported her missing on March 23, another 3-inch snowfall covered the area. Some of the snow has melted with rising temperatures, but deeper in the woods snow is still covering downed logs and branches, making it difficult to detect what could be on the forest floor.

“We still have 6 inches of snow in the woods,” said Bill on April 8.

However, Bill anticipated that much of that snow would be melted by Saturday. Once the snow is totally off the ground, he plans to request that the Wisconsin State Patrol search the area by airplane.

On the previous Saturday, April 5, 25 people went out looking for Beson, including those from canine units and others operating drones in the water and air. However, it was difficult with the snow still on the ground.

On Tuesday, Bill was driving on a side road when he came across   LDF Emergency Manager Kat Milton, who was out collecting the GIS coordinates to help organize the Saturday, April 12, search in one of the large sections of woods near where Beson was last seen.

Bill’s concern about covering a large forest is volunteers getting lost while searching for Beson.

On Saturday, he also anticipates needing the drones to look over bogs and swamps scattered around the forest.

“We can’t walk into a bog unless we throw boards down that we can walk over,” he said.

Bill said he has to consider that Beson could have gotten lost in the large forest.

Since joining the department in 2013, he has participated in three searches for lost persons who were found deceased. The missing person is not always found deep in the woods.

“The Newbold Search and Rescue found one individual a half-mile from his residence,” he said.

Surveillance footage

After Benson went missing, the LDF Police Department reviewed recordings from over 360 surveillance cameras located around the reservation but didn’t turn up any footage of Beson.

“We didn’t have any surveillance cameras where Mellisa was last seen,” said Bill.

But the police department has other cameras that record the license plates of vehicles on the roads on March 17.

“We recorded the license plates of hundreds of vehicles,” he said.

Looking at all leads

As Bill’s office prepares for the weekend ground search, it is also coordinating with law enforcement in other areas of the state on leads that Beson might be living with friends off the reservation in larger communities.

“We are following up all the information we have, but we are also searching locally to eliminate the possibility that she might have walked off into the woods and gotten lost,” he said.

Beson’s mother, Winifred Ann Beson, “Winnie,” said her daughter might be with friends, but she also said she is afraid Melissa might have been taken by human trafficking. Native American populations have been targeted by human traffickers who prey on vulnerable populations where there is poverty and high drug use.

Winnie said her daughter likes to travel to other states, but she has always stayed in communication.

“Usually, she calls me if she needs money or is in trouble, but she hasn’t called me,” she said.

The Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women/Relatives MMIW/R movement has been raising awareness of the plight of Indigenous women who have a much higher rate of being victims of violence.

The MMIW/R issue has touched the LDF band. On the edge of the Town of Lac du Flambeau, there is a new billboard asking for information on the death of Susan Poupart, a tribal woman who was murdered on May 20, 1990, and her case remains unsolved.

Winnie, who suffers from lung cancer, said it is difficult for her emotionally to not know where her daughter is or if she is safe.

“It’s hard,” Winnie said of her missing daughter. “She is big-hearted, loveable, funny. She is right by me all the time. Me and her are close.”

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A Union Pacific train transports coal through Spanish Fork Canyon in Utah County, Utah. on Wednesday, July 31, 2024. President Donald Trump signed an order on April 8, 2025, aimed at boosting coal production. (Photo by Spenser Heaps/Utah News Dispatch)

An executive order President Donald Trump signed Tuesday to block state-level renewable-energy initiatives set off alarm bells among climate advocates.

But experts and state policy groups said constitutional protections will blunt any effect the order would have on state operations.

The order, one of four Trump signed Tuesday aiming to revitalize the coal industry, directs the U.S. Justice Department to investigate and block enforcement of state laws that restrict fossil fuel production. It specifically targets state and local policies involving climate change, environmental justice and carbon emissions reductions — popular among blue states.

By attempting to strip states of their own authority to make and enforce laws, the order violates basic constitutional principles and would likely be struck down in court, environmental law experts said Wednesday.

Brad Campbell, the president of the New England-based environmental advocacy group Conservation Law Foundation, said in an interview with States Newsroom the order does not cite any federal law or interest the administration is seeking to protect — though the order does mention interstate commerce and an objective to improve national security — revealing it is more about messaging than policymaking.

“This is political theater more than it is law,” Campbell said. “It completely disregards the understanding of federalism that has been in place for centuries and the language of the Constitution itself.”

While the order itself may be unlikely to withstand legal scrutiny, it signals the administration could make demands about climate policy that would have to be obeyed at risk of losing federal cash, advocates said.

Trump officials already have shown an eagerness in their first months for using federal funding as leverage with states, universities and other institutions that are outside the federal government’s control.

In a statement, White House spokeswoman Taylor Rogers said Wednesday the order would protect against states assuming the power to regulate international issues like climate change.

“The President is right to ensure that Americans in both red and blue states are not beholden to State overreach stifling American energy that are unconstitutional or contradict federal law,” she said.

Climate action ‘irreconcilable’ with Trump agenda

The order includes a lengthy preamble attempting to justify federal involvement in state and local policymaking, while also noting that state policies focusing on emissions reductions and climate protections are at odds with Trump’s goals.

“These State laws and policies try to dictate interstate and international disputes over air, water, and natural resources; unduly discriminate against out-of-State businesses; contravene the equality of States; and retroactively impose arbitrary and excessive fines without legitimate justification,” the order’s opening section reads.

“These State laws and policies are fundamentally irreconcilable with my Administration’s objective to unleash American energy.  They should not stand.”

At the Tuesday signing ceremony for the order and three others on coal production, White House Staff Secretary Will Scharf told the president that states promoting renewable sources of energy were a major part of the coal industry’s decline.

“One of the biggest problems we have in this space is Democrat states, radical leftist states, enacting policies and enacting an agenda that discriminates against coal, against secure sources of energy,” Scharf said.

The order, though, does little to change the market and technological forces that have led to the coal industry’s decline, Erik Schlenker-Goodrich, the executive director of the environmental group Western Environmental Law Center, said Wednesday.

“I just don’t see how the order … is going to do anything but create confusion and uncertainties for communities that are transitioning away from coal right now,” he said.

“In many respects, it does an injustice to those communities by giving them a false sense of hope that somehow coal mines and coal-fired power plants are suddenly going to be resurrected from the dead or be pushed well beyond their economic and technological lifespan.”

States undeterred

Environmental lawyers and climate advocates said the order does not change the constitutional structure of the U.S. government that empowers states to set their own laws.

Casey Katims, the executive director of the U.S. Climate Alliance, a coalition of 24 governors seeking to prioritize state-focused climate policy, said the group’s members would not be moved by the order.

“The reality is that states continue to enjoy broad, independent constitutional authority to advance solutions to meet the needs of communities, businesses and workers,” Katims said in a Wednesday interview. “The president cannot change the Constitution by fiat.”

The group’s co-chairs, New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham and New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, both Democrats, said in a Tuesday statement the administration had no power to block state authority and the coalition would be undeterred by the order.

“The federal government cannot unilaterally strip states’ independent constitutional authority,” they said. “We are a nation of states — and laws — and we will not be deterred.”

If the Justice Department, under Attorney General Pam Bondi, sues to stop enforcement of state laws, courts would likely reinforce states’ well-understood power to govern themselves, Campbell said.

Even the U.S. Supreme Court, which has a conservative supermajority that includes three members appointed by Trump and has shown deference to even the most controversial actions of his second presidency, would move to restrain that federal power, Campbell predicted.

“I think the notion that the president can stop enforcement of state laws that don’t align with his political program will be too much of an overreach even for this very Trump-friendly Supreme Court majority,” he said.

Further, he said, even Republican governors, whose party has traditionally advocated for increased states’ rights in relation to the federal government, might object to the intrusion of the executive branch into state policymaking. Allowing action under the order would set a precedent for a future Democratic president to meddle in Republican states, he said.

Federal funding

The lack of legal authority to directly block enforcement of state laws may not keep the Trump administration from exercising power in another way: withholding federal funds from uncooperative states.

The order signals the administration, which has been bold in asserting a power to deny congressionally appropriated funding, could target states over climate policy, Schlenker-Goodrich said.

“Do they have a legal basis? Not really,” he said. “Can they use political weapons, in particular relative to funding, against states that are stepping up on climate action? That is very much a possibility. That is the direction you will see the White House going.”

State Rep. Jerry O'Connor gives testimony in favor of a bill that would require state agencies to report on various metrics for training and workforce development programs they supervise. (Screenshot/WisEye)

Republicans in the state Legislature are taking another run at changes to unemployment insurance and workforce programs in Wisconsin that Gov. Tony Evers vetoed in August 2023.

While sponsors of the bills cited a couple of modifications in some measures, they are for the most part unchanged, they said during public hearings Wednesday for four bills in the Assembly’s labor committee.

One, AB 162, would require state agencies to compile a series of metrics on training and workforce development programs under their supervision, including the unemployment rates and median earnings of participants six months after they graduate from a program.

“We want to make certain our money’s being spent in a way that generates a positive beneficial return both for taxpayers and for the individuals participating in the programs,” said state Rep. Jerry O’Connor (R-Fond du Lac), testifying in favor of the bill. “We’d look at the percent of individuals enrolled in training programs who obtained a measurable skill gain.”

O’Connor said the bill draws its performance measures from the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA), a federal workforce training law updated in 2014.

In vetoing the version of the bill that passed the last session of the Legislature, Evers said that many state programs it covered didn’t fit with WIOA’s reporting structure and “have separate requirements under current state law.”

Three other bills would impose tighter restrictions on the unemployment insurance (UI) system.

AB 167 would expand the definition of employee misconduct that would be grounds for denying an unemployment insurance claim as well as for a worker’s compensation claim. The bill would also require DWD to conduct random audits of 50% of all work searches reported by people claiming UI.

AB 168 would extend the statute of limitations for prosecuting felony fraudulent UI claims to eight years. It would also require the state Department of Workforce Development (DWD) to produce more training materials for employers and UI claimants, operate a call center and expand its hours in times of higher volume, check various state and national databases to verify that UI applicants qualify, and implement “identity-proofing” measures.

AB 169 would penalize UI recipients who do not show up for a job interview they have been granted or a job they’ve been offered — “commonly referred to as ghosting,” said state Rep. Dan Knodl (R-Germantown), the bill’s author.

A UI recipient who fails to respond to an interview request or job offer, fails to report for a scheduled job interview or who is not available to return to work at their previous job would lose unemployment benefits for the week in which that occurred. The bill does not impose the penalty for the first offense.

State Rep. Joan Fitzgerald (D-Fort Atkinson) asked Knodl whether the bill had gone through the state’s Unemployment Insurance Advisory Council. The joint labor-management body revises the state’s UI law every two years. In the past Evers has vetoed UI proposals for not going through the council. 

“This is one of those that they’re not going to visit,” Knodl said. “So that’s why we’re here as a stand-alone bill.”

Nobody testified against the bills Wednesday, but Victor Forberger, a Madison attorney who represents people with UI claims, sent the committee a four-page memo opposing them. He wrote that DWD already does most of what AB 168 would require, and that it would “hamstring” the department “when new practices and resources emerge.”

The measures “will do nothing to make unemployment more useful and efficient for Wisconsin workers and employers,” Forberger wrote.

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The U.S. Capitol, as seen on Oct. 9, 2024. (Photo by Jane Norman/States Newsroom)

WASHINGTON — U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson postponed a vote on the budget resolution that was supposed to take place Wednesday, as he tried to get the support of far-right members of the party who object because it won’t go far enough to achieve their goals of slashing government spending.

Johnson, R-La., said he hoped the House would be able to vote on the tax and spending blueprint Thursday, before leaving town for a two-week recess, though he didn’t rule out setting up a conference process with the Senate, or changing the budget resolution and sending it back across the Capitol.

“We are working through some good ideas and solutions to get everybody there,” Johnson said. “It may not happen tonight, but probably by tomorrow morning.”

Johnson’s comments came after he huddled behind closed doors for about an hour with more than a dozen far-right House Republicans who believe the budget resolution doesn’t require the Senate to cut enough spending.

“We want everybody to have a high degree of comfort about what is happening here,” Johnson said. “And we have a small subset of members who weren’t totally satisfied with the product as it stands. So we’re going to talk about maybe going to conference with the Senate, or adding an amendment. But we’re going to make that decision. We are going to continue to move forward. This is all positive.”

The House and Senate are far from agreement on how much to reduce federal spending later this year when they write the reconciliation bill.

The House instructions call on numerous committees to cut spending by at least $1.5 trillion, with more than half of that deficit savings coming from the committee that oversees Medicaid. Those instructions would likely lead to hundreds of billions in federal funding being pulled from the program, though Republicans insisted during floor debate they were only looking to address waste, fraud and abuse.

The Senate has given itself a floor of $4 billion in spending cuts, which could lead to substantial deficit increases. The nonpartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget released analysis last week, showing the reconciliation package could bolster deficits by up to $5.8 trillion during the next decade.

Trump lobbying, last-minute drama

House debate, which took place before the vote was delayed, followed days of lobbying by House GOP leaders and President Donald Trump, who urged holdouts to adopt the budget resolution during a campaign fundraising dinner Tuesday evening.

“I think we are there,” Trump said. “But just in case there are a couple of Republicans out there, you just got to get there, close your eyes and get there. It’s a phenomenal bill. Stop grandstanding, just stop grandstanding.”

That didn’t sway everyone, however, leading Speaker Johnson to pull about a dozen of the far-right members off the floor Wednesday evening just as the House was supposed to move on to the budget vote.

The rest of the chamber’s lawmakers waited on the floor for more than an hour as the group huddled nearby.

Freedom Caucus Chairman Andy Harris, R-Md., Pennsylvania Rep. Scott Perry, South Carolina Rep. Ralph Norman, Tennessee Rep. Tim Burchett and Texas Rep. Chip Roy were among the members to get summoned off the floor by Johnson.

Scalise pleads to ‘get America back on track’

House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-La., called on Republicans to adopt the budget resolution earlier in the day during floor debate, saying it “just opens the door to” using the complex budget reconciliation process to enact their agenda.

“The process where 11 of our committees here in the House will go to work to start making improvements in so many areas to get America back on track,” Scalise said. “And ultimately, that’s why we all come here. We come here to solve big problems. We deal with small issues too. But every now and then — and it’s not often — you deal with a big issue that can actually improve the lives of families all across this country.”

Budget Committee ranking member Rep. Brendan Boyle, D-Pa., said members of his party wouldn’t allow the parts of the 2017 tax law that benefit the middle class to expire at the end of the year, rejecting claims from GOP lawmakers.

“If you’re a middle-class American, if you are in the 99%, you will not see your taxes go up next year,” Boyle said. “There is no question about that. What is at issue is the tax cuts for multimillionaires, billionaires and big corporations.”

Pennsylvania Republican Rep. Lloyd Smucker said he couldn’t vote to approve the budget resolution since the Senate’s instructions for spending cuts were “not acceptable.”

“To me, it’s important we have the guardrails in the initial resolution,” Smucker said, before encouraging House leaders to amend the budget resolution to increase the amount of spending cuts the Senate must implement.

“I can’t vote on this bill as it is, but there’s a path forward here and that is very, very important,” Smucker said.

Roy of Texas also spoke out against the budget resolution, saying the Senate’s instructions didn’t go far enough to reduce deficits.

“The Senate sent over a joke. And we’re going to capitulate to the Senate, knowing full well that the Senate instructions carry the day,” Roy said. “And we’re going to be sitting there in a reconciliation debate, where we’re going to end up on the short end of the stick. But worse, the American people are going to end up on the short end of the stick because it absolutely increases deficits. No one can deny it.”

Roy added that members of Congress should “pass a math test” because the numbers in the budget resolution didn’t add up.

Lengthy struggle

Republican leaders have struggled for months to get the vast majority of their members on board with the outline.

Even if the House finally approves the resolution, Johnson and Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., have months of work ahead of them as committees begin writing and debating their sections of the reconciliation package.

The budget resolution tasks 11 House committees and 10 Senate panels with meeting vague budget targets. Committees either have a minimum amount of spending to cut or a maximum amount of deficits they can create.

The House and Senate are relatively aligned on some of those targets, though they are far apart on spending cuts and potentially tax policy.

In the House, the Agriculture Committee needs to slice at least $230 billion; Education and Workforce must reduce spending by a minimum of $330 billion; Energy and Commerce needs to cut no less than $880 billion; Financial Services must find at least $1 billion in savings; Natural Resources has a minimum of $1 billion; Oversight and Government Reform has a floor of $50 billion; and the Transportation Committee needs to reduce deficits by $10 billion or more.

The Energy and Commerce Committee’s instructions have been a central issue for Democrats, and many centrist Republicans, who are concerned that Medicaid, the state-federal health program for lower-income people, will be a target for hundreds of billions in cuts.

Four Senate committees — Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry; Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs; Energy and Natural Resources; and Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, or HELP — must each find at least $1 billion in spending cuts over the 10-year budget window.

House committees that can increase the federal deficit include the Armed Services Committee with a cap of $100 billion in new spending, Homeland Security with a $90 billion ceiling for new funding for programs it oversees, Judiciary with a maximum of $110 billion and Ways and Means, which can increase deficits up to $4.5 trillion for tax cuts.

Senate committees also got instructions for increasing the deficit, which will allow them to spend up to the dollar amount outlined in the budget resolution. Those committees include Armed Services at $150 billion; Commerce, Science and Transportation with $20 billion; Environment and Public Works at $1 billion; Finance with $1.5 trillion in new deficits, likely for tax cuts; Homeland Security at $175 billion and Judiciary with $175 billion.

House instructions call for the reconciliation package to raise the debt limit by $4 trillion while the Senate’s plans say lawmakers can raise it by up to $5 trillion.

Slim majority

Assuming the House adopts the budget resolution, GOP leaders will need to keep nearly all of their members supportive during the next couple months as those numbers turn into tangible policy proposals.

House Republican leaders can only lose three members on party-line votes, given their paper-thin 220-lawmaker majority.

The same number of GOP senators can vote against the final reconciliation package as long as Vice President J.D. Vance casts the tie-breaking vote.

Any more Republicans opposing the package would prevent it from becoming law. 

Minister of Justice and Public Security Héctor Villatoro, right, accompanies U.S. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, center, during a tour of the Terrorist Confinement Center, or CECOT, on March 26, 2025 in Tecoluca, El Salvador. (Photo by Alex Brandon-Pool/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — Federal judges in Texas and New York Wednesday temporarily halted the Trump administration’s use of the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 in parts of those two states where Venezuelans set for deportation are incarcerated.

The American Civil Liberties Union filed cases in the Southern District of New York and the Southern District of Texas, after the U.S. Supreme Court this week deemed challenges to the wartime law must be brought in the location of those subject to President Donald Trump’s proclamation on use of the act. The cases earlier were argued in the District of Columbia.

That Monday decision from the high court lifted a lower court’s order that barred the Trump administration from invoking the wartime law to deport any Venezuelan nationals 14 or older who are suspected gang members — but the justices also said unanimously that the Venezuelans must be allowed court hearings.

Texas Judge Fernando Rodriguez Jr. issued a temporary restraining order to prevent the deportation of Venezuelans in the entire state of Texas under the Alien Enemies Act, as well as the facility where the three men who brought the case are currently detained, the El Valle Detention Center in Raymondville.

The restraining order from Rodriguez Jr. is in place until April 23. The order also states that the three Venezuelan men cannot be removed from the El Valle Detention Center, which is the same center from which the Trump administration on March 15 transferred those subject to the wartime law and placed them on a plane to a notorious mega-prison in El Salvador.

New York order

The temporary restraining order from New York Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein that he plans to sign Wednesday would cover Venezuelans in the Southern District of New York, according to The Associated Press. That would include New York City, the boroughs of Manhattan and the Bronx and Dutchess, Orange, Putnam, Rockland, Sullivan and Westchester counties.  

Two Venezuelans brought the suit in the Southern District of New York.

Hellerstein, who was appointed by former President Bill Clinton, will hold an April 22 hearing to determine if the temporary restraining order should become a preliminary injunction. The ACLU is also pushing for a class certification.

The Supreme Court said this week it will allow, for now, the Trump administration to use the Alien Enemies Act, but those subject to the proclamation must be allowed to bring a challenge in court.

The original suit against the Trump administration’s use of the Alien Enemies Act came from five men detained in Texas. The justices argued that the proper court venue should be where they were being detained in Texas rather than before the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. 

More than 238 Venezuelans have been deported to the brutal prison, Centro de Confinamiento del Terrorismo, known as CECOT.

Marylander’s case cited

Judge Rodriguez Jr., whom President Donald Trump appointed in 2017, in placing the temporary restraining order noted that anyone who is erroneously deported under the Alien Enemies Act potentially cannot be returned to the United States.

In his reasoning, he cited the Trump administration’s stance in a high-profile case that led to a Maryland man being sent to a prison in El Salvador by mistake.

The Trump administration has asked the Supreme Court to strike down a lower court’s order that officials return Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia of Beltsville, Maryland, who had a 2019 court order barring his removal to El Salvador. On Monday the Supreme Court temporarily paused the deadline until the high court could make a full decision.

“Furthermore, if the United States erroneously removed an individual to another country based on the Proclamation, a substantial likelihood exists that the individual could not be returned to the United States,” Rodriguez Jr. wrote.

A hearing in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas in the Brownsville division, is set for Friday 1:30 p.m. Central. 

Rodriguez said of the upcoming Friday hearing, “the Court will consider whether to extend the temporary restraining order or issue other forms of emergency relief.”

Jennifer Vasquez Sura, left, and Congressional Hispanic Chair Adriano Espaillat, a New York Democrat, center, talk with Democratic Maryland Rep. Jamie Raskin, right, after a press conference calling for the return of Vasquez Sura's husband, who was erroneously deported. (Photo by Ariana Figueroa/States Newsroom)

WASHINGTON — Jennifer Vasquez Sura has a message for her husband, who was erroneously deported to a notorious mega-prison in El Salvador by the Trump administration.

“I’m still fighting for you,” she said during a Thursday press conference with the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and Maryland Democratic lawmakers who are demanding the Trump administration return Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia to the United States.

Abrego Garcia, a national of El Salvador with deportation protections, was not charged with any offense but was detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement March 12 due to a “change in status.”

Trump officials have admitted his removal on March 15 to the Centro de Confinamiento del Terrorismo, or CECOT, was a mistake, but have stood by their decision.

“This so-called administrative error has destroyed my family’s happiness, my children’s innocence,” Vasquez Sura said, her voice shaking as she took small breaks before continuing to read her statement.

Pleas to president of El Salvador

The chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, Adriano Espaillat, said he is writing a letter to El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele to ask for Abrego Garcia’s release as well as request for a congressional delegation to visit CECOT.

Bukele is scheduled to meet with President Donald Trump at the White House April 14. Espaillat, a New York Democrat, said if he does not receive a response from Bukele, he will ask for a response from Bukele when he visits the White House.

“We don’t know his condition,” Espaillat said of Abrego Garcia. “The family deserves to know his condition, and if they don’t tell us, we will visit the prison ourselves.”

Democratic Maryland Sen. Chris Van Hollen and Democratic Rep. Glenn Ivey, whose district includes the family’s home in Beltsville, criticized the Trump administration for not only accidentally deporting Abrego Garcia, but labeling him as a MS-13 gang member, despite his lack of a criminal record in any country, including the U.S.

“He was whisked off without any due process, and is now in a torturous … jail in El Salvador,” Van Hollen said.

Senators send letter

In 2019 Abrego Garcia was given removal orders to his home country. He was granted protections from removal by an immigration judge because it was more “likely than not that he would be persecuted by gangs in El Salvador” if he were returned, according to court documents.

On Tuesday, two dozen Senate Democrats sent a letter to U.S. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, demanding  Abrego Garcia be returned to the U.S.

The Trump administration was ordered by a federal judge to return Abrego Garcia by Monday, and while the order was unanimously held up by a panel of judges on an appeals court, the U.S. Supreme Court temporarily paused the deadline to return Abrego Garcia.

The high court will make a full decision on whether or not the Trump administration will be required to bring Abrego Garcia back to the U.S. 

U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during an executive order signing in the Oval Office at the White House on Feb. 11, 2025, in Washington, D.C.  (Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — Suddenly veering from his declaration a week ago, President Donald Trump on Wednesday paused his sweeping “liberation day” tariffs for 90 days on countries he’s said are willing to negotiate new trade deals.

Stocks surged upon his announcement after days of wrecked markets erased trillions of dollars from investor portfolios. The Nasdaq index saw the biggest single-day hike in five years as of Wednesday afternoon, according to financial media.

The pause will not extend to China, which he announced will see a further hike to 125% on imports to the U.S. “effective immediately,” he said.

“At some point, hopefully in the near future, China will realize that the days of ripping off the U.S.A., and other Countries, is no longer sustainable or acceptable,” Trump posted on Truth Social just after 1 p.m. Eastern.

The president said more than 75 countries have reached out to negotiate, and that because “these Countries have not, at my strong suggestion, retaliated in any way, shape, or form against the United States” he is dropping their tariff rates to a universal 10%.

Several rounds of tariffs the president enacted in March will remain in place, including 25% import taxes on foreign steel, aluminum and cars — charges which sparked the European Union to approve retaliatory tariffs Wednesday.

Canada and Mexico, which both face up to 25% tariffs on a sizable chunk of products, will continue to see the levies but will not face an additional 10% stacked on top.

Trump’s 25% tax on imports from any country that buys oil from Venezuela also remains unchanged.

Americans ‘yippy’

The president told the press outside the White House Wednesday afternoon that he saw people getting “queasy” and “yippy” about the market turmoil.

“You have to have flexibility,” Trump said about his decision to pause the levies.

The tariffs, which the administration maintains are “reciprocal,” though under a formula disputed by economists, went into effect just after midnight Wednesday.

When asked by reporters if he’ll consider exempting any large companies that lost big in the market crash from paying the baseline 10% import tax, Trump said he’ll rely on his “instinct” to make the decision.

The announcement came just hours after the president posted on social media “BE COOL!” and “THIS IS A GREAT TIME TO BUY!!! DJT.”

Trump’s sudden pause also came just after U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer defended the steep tariffs to nervous lawmakers for the second day in a row.

Administration officials quickly claimed the sudden pause was part of Trump’s strategy all along — despite several saying over the last few days that the tariffs were here to stay and that Americans needed to have patience as the market crashed. More than half of Americans are invested in the stock market.

White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller characterized Trump’s about-face on tariffs as “the greatest economic master strategy from an American President in history,” in a post on X Wednesday afternoon.

A rollercoaster few days

Trump’s tariff plan sent shock waves through the economy after he unveiled import taxes on trading partners and allies, including 46% for Vietnam, a major tech exporter to the U.S.

The administration calculated the steep tariff rates based on each country’s trade deficit with the U.S.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told reporters outside the White House Wednesday that the tariffs were “a successful negotiating strategy.”

“As I told everyone a week ago in this very spot: Do not retaliate, and you will be rewarded,” Bessent said.

The administration met with Vietnamese officials Wednesday, according to Bessent, and meetings with Japan, South Korea and India are expected shortly, though he didn’t provide details.

When asked by reporters if Trump’s tariff policy was mainly now focused on China, Bessent said “it’s about bad actors” but added that China “is the biggest source of the U.S. trade problems.”

The trade war — a term Bessent rejected — between the U.S. and China expanded rapidly overnight Wednesday when Chinese officials raised levies on U.S. goods to 84%.

“The US’s practice of escalating tariffs on China is a mistake on top of a mistake, which seriously infringes on China’s legitimate rights and interests and seriously damages the rules-based multilateral trading system,” according to a translation of a statement Wednesday from the country’s State Council Tariff Commission.

Pressure from lawmakers

A Trump campaign account posted on X a screenshot of the president’s morning message urging people to buy stocks and asked “Did the Panicans listen to @POTUS’s advice this morning?”

“Panicans” is a term Trump used recently to mock lawmakers who openly criticized losses to retirement funds and questioned how the tariffs would affect small businesses in their districts.

Republican Sens. Thom Tillis of North Carolina and James Lankford of Oklahoma grilled Greer Tuesday during a hearing before the Senate Committee on Finance.

“Whose throat do I get to choke if this proves wrong?” Tillis asked.

Greer faced questions Wednesday morning from the House Committee on Ways and Means, where Chair Jason Smith of Missouri cheered on Trump’s choice to unleash tariffs on almost every country at once.

Rep. Richard Neal, the panel’s top Democrat, told Greer that his office has been “inundated” with calls from constituents worried about their 401k funds.

“They don’t know what to expect, trillions of dollars of market value being lost even as we meet,” the Massachusetts Democrat said at the morning hearing before Trump called off the tariffs.   

Democratic Sen. Adam Schiff said Wednesday that he’s asking the White House if any insider trading occurred while Trump was “creating giant market fluctuations with his on-again, off-again tariffs.”

“Who in the administration knew about Trump’s latest tariff flip flop ahead of time? Did anyone buy or sell  stocks, and profit at the public’s expense?” Schiff wrote on X.

Democratic Sen. Maria Cantwell of Washington and Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa introduced a bipartisan bill to claw back Congressional power over trade decisions from the president, who currently has near-unilateral authority.

GOP Rep. Don Bacon of Nebraska introduced companion legislation in the House.

While Trump imposed some of his tariffs — including those on foreign steel and aluminum — under a national security provision, he levied the charges on Canadian and Mexican imports as well as his recent worldwide tariffs by declaring a national emergency. 

The Milwaukee County Courthouse. (Photo by Isiah Holmes/Wisconsin Examiner)

The Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) office of Milwaukee released new information Tuesday regarding the arrests of two undocumented immigrants at the county courthouse. 

A spokesperson wrote in an email statement that Edwin Bustamante-Sierre, 27, and Marco Cruz-Garcia, 24, were arrested by ICE at the courthouse. The statement said that Bustamante-Sierre, a citizen of Nicaragua, was arrested on April 3, and convicted in Fond du Lac County for reckless driving on Dec. 5, 2024. He is currently charged with endangering safety, reckless use of a firearm, use of a dangerous weapon and cocaine possession in Milwaukee County, the email statement read. 

Mexican citizen Cruz-Garcia, the spokesperson wrote, was detained by ICE on March 20. The agency’s statement accuses Cruz-Garcia of being a known member of the “Sureños transnational criminal street gang” and states that he’d been arrested for “multiple criminal charges including breaking and entering, car theft, and assault.” The spokesperson wrote that an immigration judge ordered Cruz-Garcia to be deported to Mexico on Feb. 5, 2020.

Wisconsin Examiner was unable to locate an online court record related to Bustamante-Sierre. For Cruz-Garcia, online court records show a case filed on Jan. 18 involving one count of misdemeanor battery with a domestic abuse modifier. The court record shows that on March 9, Cruz-Garcia was in custody and appeared in court via video, where it was noted that he was indigent. Cruz-Garcia’s case was assigned to another judge and he was turned over for supervison to Justice Point, a non-profit organization which provides a variety of evidence-based criminal justice programs.

All Cruz-Garcia’s prior court orders, including a no-contact order and no possession of firearms, remained in place, as he was required to attend all future court proceedings. On March 20, the day he was detained by ICE, Cruz-Garcia appeared in family court where a domestic violence restraining order was dismissed. 

Days later in early April, there was a courtroom discussion about Cruz-Garcia having been deported to Mexico. Rather than dismissing the case, as defense attorneys asked, Circuit Court Judge Marshall Murray (serving as a reserve for Judge Rebecca Kiefer) granted a prosecutor’s request for a warrant to be issued, according to online court records. An order to review the dismissal of the case against Cruz-Garcia 60 days from April 2 was also issued. 

Courthouses are not immune from the Trump administration’s deportation efforts. On Jan. 21, ICE was directed to conduct “civil immigration enforcement actions in or near courthouses when they have credible information that leads them to believe the targeted alien(s) is or will be present at a specific location, and where such action is not precluded by laws imposed by the jurisdiction in which the civil immigration enforcement action will take place.” 

Agents are instructed to conduct enforcement actions “in non-public areas of the courthouse” in collaboration with court security staff, and to use “non-public entrances and exits.” Wherever possible, ICE agents should operate “discreetly to minimize their impact on court proceedings,” the directive states. The order also says ICE agents and officers should avoid actions in or near non-criminal courthouses, such as family or small claims court. 

Last week, the Milwaukee County Sheriff’s Office (MCSO) said in a press statement that it did not participate in the arrests. Although MCSO was aware of the first arrest, the office was not given advance notice of the second arrest. The press release did not name the people who were arrested, and noted that it’s “not uncommon” for law enforcement agencies to search available databases for upcoming court hearings to find targeted individuals. 

The courthouse arrests were widely condemned by community members. Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley said “an attack on this safe, community-serving space undermines public trust, breeds fear among citizens and staff and disrupts the due process essential to our courts.” Senior staff attorney at the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Wisconsin Tim Muth echoed concerns that the arrests would create an atmosphere of fear around the courthouse. “Research by the ACLU has shown that when ICE is known to be active in courthouses, members of the immigrant community are less likely to report crimes, less likely to cooperate with police and prosecutors and less likely to make their court appearances,” said Muth. “Our communities become less safe as a consequence.” 

Activists from the Milwaukee Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression also expressed concerns about database sharing between local and federal law enforcement, and called for the courthouse to be a safe space for people to come for legal support, services and to seek justice. Over the weekend, at a rally  protesting policies by the Trump administration and Elon Musk, local immigration activists raised those same concerns. “People will be afraid to come to the courthouse if that is not a protected zone,” said Christine Neumann-Ortiz, executive director of Voces de la Frontera during the protest. “And we know that these local fights are our frontline battles.”

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