UW President Jay Rothman tells lawmakers that this will be a “make it or break it” budget for the UW system. Photo by Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner.

Leaders of the Universities of Wisconsin and the state Department of Corrections (DOC) defended Gov. Tony Evers’ budget requests to lawmakers on the Joint Finance Committee during a meeting Tuesday. 

The hearing marks the start of lawmakers’ official work on the state budget, which will continue this week with public hearings in Kaukauna on Wednesday and West Allis on Friday. 

Sen. Howard Marklein (R-Spring Green) and Rep. Mark Born (Beaver Dam), co-chairs of the Joint Finance Committee, said during a press conference ahead of the meeting that they were looking for “justification” on the “massive” requests from the UW and wanted an explanation of the plan for DOC. 

“[The DOC request is] lacking in a lot of details and seems to be a little short of being able to accomplish its mission, but I’m interested to hear more about how they arrived at that and why they made some of the decisions they made and hopefully provide some information that will allow us to improve that plan and make sure that it’s a good plan for the future of the Wisconsin Department of Corrections and for public safety here in Wisconsin,” Born said.

In the past, lawmakers have heard from a greater number of agencies about their requests. During the last budget cycle, lawmakers heard from four agencies, including DOC, the Department of Transportation, the Department of Safety and Professional Services and the Department of Administration. That year, state Superintendent Jill Underly traveled to Eau Claire to talk to lawmakers about the Department of Public Instruction budget after not getting an invitation to speak. 

The lawmakers said it would have been a “waste of their time and our time” to hold briefings with other agencies.

“[The agency leaders] just have not been straight with us on things. They just don’t want to really talk about what they’re doing and why they’re doing it,” Born said. He said lawmakers were hopeful that the UW and DOC would work with them to answer some questions. 

Universities of Wisconsin President Jay Rothman told lawmakers during the briefing that he agrees with Gov Tony Evers’ assessment that this will be a “make it or break it” budget for the UW system. Evers’ request for the UW includes an additional $856 million, which would be one of the largest investments in the university campuses in state history. 

Rothman acknowledged that the request is “significant” but he emphasized that Wisconsin currently sits at 43rd out of 50 when it comes to state investment in public universities. The investments in the request would bring the system up to the median nationwide. 

Rothman explained to lawmakers that inflation and a lack of state investment over the last three decades to meet increasing costs has hindered the UW system. 

UW schools have worked to make changes, he said. When he started as president in June 2022, Rothman said 10 of the system’s 13 campuses were running fiscal deficits. That number is now six and should hit zero over the next year or so. He also noted there have been six two-year colleges that have closed or will close this year.

Rothman called the reforms necessary and said that the changes position the system for sound investments from the state. 

“We have to be asking ourselves a question: who will teach our children and grandchildren? Where will the nurses come from that will help care for our families and perhaps ourselves? Where will the engineers come from?” Rothman told lawmakers.

Rothman explained that the proposals seek to address five goals including increasing affordability, accessibility, developing talent, ensuring quality and investing in innovation.

“You cannot cut your way to success,” Rothman said. “You need to invest.” 

Rep. Tip McGuire (D-Kenosha) asked Rothman what would happen if the state did not fund the requests. 

“If we get the budget funded, we will not have to raise tuition. If we don’t get funded at an adequate level, that’s one of the levers… that I don’t want to have to use,” Rothman said. “I want to be able to maintain the accessibility that our students get, but we will do what we need to do, and it won’t be just one piece. That will be multiple levers, and we get more efficient in some places. We have to stop offerings, programs at certain universities.”

Republican lawmakers grilled Rothman on “administrative bloat” across the system and requests for additional positions and funding from the UW schools. 

The budget request would add 214 positions funded by state general purpose revenue to UW campuses. Rothman noted that UW campuses, excluding flagship UW-Madison, have lost 6,000 positions funded by the state since 2019. 

Born asked why there was a request for 13 additional staff members to support students who have aged out of the foster care system. He noted that a 2023-24 report found there were 420 of those students across the system. 

“I’m trying to wrap my head around — you talked about strategic investments, sound investments, and you’re asking for 13 positions, one on every campus to serve 420 kids?” Born asked. 

Rothman said the intention would be to expand the number of students who could be supported. 

“They’ve had a tough lot in life to start with,”  Rothman said, adding that the additional staffing  could give those students a leg up. “I would hope that we could expand that number.” 

Rothman also said that the specific request is part of the general goal of investing in students to ensure they make it to graduation. 

“If you look at the positions that we have asked for, they are all student-facing. We are trying to help our students be successful,” Rothman said. 

“This is a shining example of the governor’s desire to grow government and your desire to grow your system, and it’s not focused on the reality of how you invest in this stuff,” Born said. 

Born also focused on the idea of funding new programs on UW campuses. 

“Why would we need to fund a curriculum of the future? Isn’t there things that are fading away, things that are no longer of interest to students, things are no longer of interest to the workforce? Shouldn’t there be funds available to offer new things?” Born asked. 

Rothman said that the UW system has cut about 100 programs already. 

“So you’ve eliminated about 100 programs, but you can’t fund a new program and curriculum and AI without more funding?” Born continued. 

“I think the fact of the matter is if we had kept up with inflation in terms of our state support, we’d be in a different position,” Rothman answered. 

Corrections budget 

DOC Sec-designee Jared Hoy also defended Evers’ proposals during the hearing, saying that policy changes, increased investments and capital projects are needed to improve safety in facilities across the state. The proposal, Hoy said, is “not simply a list of funding requests” but is a “blueprint for the future” of state corrections. 

Under the proposal, the state would invest about $634 million in the DOC. The majority of the money would be used to fund major reforms throughout the state’s prisons including infrastructure upgrades and capital improvements to Waupun Correctional Institution, Lincoln Hills School, Stanley Correctional Institution, Sanger B. Powers Correctional Center and John C. Burke Correctional Center. The improvements would culminate in the closure of the Green Bay Correctional Institution. 

Hoy told lawmakers that the budget proposal was developed through conversations with DOC staff, legislators and outside experts with a focus on “safety for those in our communities and the people that work in our facilities every day.” 

The proposal also includes some policy changes meant to help limit recidivism, including by expanding access to workforce training and substance use treatment for people who have 48 months or less left in their sentences for nonviolent offenses.

“A system that prioritizes re-entry and release, but fails to reduce recidivism is not truly safe. A facility that contains individuals but is dangerous and unstable inside its walls is not safe,” Hoy said. “Safety must be both measured by what happens inside the walls of our facilities, and by what happens when a person releases into the community.”

Hoy said that he hoped lawmakers would see some of their thoughts and ideas for the agency reflected in the plan.

“The governor’s budget request is an opportunity for our state to come together and use our taxpayers’ money responsibly to help keep our children and our communities safe,” Hoy said.

The idea that some lawmakers have floated of building a new facility would take significantly more time and money, he added. 

“Our agency does not have time to wait 10 to 12 years for a new facility to be built,” Hoy said.

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State Superintendent Jill Underly won a second term in office Tuesday evening. (Photo by Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner)

Incumbent Jill Underly, who had the backing of the Democratic Party of Wisconsin, won a second term as state superintendent on Tuesday, defeating education consultant and Republican-backed candidate Brittany Kinser. 

“I’m just deeply honored and humbled for the trust you have placed in me to continue as state superintendent for public instruction,” Underly told supporters at her Election Night party. “This victory belongs to all of us who believe in the power of public education, but for every educator, family, and most importantly, kids across our state.”

The Associated Press called the race at 10:05 p.m. with Underly leading by more than 5 points and with more than 80% of the votes counted.

Kinser’s campaign released a statement shortly before 10:30 p.m. in which she acknowledged the result was “not the outcome I had hoped for.”

“Our kids’ future shouldn’t rest on the politicization of our education system, but on the belief that our kids deserve so much better than they currently receive,” she said.

The state superintendent, a technically nonpartisan position, is responsible for providing guidance for the state’s 421 public school districts, leading the Department of Public Instruction (DPI)  — an agency responsible for administering state and federal funds, licensing teachers and developing educational curriculum and state assessments — and also holds a position on the University of Wisconsin Board of Regents. 

Underly received the endorsement from Wisconsin Education Association Council (WEAC), the state’s largest teachers’ union, and AFT-Wisconsin. The Democratic Party of Wisconsin contributed over $850,000 to her campaign. While Underly had the backing of the state Democratic party, Democrat Gov. Tony Evers refused to endorse in the race. 

WEAC said in a statement that the “victory inspires the public school educators who work with students every day to be even more visible and more involved in education policy deliberations to solve staffing shortages and the state funding crisis that forces communities to referendum every year to keep the schoolhouse doors open” and that the result is a rejection of “the school voucher lobby in favor of educators, so all students – no exceptions – have the opportunity to learn without limits and unlock their dreams.”

Kinser had never worked in a traditional Wisconsin public school and received criticism during the campaign for never holding a Wisconsin teachers’ license and allowing her administrator’s license to lapse, though she eventually updated it. She had also worked mostly in charter school circles in recent years, including as principal and executive director of Rocketship schools in Milwaukee and as a leader of the City Forward Collective, a Milwaukee-based advocacy group that has lobbied in favor of increasing funding for the state’s voucher program.

With her background, Kinser, who describes herself as a moderate, found support from Republicans and school choice advocates, receiving over $1.6 million in contributions from the Republican Party of Wisconsin.

While decisive, Underly’s victory was by a narrower margin than her first election in 2021, while Kinser did better than past DPI candidates who have run with the backing of the state’s powerful school choice lobby.

Underly said her takeaway from the closeness of the race is that “we need to just communicate better.” 

Throughout the campaign, Underly faced criticism from her opponent, Republicans and others for her recent approval of changes to state testing standards and poor communication with school districts. 

“There’s a lot that goes on at the agency that I think in years past, maybe state superintendents took for granted, but I think it’s important that we are communicating more,” Underly told the Wisconsin Examiner.

Underly said that the agency is working on rebuilding its relationship with legislators. 

“The Legislature and the relationship with the state superintendent hasn’t always been that great…,” Underly said. “We meet with them frequently. We meet with the governor’s office quite frequently also. I’m just going to go back to the fact that I hope that we all want the same things, regardless of where we are on the political spectrum.” 

Underly said that she also respected Evers’ decision not to endorse in the race and that her working relationship with his office is “fine.”

Throughout her campaign, Underly defended her decisions during her first term and said that she has served as “the No. 1 advocate for public education” and will continue to do so. Prior to being elected to the top DPI position, Underly worked as assistant director in DPI. She also previously served as a principal and superintendent of the Pecatonica Area School District and taught in public schools in Indiana.

Underly leaned on her advocacy for public schools while making the argument for her reelection. She introduced a budget request for the state that would have invested over $4 billion in public education, saying that it’s what schools deserved. Republicans and Evers both said it was too large. 

Democratic lawmakers said Underly’s victory is a sign of Wisconsinites’ support of public schools and will hopefully bode well for the future of securing improved funding for public education. 

Senate Minority Leader Dianne Hesselbein (D-Middleton) told the Wisconsin Examiner that Underly’s victory was a vindication of her first term in office.

“She’s had to make do with some really tough choices, and she’s done a great job for kids and for teachers,” Hesselbein said.

“We know public schools unite communities, and when we have strong public schools, we have strong communities,” Rep. Francesca Hong (D-Madison) said. “We’ve got a state superintendent who’s going to be looking out for every learner in our state, and so I’m also looking forward to the transparency and accountability that will come with ensuring that public dollars are for public schools.” 

Hong said that the lack of communication between Republican lawmakers and Underly is the fault of  lawmakers who are not interested in meeting the needs of students. She said that Underly’s win and “Republicans needing to answer to their communities who care about their public schools again” could encourage them to work across the aisle. She noted that Wisconsinites have repeatedly raised their property taxes to ensure schools have funding in lieu of reliable state investments. 

Hong also said that she thought Underly’s victory showcased that “public dollars going to private schools was a deep concern for a lot of Wisconsinites.” During her campaign, Underly criticized  her opponent for her lobbying for and support for Wisconsin’s school choice programs. She also expressed her opposition to the growth of those programs, saying it is not sustainable for the state to fund two school systems and that she would oppose dedicating more money to private school vouchers.

Underly said it’s clear that her opponent “cares about kids and she cares about kids learning,” and that something she would take away from the race is that “we all want the same things. Ultimately, we want kids to be successful.”

Tennesseans and Wisconsinites involved with the Builders' project. Photo by Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner.

Madison School Board member Ali Muldrow said people who work in education know that the “worst day” is when children get hurt in school. 

“When the Abundant Life shooting happened, which was at a private Christian School very close to my home, it was just a really horrible day, and I think I realized it’s too late to talk about this,” Muldrow said. “It’s been too late and we can’t keep letting it be too late.”

A teacher and student were killed and six others were injured by a 15-year-old who brought a gun to Abundant Life Christian School, a private school in Madison, in December 2024. It is the deadliest school shooting on record in Wisconsin.

The shooting made national headlines, but it is just one example of children harmed by gun violence. According to the K-12 School Shooting Database, there were 332 school shootings in 2024. A 2024 report by Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Violence Solutions found firearms continue to be a leading cause of death for children and teens, and those who are Black are disproportionately the victims

Muldrow, who is running unopposed for another term on the Board this spring, said measures taken to try to prevent shooting deaths at school have not been enough. 

“All of the things that we’ve done to our students haven’t resolved this issue — whether it’s practicing and having drills or whether it’s making our schools harder places to get into,” Muldrow said. “None of that changes the reality that a 15-year-old went into their school, two guns, and killed multiple people, including themselves.”

Students from Madison Metropolitan School District walked out of class in December and marched to the state Capitol to demand something be done about gun violence. 

“They asked for two things,” Muldrow said. “They asked for laws related to gun storage and gun safety, and they asked for more mental health support within their education.”  

Muldrow said that adults should “honor” the demands of the students and build bridges across political divides to get the work done. She said having conversations is an important starting point. 

In the aftermath of the Madison school shooting, Muldrow said she wanted to organize an event to inspire people in the community to feel capable of making change. She turned to a group that tried to find solutions after a school shooting took place about two years ago and more than 620 miles away.

Tennesseans were left reeling in 2023 after a shooter killed three 9-year-olds and three adults at the private Christian Covenant elementary school. A nonprofit organization called Builders (formerly known as Starts With Us) that seeks to ease political polarization brought together a group of 11 Tennessee residents with a range of opinions on the issue of guns to discuss and come up with some solutions. 

Muldrow was part of a similar group in Wisconsin in 2024 that explored the debate on abortion. She saw a documentary about the Tennessee group and thought its approach could be a way for the community affected by the Abundant Life shooting to come together and find a way forward. 

Muldrow said that the point of the event she helped organize Sunday was not necessarily to “mirror or mimic what happened in Tennessee, but to learn from that collaborative attitude towards solutions.” 

More than 100 people attended the event at the Overture Center for the Arts in Madison, which included a screening of the documentary about the Tennesseeans’ journey and a panel discussion with two of the participants and a handful of Wisconsinites.

Charles Franklin, director of the Marquette Law School Poll noted during the panel that potential solutions to gun violence would look different for Wisconsin, given the difference in state laws and the general beliefs of residents in each state. A key point of disagreement among participants in the documentary centered on concealed carry permits and whether they should be mandated. Tennessee has allowed for permitless carry of handguns since 2021.

Wisconsin already requires a permit for concealed carry, however, and it’s mostly not a partisan debate, Franklin said. According to the most recent polling, about 65% of Wisconsinites support concealed carry, but only under certain circumstances. 

“We do have a concealed carry law that requires a permit. When the Legislature has considered concealed carry without a permit, we found only about 20% support for that, about 80% opposition,” Franklin said. “There is a distinction that the public makes… public opinion is quite opposed to that form of concealed carry, but solidly in favor of [concealed carry] with a permit.”

Franklin said he thought proposals that originate from and garner support among Second Amendment supporters should be celebrated. He noted that there is a Republican bill that’s been introduced in Wisconsin that would create a tax exemption for gun safes. 

“That’s a small, incremental matter of, what, 5 ½% on the cost of the safe, but on the other hand, when you think of children’s access to guns in the home, access to those guns by burglars or other circumstances,” it could be a significant step, Franklin said. 

Franklin said the idea that “if you don’t get everything you’ve got nothing” is a huge barrier to progress. 

“I would just stress that incremental improvements are still improvements,” Franklin said.

Steve D’Orazio, founder and president of the Oregon, Wis., gun shop and range Max Creek Outdoors said during the panel that his business works hard to educate people who acquire guns. He said he has been working with a doctor at the UW Health System to educate doctors on guns and have them talk with their patients about gun safety and awareness, including keeping guns locked away. 

“My goal is the safety of our children,” D’Orazio said. 

The solution to school shootings he emphasized the most was implementing metal detectors in all schools. 

“Every one of us here today walked through the front door of this building and we walked through a metal detector, but our schools don’t have metal detectors,” D’Orazio said. “I sell guns. That’s our business. There’s so much education that we do at our shop to make sure that the gun owner doesn’t get hurt and that they use it correctly…, but every school district should have a metal detector. That’s how you’re going to stop this stuff.” 

The documentary shows the Tennessee group taking and presenting their recommendations at the Tennessee State Capitol. Those recommendations included temporary removal of firearms based on risk of violence, developing tools to support responsible gun ownership, expanding the role of school resource officers, investing in community to reduce trauma and developing gun literacy resources for schools, communities and media. 

Tennessee leaders did pass a bill in 2024 requiring education in schools about guns, a policy similar to the recommendation of the group. Though the end result was not exactly as participants imagined it. 

Adam Luke, a Tennessee marriage and family counselor and conservative, spoke to how the “rush to be right” by lawmakers on the issue may diminish the effectiveness of the legislation.  

“People will not be able to opt out [of the curriculum]. Now, I would like to turn to conservative America and say, ‘If you did not have the ability to opt your child out of sex education would that bother you?’” Luke asked. “This is what happens when you have super majorities.” 

Luke said that the Tennessee Department of Education also doesn’t have the curriculum for teachers and just recently closed the public response period. He said lawmakers were so quick to want to get something done that they’ve created a policy that may not be effective.

“Let’s say that we did something, but guess what? We forgot to actually give you the resources to be successful with it,” Luke said. 

Political polarization was on display following the Madison school shooting. Muldrow said she has been “saddened” by the divide.

“It’s really hard to see our Legislature be so divided and in such a contentious relationship with our governor, and it’s a shame because all of these people represent us and there is an expectation that they work together,” Muldrow said. 

Since the shooting, Gov. Tony Evers has launched the Office of Violence Prevention and has proposed adopting further gun safety policies including stricter background checks and red flag laws. Republican lawmakers were quick to criticize Evers’ proposals and have been developing their own proposals for addressing school shootings, including financial support for the Office of School Safety and allowing teachers to be armed. 

The Madison Common Council and the Dane County Board of Supervisors both passed resolutions urging the Legislature to take action and implement common-sense gun measures. 

Steven Olikara, a former candidate for Wisconsin Senate and founder of the nonpartisan organization the Future Caucus, said the actions of local leaders and Evers are a step forward, but the state needs to take bigger steps. 

“Those bigger steps will come from bringing Democrats and Republicans together in a real way and building trust,” Olikara said. “And I think conversations like this can help create that kind of momentum. [When people are at] each other’s throats, the kind of progress you make is very small and very incremental. When you have conversations like the one today, you can reach transformative change, and that’s really what we need.”

Tennessee educator Alyssa Pearman, who lost one of her students to gun violence, said the key is to keep showing up to have the conversations.

“You are going to be told no, and you are going to have people who have no interest in making a change and being a builder, but you keep showing up,” Pearman said. “You find people who want to do something, who want a better tomorrow, and you have conversations like these… This is the type of conversation that needs to be had, whether it’s in Wisconsin, whether it’s in Tennessee and whatever state where we have this crisis.”

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Mayor Satya Rhodes-Conway alongside other Wisconsinites at a city celebration for Transgender Day of Visibility. Photo by Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner.

Wisconsin Democrats and city of Madison leaders recognized transgender visibility day in Wisconsin Monday, introducing legislation that would provide protections for people and raising the transgender pride flag. 

This year’s International Transgender Day of Visibility comes amid a political environment in which trans people have been targeted by new proposed federal and state restrictions. Wisconsin Republican lawmakers spent significant time in March on a slate of bills focused on transgender kids and would have limited their ability to play sports, access gender affirming medical care and change their names and pronouns in school. The bills are among more than 800 anti-trans bills that have been introduced nationwide this year.

Participants in the Madison celebrations said the point of the day was not to focus on the negative and harmful actions being taken, however, but to focus instead on the positive experiences of being transgender. 

Sen. Melissa Ratcliff (D-Cottage Grove), co-chair of the Transgender Parent and Nonbinary Advocacy Caucus, said during a press conference that the purpose of the day is to “elevate the voices of our trans and non-binary communities, emphasize the joy of living life as your authentic self and to visualize the world in which all our trans and non-binary children, co-workers, neighbors, parents and elected officials throughout Wisconsin and the world are loved, accepted and safe.”

Democrats holding the press conference proposed a handful of bills. One would extend Wisconsin’s nondiscrimination laws to include transgender and nonbinary people by prohibiting discrimination on the basis of gender identity or gender expression.

Another bill would create an exception to current law for those seeking a name change for gender identity reasons. Under the current state statute people seeking a name change petition must publish notice of their petition in a local newspaper, including in the area where the petition will be heard, once per week for three consecutive weeks before they may petition the court.

A third bill would declare March 31, 2025 as Transgender Day of Visibility in Wisconsin and recognizes the achievements of several transgender people and organizations who have made contributions to Wisconsin.

In addition to the bills, Gov. Tony Evers, who has committed to vetoing any anti-trans legislation that makes it to his desk, signed a proclamation declaring Monday Transgender Day of Visibility.

Rep. Christian Phelps (D-Eau Claire) said the bills are important because lawmakers need to send a positive message to young Wisconsinites who may be paying attention. He said that when he was young he remembers feeling discouraged as a gay teen when the state passed a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage. 

“Thirteen-year-olds across Wisconsin are listening to political actions and messages that are being sent out of the Capitol,” Phelps said, adding that children should know there are elected officials and allies and leaders who are fighting for transgender, non-binary and gender-expansive people of all ages across Wisconsin.

“That’s the message that we want people to take out of the Capitol and into their communities and to see [protections] passed in the state law as well,” Phelps said. 

When asked about plans to discuss the legislation with Republicans and the potential for garnering support across the aisle to pass any of the bills, the lawmakers sounded doubtful. Republicans hold majorities in the Assembly and Senate and support from them would be necessary for any of the Democratic legislation to be taken up.

“I don’t think they will sign on to this legislation. I certainly wish that they would take a look at it and hear our voices here today and see the love and support of so many community members,” Sen. Melissa Ratcliff (D-Cottage Grove) said. 

Clancy called it a “valid question” that Democrats get every time they hold a press conference. 

“Will Republicans sign on to this? And every time the answer is somewhat the same…,” Clancy said. “Republicans, two weeks ago, sat on the floor of the Assembly just feet from here for hours. They said that trans people should not exist, should not have basic rights. They have had the opportunity to weigh in on this, and I would welcome any of them moving across the aisle, breaking ranks from their, frankly, hateful leadership and joining in on these things.” 

The city of Madison also recognized Transgender Visibility Day by raising the transgender pride flag outside of the city municipal building.

Mayor Satya Rhodes Conway said the city was raising the flag to celebrate trans people, because the city respects individual rights and “rejects hate.” 

“The safety and the livelihoods of trans people are being threatened, and the issue of the fact of trans people is being used to divide our country in a hateful and really disappointing way, but here in Madison, we refuse to go backwards, and we refuse to let hate divide.” 

Asked about communicating the message of acceptance to those who disagree, Rhodes-Conway said that she thinks it’s important people recognize that diversity makes the Madison community stronger and invited people to “learn about the things that maybe make them nervous or scared and to be a part of the incredible diversity.” 

Rhodes-Conway also urged people to educate themselves.

“Folks can educate themselves and each other and a lot of the fear and resistance comes from lack of knowing, and so I just encourage people — there’s a lot of resources,” Rhodes-Conway said. “Please don’t ask the trans people in your lives to educate you. There’s a lot of resources out there and our libraries, our fantastic resources, and people can educate themselves about the history.”

Dina Nina Martinez-Rutherford, the first out transgender member of the Madison Common Council, said that transgender people are all “part of an unbroken legacy of resilience” and “authenticity.” 

Martinez-Rutherford said that she never expected to feel “so much love and community” when first elected in 2023 and never expected when she first started transitioning in 2007 to be in a position to advocate for people. 

“We raise the transgender flag today for it to be a symbol that Madison is welcoming and that you belong here,” Martinez-Rutherford said. “Let it be a beacon of hope, a reminder that we will not be erased.”

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A yard sign urging voters to vote 'Yes' on a referendum request for Ashwaubenon School District in 2024 when a record number of schools went to referendum. Photo by Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner.

As Wisconsin school districts seek permission this week from voters to spend more than $1.6 billion for operational and building costs, state lawmakers are looking for ways to address the issue of schools’ growing reliance on referendum requests.

Voters across the state are deciding this spring on a total of 94 referendum requests including some in February and many in the upcoming April 1 elections. According to the Wisconsin Policy Forum, it’s the most ever between January and April in a non-presidential or midterm election year and it’s the continuation of an ongoing trend.

Republicans have introduced three proposals for new limitations on the referendum process in reaction to Milwaukee Public Schools’ successful request last year, with lawmakers saying the proposals would increase fairness and transparency for voters and taxpayers. However, one Democratic lawmaker and other stakeholders said the proposals would limit local control and don’t address the structural financial issues that drive school districts to go to referendum.

Eliminating ‘recurring’ referendum requests

A bill coauthored by Rep. Cindi Duchow (R-Town of Delafield) and Sen. Chris Kapenga (R-Delafield)  would eliminate referendum questions that allow permanent operational funding increases and would limit other referendum requests to cover no more than a four-year period.

Duchow said in an interview with the Wisconsin Examiner that she doesn’t think there is a problem with school districts going to referendum and called them the “perfect tool” to allow local residents to make funding decisions. But she doesn’t think funding increases sought through a referendum should be permanent — or, in legislative terminology, “recurring” year after year. 

The referendum option was created for schools in 1993 as a part of legislation that put limits on schools’ ability to raise revenue by increasing property taxes. 

Anne Chapman, research director for the Wisconsin Association of School Business Officials Association (WASBO), said in an interview that the idea behind the legislation was that property taxpayers would be protected and the state would take care of school districts financially in return. From 1993 to 2010, revenue caps — the limit on how much districts could raise without voters’ permission — were tied to inflation. The inflationary increases were eliminated in 2009 and state funding has not filled the gap to give schools an inflationary increase. 

According to WASBO, general school district revenues have lagged the rate of inflation for a decade and a half. If funding had kept up with inflation, districts would be getting $3,380 more per pupil in 2025.

Wisconsin schools also only receive funding for about a third of their special education costs and many are drawing from their general funds to keep up with providing expensive federally and state mandated services to students with disabilities. Districts are also dealing with declining enrollment, which results in lower funding for a district as there are fewer students even if fixed costs such as maintaining facilities may not fall.

School officials and advocates have pointed out that many districts are relying heavily on referendum requests to meet costs (even to keep schools open), saying the trend is untenable. Mauston School District is one example as school leaders were considering dissolving the district after two failed referendum requests until voters finally approved a request in February.

Chapman noted that when a referendum fails it can result in a school deferring maintenance, increasing class sizes and cutting staff, AP programs, language, support staff for special education, nurses, librarians, athletics and “all the things that kids need to kind of stay engaged in school.” 

Dale Knapp, director of Wisconsin-based research organization Forward Analytics, said in 2023 that he didn’t “think the lawmakers who created this law envisioned referenda being relied on this much.”

“Maybe the answer after 30 years of the limits is an in-depth review of the law to see how it can be improved to continue protecting taxpayers and ensure adequate funding of our schools,” Knapp said.

Duchow, however, said that the state is providing “plenty of money” to schools.

“If they want a new gym, that’s on them. I’m not here to build you a new gym. The people who live in that community should make that decision,” Duchow said. She also said there are some schools that probably need to consolidate and others that need to close.

While school districts do go to voters to fund building costs, many are also going to referendum for “operational” (and often recurring) costs and as a way to keep up with staff pay, afford educational offerings and pay utility bills.

Duchow said recurring referendum questions are unfair. She said lawmakers in the caucus have been discussing changing the policy for a while. A similar proposal was introduced in 2017.

“We are looking at declining enrollment around this state, and how do we know what we really need 10 years from now?” Duchow said. “The Milwaukee referendum never goes away, so 10 years from now, we have less students in Milwaukee and we need the same amount of money?  We have more technology coming in, which means we probably need less teachers.” 

Duchow said Milwaukee’s $252 million operating referendum, which was the second largest school operating request in state history, was the “catalyst” for her bill.

Republican lawmakers and other state leaders have been highly critical of the request, which the district said was needed to fund staff pay and educational programming and voters narrowly approved. The criticism grew louder after the district’s financial crisis that resulted in the resignation of the superintendent and audits launched by Gov. Tony Evers.

“Enough is enough. MPS is a disaster. We have the worst reading scores in the nation, and all they do is scream they need more money,” Duchow said. “Money is obviously not the answer.”

Even with declining enrollment, the Milwaukee Public School District is the largest district in the state with 65,000 students enrolled, according to the 2024-25 enrollment data from DPI. This is over 2.5 times as many students as the next largest district in Wisconsin, Madison Metropolitan School District.

MPS students are also more likely to face significant challenges. More than 20% of students in the district have a disability, more than 80% are economically disadvantaged and 17.5% are English language learners. Statewide about 40% of students are economically disadvantaged, 15.7% are students with disabilities and 6.92% are English language learners.

Chapman said students with higher needs often incur higher costs for districts. 

Duchow said that putting a four-year limit on referendum requests for recurring funds gives communities the ability to react to changing circumstances and that school districts should justify to voters why they need the funds. She said she would be open to discussing a different limit when it comes to nonrecurring referendum requests.

“It’s also not fair that everybody could vote for that referendum and then decide, hey, this is really too expensive. I can’t afford these property taxes and then they move out, and I’m still there paying the referendum,” Duchow said. 

Duchow said she hadn’t yet spoken with any school district leaders when she was interviewed by the Examiner in early March, but planned to reach out before a public hearing on the bill.

“I’m sure I can already tell you how the schools are going to feel. The schools are going to feel they want their recurring referendum, just like we want your boss to give you a 20% raise every year without you justifying why you should get it,” Duchow said. “That’s what the schools want, too. I don’t blame them. I would, too, but we can’t do that to our taxpayers.”

According to the Wisconsin Eye on Lobbying website, the Wisconsin Education Association Council has registered against the bill, while the Wisconsin REALTORS Association has registered in favor.

Lawmakers have added new restrictions to school referendum requests before. The 2017-19 state budget limited scheduling of a referendum requests to only two per year and only allowed them to be held on regularly scheduled election days.

“It used to be that referendums could be called by a school district at any time, but the Legislature said… we don’t want you to have the option to run so many referendums,” Chapman said. 

Chapman noted in an interview that recurring referendum requests pass at lower rates than other types because it is harder to convince taxpayers. She said voters “know how to handle this” and lawmakers shouldn’t further reach in to restrict district’s options.

“Some districts and some communities want a recurring referendum,” Chapman said. “School districts have the option of asking for recurring and sometimes they do and voters sometimes approve them because they’re asking to fill structural budget holes that are never going to go away. They’re asking for basic operating dollars that they’re going to need in four years.” 

A recent Marquette Law School poll found that Wisconsinites are becoming increasingly concerned with holding down property taxes since 2018 and less favorably inclined toward increasing funding for K-12 public schools. 

Chapman noted that districts also often make nonrecurring referendum requests for recurring costs because they are an easier ask, though this places districts in another difficult position.

“As soon as you go to nonrecurring referendum in this environment with grossly inadequate state funding and state policies to support schools financially, you are now going to be in your own personal fiscal cliff,” Chapman said. “You’re going to have to go again, and probably for more, because your costs have gone up and funding does not keep up with inflation.” 

Bills meant to provide ‘fairness,’ ‘transparency’

Lawmakers, concerned about the MPS referendum, requested a Legislative Fiscal Bureau memo last year that found some school districts in Wisconsin could see a decrease in state aid after the MPS referendum due to the way that equalization aid is calculated.

Equalization aid acts as a form of property tax relief, according to the Wisconsin School Business Officials Association. The amount of aid a district receives from the finite pot of money distributed by the state is determined by a formula that depends on a district’s property wealth, spending and enrollment.

Spending triggered by referendum requests is one factor in determining districts’ equalization aid, and Milwaukee — like other districts with low property wealth per pupil compared to the rest of the state — will receive more state aid per pupil than other districts with higher property wealth per pupil as a result of its increased spending from the referendum.

Chapman noted, however, that all 148 referendum requests for operating expenses in 2024 affect the share of equalization aid districts receive. She also emphasized that it’s not the only factor affecting the amount of aid districts get.

“Some districts have increasing enrollment, which means they’re going to pull more money away from Milwaukee.” Chapman said. “There’s all of these factors that affect every single district, and they intertwine with each other.”

Republicans viewed Milwaukee’s referendum as taking too much from other districts. 

“Is it fair to the students, parents and taxpayers in Waukesha, Madison, Wautoma and others suffer without having the right to cast a vote?” the bill authors Rep. Scott Allen (R-Waukesha) and Sen. Julian Bradley (R-New Berlin) asked in a memo. “Local school referendums should not have a significant negative impact on other districts. Simple fairness demands this type of thinking.”

The lawmakers’ bill would exclude any district referendum request worth more than $50 million from being considered when determining equalization aid. The effect of the bill would be that districts that pass a large referendum would have their aid eligibility reduced, leaving local taxpayers to pay more of the cost. The bill would only apply to districts below a certain property wealth value.

Chapman said the bill would penalize districts for being larger and having lower property wealth and is an example of lawmakers trying to micromanage local entities.

A final bill introduced by Allen and Sen. Rachael Cabral-Guevara (R-Appleton) would require that tax impact information be added to ballots. Currently, referendum ballot questions are required to include the dollar amount of the increase in the levy limit.

Under the bill, referendum questions would also need to include the estimated interest rate and amount of the interest accruing on the bonds, any fees that will be incurred if the bonds are defeased and a “good faith estimate of the dollar amount difference in property taxes on a median-valued, single-family residence located in the local governmental unit that would result from passage of the referendum.” 

Proposal criticisms

Freshman Rep. Christian Phelps (D-Eau Claire) said he wasn’t inclined to support a ban on recurring referendum requests given the inconsistency in state funding. 

“We go through this sort of toxic [state] budget cycle every two years and districts have to levy, and they don’t even know what to plan for, so recurring referendums are obviously a response to that,” Phelps said.

Phelps said the question of fairness is relevant when talking about the referendum process, but the framing of the Republican proposals is misguided, given the state’s over $4 billion budget surplus.

“It is not fair to taxpayers that, depending on what school district you live in, you might have an astronomical property tax bill just to keep that district running. That’s not fair,” Phelps said. He said the state of Wisconsin is “underfunding public schools and not using the taxes people already paid.”

Derek Gottlieb, an associate professor at the University of Northern Colorado and senior research director for School Perceptions, an education research firm, said Republicans appear to be “operating on behalf of the taxpayers across the state who have voted no on school referendums and yet lost and so had their taxes raised anyway.”

“Suddenly, because so many [referendum requests] are passing, homeowners, taxpayers who don’t want to have their taxes raised are saying that this is unfair or we shouldn’t have to have our taxes raised just because everybody in our community wants to raise our taxes and Republicans are coming to the defense of those folks,” Gottlieb said. 

According to the Wisconsin Policy Forum, while the number of requests continues to rise, approval rates have started to decline with the 66.2% approval rate in 2024 being the lowest in a midterm or presidential election year since 2012.

Gottlieb said some of the concerns raised by lawmakers are valid. For example, he said the current terms used to describe referendum questions are “obscure” and unclear.

“Why not just say a permanent referendum and a temporary referendum?” he asked. “You could do a lot to increase the transparency of what people are voting on if you made that little language change.” 

Gottlieb also said that he does have “sympathy” for those who don’t think there should be permanent funding requests, but acknowledged that this would have consequences for districts because it removes predictability in planning.

However, he said he doesn’t agree that the potential for people to move out of a community or into a community in the future should be the deciding factor in funding decisions. 

“That’s a basic feature of any community anywhere,” he said. 

The argument that “it is not a legitimate exercise of public governmental power to make a decision for a community, given the fact that the community will change in the future…is ridiculous,” Gottlieb said. “If that were the case, it would make all public decisions fundamentally illegitimate.”

The increasing number of referendum requests, Gottlieb said, is a sign that revenue limits are set too low, at an amount that is unacceptable to community members. He noted that when operational referendum requests fail, the schools typically cut theater arts, advanced placement coursework, second language instruction, foreign language instruction and other programs that aren’t required by the state.

Chapman called the proposals a “BandAid” on the issues districts are facing that “isn’t even really fixing the problem.” 

“[If] legislators really wanted to protect taxpayers and make sure schools have what they need, they would do something like keep revenue limits inflationary [and] significantly improve the funding for special education, which would help every single kid,” Chapman said.

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Gov. Tony Evers vetoed a Republican bill that would have undone recent testing standards changes. Evers talks to reporters at a WisPolitics. Photo by Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner.

Gov. Tony Evers vetoed a Republican bill Friday that would have undone recent changes to Wisconsin’s state testing standards — taking the state back to those used in 2019 and tying the standards to the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP).

Lawmakers introduced the bill after changes were approved by state Superintendent Jill Underly last year, who said the changes would better align tests with educational standards and were developed with the help of teachers and other stakeholders as a part of a standard process. However, lawmakers accused Underly of lowering standards for kids. Evers had criticized the process for the changes as well, saying that there should have been better communication between Underly and other stakeholders. 

Evers said in his veto message for AB 1 that while he has criticized the processes for the recent changes, he vetoed the bill because he objects to lawmakers “attempts to undermine the constitutional authority and independence of the state superintendent.” 

Evers noted that the state superintendent is responsible for supervising public schools under the Wisconsin State Constitution and the Legislature is overstepping, and lawmakers had opportunities to provide input to the review and revision. The bill, he said, would “essentially strip control over school scoring and standard metrics away” from the superintendent and give it to the Legislature.

Underly said in a statement that she commends the veto. She said the bill was “deeply flawed as it relied on the NAEP – a federal assessment that is currently being cut by the federal government and is not aligned to Wisconsin’s rigorous standards – to influence local school policies. Most importantly, it undermined the authority of the state superintendent as outlined in Wisconsin’s Constitution.” 

Lawmakers used the veto as an opportunity to criticize Evers and incumbent Superintendent Jill Underly — and to call on Wisconsinites to vote her out of office next week. Underly is running for her second term and faces education consultant and school choice advocate Brittany Kinser, who has cited the changes as a reason that she entered the race, on Tuesday. 

Senate Majority Leader Devin LeMahieu said in a statement that Evers “failed” students by vetoing the legislation. 

“In January, the governor slammed State Superintendent Underly for lowering standards, but when he had a chance to fix it he chose politics over students,” LeMahieu said. “If 2025 is going to be the ‘Year of the Kid,’ Wisconsin voters will have to make changes at the Department of Public Instruction.”

Kinser said in a statement that “the decision to restore high standards now rests in the hands of Wisconsin voters” and she would “restore high standards” if elected.

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Brittany Kinser discussed her plans for leading the state education department at a forum with reporters Tuesday. On many issues she said she "is not an expert" and would need to learn more.High school classroom. (Dan Forer | Getty Images)

State Superintendent candidate Brittany Kinser said Tuesday she would support Milwaukee schools and advocate for reform to the state funding formula if elected, but declined to explain what she would specifically advocate for, saying that she needs more information and isn’t an expert.

Kinser, an education consultant, is challenging incumbent Jill Underly for the nonpartisan position in the April 1 election. The state superintendent is responsible for overseeing the state’s 421 public school districts, leading the state Department of Public Instruction and has a seat on the University of Wisconsin Board of Regent.

At an hour-long event hosted by the Milwaukee Press Club, the Rotary Club of Milwaukee and WisPolitics, Kinser answered questions from WisPolitics President Jeff Mayers and the audience about her stances. Both DPI candidates were invited to take part, but Underly declined. The two candidates participated in a conversation hosted by other groups last week.

Kinser has outraised her opponent partially due to the contributions she’s brought in from the Republican Party. According to recent campaign finance filings, Kinser raised $1,859,360 from Feb. 4 through Mar. 17. The Republican Party of Wisconsin contributed $1.65 million, and other political organizations $8,380, while individuals contributed $200,980. 

Underly raised $1,063,866 in the same time period, with $850,000 coming from the Democratic Party of Wisconsin.

Mayers asked Kinser, who has previously called herself a moderate, whether the support makes her “uncomfortable” because she is being cast “as the conservative Republican individual” in the race.

“I’m very thankful for all of my supporters. I’m thankful for the Republicans, the Democrats, the independents who have supported me,” Kinser said.

Kinser spoke to some of the issues that Milwaukee Public Schools, the state’s largest school district, has faced in recent years, including the financial crisis that led to audits by the state, recent results from the “nation’s report card” that show wide racial achievement gaps in the district, and reports of lead in schools. Kinser, who has worked in the charter school sector in Milwaukee in the past and is from Wauwatosa, has repeatedly criticized her opponent for problems in the district.

Kinser said she thinks some of the problems are a result of the governance and leadership of the district and said she is excited about the recently hired MPS superintendent. 

Brenda Cassellius, a former superintendent of Boston Public Schools and former Commissioner of the Minnesota Department of Education, started her tenure earlier this month — taking over a vacancy left by the former superintendent who resigned after details emerged of a financial crisis at the district.

“We all need to support her because her successes are children’s success, so we need to make sure that she has the support she needs,” Kinser said. 

She said she hasn’t spoken to Cassellius yet.

“I’ve been a little busy, but I hope to meet her,” Kinser said. “If I get elected, she’ll be definitely on the top of my list to reach out to.”

Kinser said that she hopes Cassellius will “create very clear goals on what she wants to see with operations and academics, financials, and that she can meet those goals.” If the problems persist after some time, that would be the time for the state to step in, she said. 

Kinser said she hasn’t supported splitting up the district — as Republicans have proposed in the past — but she would be open to discussing the possibility. 

“I think that would actually cause more bureaucracy,” Kinser said. “If that’s what the community wanted, I’d be supportive as long as we could show the kids would have better results, that kids can learn how to read, they’re not going to be poisoned by lead — all of those things.”

Kinser said she wants to open a DPI office in Milwaukee to work with the district. 

When it comes to funding, Kinser said MPS gets a lot of money per child, but said special education is underfunded. 

“I want to make sure we have an increase,” Kinser said. She has said that she thinks the current reimbursement model for special education costs is outdated and would want to look to other states to see if there is another way to do it.

Kinser again said that she would want to help modernize the state funding formula, but she didn’t provide specific suggestions. She said she would want to look at other states and consult with others when asked about her ideas for modernizing the funding formula. She named Florida, Colorado as states with funding models she would want to look at.

“I would hire someone to help me do this work because I am not a financial expert in school funding and so would have to look and see what they’re doing in other states,” Kinser said.

She also emphasized that the ultimate decision wouldn’t be made by the state superintendent.

“We could provide ideas. The Legislature and the governor have to sign off. I’m not a lawmaker,” Kinser said. “People talk about this role as if it were a lawmaker.”

While the state superintendent recommends an education budget, the final proposal comes from the governor’s office. For the 2025-27 budget, which state lawmakers will take up starting in April, Underly submitted a proposal to increase public education by $4 billion. Gov. Tony Evers trimmed that back to more than $3 billion before submitting his draft budget. 

Kinser declined to weigh in on whether Evers’ recommendation was “right or wrong.” 

“I haven’t created my own state budget,” said Kinser, who is making her first run for public office. “I just started this 100 days ago, but I would want to make sure that it’s something that is possible because you want to be taken seriously by the Legislature and the governor.”

Across the state, many school districts have held referendum votes in the last couple of years to increase local property taxes, covering budget shortfalls. 

Kinser said she agrees there are too many referendums, but also said she hadn’t thought about whether the state is relying too much on property taxes for school funding. Asked if the state should rely more on sales tax or the income tax to fund schools, Kinser said she thinks the state would probably need to rely on both.

“I don’t know. Like I’m telling you, I’m not an expert in that,” Kinser said. “I promise to learn more about it [and] try to find the best way for communities, but I don’t want to say something that I’m not an expert in.” 

She added that she would seek advice on such matters. “I promise to have experts around me to answer these questions that you’re [asking], talk with Republicans, Democrats, independents, anyone that owns a home, that has children, worried about their kids,” Kinser said. 

Kinser has never held a teacher’s license in Wisconsin, and she recently updated her Wisconsin administrator’s license after a Milwaukee Journal Sentinel report that her license had lapsed in 2024.

She emphasized that there is no requirement in state law that the state superintendent hold a teacher’s or administrator’s license

“We’re not trying to be a teacher or a principal in the school. You don’t need that. You just need to be a citizen of Wisconsin,” Kinser said. She added that she has a varied background with experience as a special education teacher as well as a charter school principal and leader, but that getting licensed in Wisconsin was difficult.

Kinser, who supports school choice and has lobbied for increased funding to voucher schools, was also asked about a report from the Journal Sentinel published Tuesday morning. The report found that a Milwaukee-based virtual private school received millions of dollars from the state despite being virtual — blurring the lines between the state voucher program, which uses state funds to send students to private and charter schools, and homeschooling, which isn’t eligible for state funding.

“Does that bother you as an educator that there’s this virtual school that’s getting this much state money?” Mayer asked.

“I would have to look into this,” Kinser said. “I did not read the article today. I was not made aware. Sounds like there’s some controversy there.”

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Sen. Mary Felzkowski (R-Tomahawk) said she thought there were “worthy” projects in the proposal but criticized the $3.85 billion in bonding to pay for the projects. Gov. Tony Evers delivers his seventh State of the State address while standing in front of Assembly Speaker Robin Vos and Felzkowski. Photo by Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner

The State Building Commission is not recommending Gov. Tony Evers’ $4.1 billion capital projects proposal to the budget committee after Republican lawmakers voted against doing so saying that it wasn’t realistic and wasn’t created in a bipartisan manner.

The State Building Commission is made up of eight members including Evers, four Republican lawmakers, two Democratic lawmakers and one citizen member appointed to the body by Evers. The votes on each section of the capital projects budget was split down the middle, with Republicans all opposed. The outcome was expected as Republicans have said they plan to create their own proposal. 

Evers’ proposal includes nearly $1.6 billion in projects for the University of Wisconsin System, $634 million to the Department of Corrections, $195 million for health facilities, $170 million for Department of Veterans Affairs’ projects, $164 million in projects requested for the Department of Natural Resources and investments in other areas. 

Sen. Mary Felzkowski (R-Tomahawk) said she thought there were “worthy” projects in the proposal but criticized the $3.85 billion in bonding to pay for the projects.

“This is more new bonding in this capital budget than the last five capital budgets combined, and I think to get to a more appropriate level, further discussion is needed,” Felzkowski said. “We need to hear from stakeholders and the public and that just hasn’t happened.” 

Sen. Andre Jacque (R-New Franken) said that he thinks lawmakers and Evers will be able to find some agreement, but argued that “shoehorning” money at the moment for projects will “limit the ability to have some of those discussions, or in some cases might prejudice the [Joint Finance] Committee against whatever we might do here.” 

Evers’ ambitious proposal for reforming the state’s prisons would include infrastructure upgrades and capital improvements to Waupun Correctional Institution, Lincoln Hills School, Stanley Correctional Institution, Sanger B. Powers Correctional Center and John C. Burke Correctional Center. The projects are planned to be carried out one after the other and culminate in the closing of the Green Bay Correctional Institution.

Felzkowski said she was “very saddened” about the corrections proposal and called it a “missed opportunity” for a bipartisan solution. 

“There’s quite a few of us in this Legislature who have worked diligently for corrections reform, and so much of the DOC capital budget rests on the changes to policy around corrections reform,” Felzkowski told Evers. Republican lawmakers have expressed opposition to proposals in the corrections budget that would increase early release. 

“We could have been brought in earlier to discuss the changes or even when you had brought in a consultant around corrections, I would have loved to have been able to work with them and to help bring my side of the aisle into the reform process,” Felzkowski said. 

The Joint Finance Committee, which is responsible for writing the budget, will kick off its work next week with briefings from the University of Wisconsin System and the Department of Corrections. Public listening sessions will then take place starting next week with lawmakers traveling to Kaukauna on April 2 and West Allis on April 4.

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Rep. Barbara Dittrich (R-Oconomowoc) speaking during floor debate Thursday. Photo by Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner.

The Wisconsin State Assembly passed several bills Thursday that target transgender youth in sports, their medical care and decisions on pronouns and names used in school. 

The bills are part of a national wave of actions targeting transgender people that have been taken since President Donald Trump took office. According to the Trans Legislation Tracker, 796 bills have been introduced across the country in 2025. 

Hearings on the bills over the last two weeks were emotional and lengthy, lasting over 20 hours, with the vast majority of people testifying against the bills. Republicans dismissed the public feedback, saying the policies are popular. They cited recent surveys, including a Marquette Law School poll that found 71% of U.S. adults favor requiring transgender athletes compete on teams that match the sex they were assigned at birth.

It’s unlikely the bills will become law as Gov. Tony Evers has vetoed similar bills in the past and vowed to veto any legislation targeting LGBTQ+ youth. 

Assembly Speaker Robin Vos (R-Rochester) said lawmakers were still pursuing the bills because they provide an opportunity for the public to tell Evers what it thinks.

“At some point you would hope that public pressure would convince Gov. Evers that he has to change his stance,” Vos said. “We have seen some brave Democrats across the country realize that their party has veered way too far to the left, and then if they want to win elections again, and they want to be on the side of the public, they’re going to change their stance.” 

When asked what he made of the overwhelming opposition to the bills at hearings, Vos referenced a saying by former Wisconsin Gov. Lee Dreyfus that Madison is “30 square miles surrounded by reality.”

“If you look at where the most part of Wisconsin is, I think everywhere there’s broad bipartisan support,” Vos said. The area surrounding the Capitol “is the one place where the majority of people think that it’s OK to mutilate your kids. It’s OK to have women never win another sporting event. Yes, did they succeed in getting a couple dozen people to come and testify? Yes, they did and to that, they deserve the credit, but the reality is, we had elections. This was an issue.”

Since the 2024 elections, some Democrats across the country, including U.S. Rep. Seth Moulton of Massachusetts and California Gov. Gavin Newsom, have challenged other Democrats’ positions on policies related to transgender people. Wisconsin Democrats were mostly united against the bills, giving impassioned speeches about how the bills would do more harm than good and citing testimony delivered at the hearings.

Assembly Minority Leader Greta Neubauer (D-Racine) said that denying children health care is a “new low” and accused Republicans of proposing the legislation in order to create a political issue and rile up their own base.

“We are here because the majority party is trying to gain an advantage in the Supreme Court election by bullying kids. We know it. You know it. It’s mean-spirited, and it’s not helping people of Wisconsin,” Neubauer said.

One Democrat, Rep. Russell Goodwin (D-Milwaukee), joined Republicans voting in favor of AB 100, which would ban transgender girls in Wisconsin K-12 schools from participating on teams that reflect their gender identity. 

AB 102, which would ban transgender women attending UW System schools and Wisconsin technical colleges from participating on women’s teams, passed 50-43 along party lines. Goodwin left before voting  on that bill or any of the other bills on the calendar.

Rep. Barbara Dittrich (R-Oconomowoc) said the sports bills are needed to fill the “gaps” left by recent policy updates by the Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association and the National Collegiate Athletic Association, which recently barred transgender girl athletes from competing on teams that don’t correspond with their sex at birth. The changes came in reaction to an executive order signed by Trump.

The bill was amended to explicitly exclude transgender women from locker rooms and shower areas as well. 

Dittrich said the bills are about fairness and inclusion for women, saying that a co-ed option for teams is included.

“If you want to play with boys, have at it, there’s a co-ed track for you to do that,” Dittrich said.

Rep. Angelina Cruz (D-Racine) and Rep. Angela Stroud (D-Ashland) questioned how the legislation would be enforced. 

“This bill would inflict harm on girls. This bill is an attack on girls. This bill is about exclusion and not protection. This bill does not contemplate enforcement mechanisms — raising concerns about girls’ privacy,” Cruz said. “It is unclear whether the bill would require them to answer intrusive questions about their bodies or undergo physical exams.” 

Stroud said it would likely require people to carry documents to avoid harassment and discrimination. She said the bill wouldn’t help women as a group. 

“One of the reasons we so often celebrate Title IX is because sports have allowed women to defy narrow definitions of acceptable femininity. We could be strong. We could be aggressive. We could be tough. We could be leaders,” Stroud said. “No woman is benefited by narrowing the definition of what counts as being a real woman.” 

Several Republicans complained throughout the debate about “name-calling” and harsh words that were said to them during hearings.

“The only bullying I saw was coming from the trans community,” Dittrich said, adding that she was physically threatened, called a Nazi and had to be escorted to her car from her office. She added that there were “vile” comments posted about her and her family on social media.

AB 103 would require school districts to implement policies that require a parent’s written permission for school employees to use names or pronouns different from a student’s legal name. There is one exception in the bill for a nickname that is a shortened version of a student’s legal first or middle name. The bill passed 50-43 along party lines.

Dittrich, the author of the bill, said it is necessary for parents to be included in those decisions.

“We don’t want to divide between home and school,” Dittrich said. “This is meant to heal that.”

AB 104 would ban gender-affirming care, including the prescribing of puberty-blocking drugs or gender-affirming surgery, for those under 18. It would also require revocation of a medical provider’s license found to be providing the care. It passed 50-43 with Democrats against and Republicans in favor. 

Republican lawmakers said that the bill is necessary because children often change their minds about things, and shouldn’t make medical decisions that cannot be reversed. 

“It would be a failure on our part to allow children to make life-altering decisions, decisions that they will have to live with for the rest of their life, even when that choice is made with parental support,” Rep. Rick Gundrum (R-Slinger) said. 

Gender-affirming medical care is often a lengthy, multi-step process. For those under 18, it typically focuses on pubertal suppression or hormone therapy and surgeries are extremely rare for those under 18, according to KFF. Decisions in the process are made with the input of children, their families and health care providers, including mental health providers. 

Rep. Francesca Hong (D-Madison) said her office had gotten many calls from people who have concerns about the actions lawmakers are taking, including a Wisconsinite she said was “afraid that standing up for trans people would result in retaliation to her business.”

Hong said the bill is “deeply shameful” and she was “embarrassed” to be there as the Assembly passed it.

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Brittany Kinser headshot. Photo: courtesy of campaign. State Superintendent Jill Underly speaking at a rally in the Capitol. Photo: Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner.

State superintendent candidates, incumbent Jill Underly and education consultant Brittany Kinser, answered questions about public school funding, the state’s voucher program and working with the Legislature during an online forum Wednesday evening.

The forum was hosted by the Wisconsin Public Education Network (WPEN), the NAACP, the League of Women’s Voters and Wisconsin Early Childhood Action Needed and moderated by Kevin Lawrence Henry, Jr., Associate Professor of Educational Leadership and Policy Analysis at UW-Madison.

The race for the nonpartisan office will appear on voters’ ballots April 1 alongside the high-profile state Supreme Court race. The state superintendent is responsible for overseeing Wisconsin’s 421 public school districts and leading the Department of Public Instruction (DPI), which administers state and federal funds, licenses teachers, develops educational curriculum and state assessments and advocates for public education.

Underly, who was elected to her first term in 2021, said she has the relationships, experiences and “deep knowledge of what it takes to lead Wisconsin’s public schools.” She said that she is “100% pro public school” and said that improvements have been made to Wisconsin’s education system, but there is more work to be done. 

Kinser said that her “vision for Wisconsin education is that 95% of children will be able to read well enough to go to college, have a career or a meaningful job or master of trade” and is running “to restore our high standards.” She referenced the recent changes approved by Underly in 2024 to state testing standards, but this was the only mention of what has become a major issue among the candidates and state lawmakers who have launched an audit into the changes and passed a bill to reverse them.

Both candidates said the state’s educational gaps must be addressed, but had varying answers on how to do that. According to the 2024 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), about three out of every 10 fourth graders and eighth graders were at or above proficient levels. 

“We have got to take accountability at the state level for how our children are learning or not learning… This is a crisis,” Kinser said. “That’s why I got into this race. We have got to hold ourselves accountable. We have got to make it transparent. We have to make sure that it’s easy for all of us to know the information right now.”

Kinser said she has been researching some of the best practices around the country and wants to bring “more transparency and predictability” to DPI. 

Underly said the gaps are “absolutely unacceptable.” She said they know how to solve the problem but that “it takes money and it takes effort.” 

Both candidates said they would want to look at the state’s funding formula for schools, though Underly said that the state’s school choice program, which allows students to attend private and independent charter schools using public dollars, is draining needed resources from public schools and making problems worse. 

“It goes back 30-plus years to [former Gov.] Tommy Thompson and his effort to defund public schools and send funding to unaccountable voucher schools, and this goes back to the refusal of the Legislature to fund public schools and the efforts that they make to defund public schools,” Underly said. “I say, give us the tools we need to do the work, and we can get it done.”

Underly added that she would have to sue if the Legislature continued not investing in schools, as required by the state constitution.

Kinser said that she would also want to look at the funding formula. She said that throughout her campaign she has learned that most people agree that the funding formula is “broken” and is in need of “an upgrade.” She also said that she would be interested in examining whether there is a better way to fund special education costs other than through the current reimbursement system. 

“Schools are operating with limited resources, are concerned and tired of actually paying the referendums,” Kinser said. “Wisconsin’s funding formula needs to be modernized, and I promise to be a leader in that… I have relationships on both sides of the aisle and rapport with the governor’s office. We have to make sure that it’s updated.” 

Underly said that she has worked to develop relationships with legislators, and has worked to “foster productive dialogue, even when we don’t agree.” She noted that collaboration between DPI and the Legislature helped get Act 20, a law that implemented new literacy requirements, passed.

Kinser took credit for helping get Act 11 passed in 2023. The bill provided a historic funding increase to independent charter schools and private schools participating in the Parental Choice Programs and raised the revenue ceiling for public schools to $11,000 for the 2023-24 school year.

“It was the Republicans plus five Democrats in Milwaukee,” Kinser said about the lawmakers who supported the bill. “The governor’s office signed that bill, so it was a group effort to get more funding for all the schools and then some other areas that the governor prioritized.”

Kinser, during her time at the City Forward Collective, a Milwaukee-based school choice advocacy group, lobbied for a bill that increased funding to Wisconsin voucher schools.

While most of the conversation throughout the forum was cordial, the candidates butted heads at the end over Kinser’s lack of a teacher’s license and her support of the state’s choice program. 

A report from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel in early February found that Kinser has never had a teacher’s license in Wisconsin and had let her administrator’s license lapse.  

“I don’t believe she fully understands how public schools work in Wisconsin,” Underly said. “She’s made this claim routinely, for example, that only three in 10, or 30 percent of kids, are able to read, or that they’re college ready, and that makes absolutely no sense. We’ve made incredible gains in Wisconsin — how can we be sixth in the nation? And I think my vision has had a lot to do with that.”

Underly also underscored Kinser’s background as a lobbyist advocating for school vouchers and independent charter schools. 

Kinser pushed back noting her varying experiences in the education field including a decade in Chicago Public Schools as a special education teacher and at the district level and about a decade as a principal and in leadership at a charter school in Milwaukee. She also clarified that she recently retained a license again.

“I paid the $185 to update my license… It was so difficult to move my license in from New York and Illinois to Wisconsin,” Kinser said. “I would hope Dr. Underly would understand this as she has said she understands that the teacher shortage is real.”

According to state records, DPI received Kinser’s application and payment on Feb. 25.

Kinser also said the claim that she is a school “privatizer” isn’t true, although she supports school choice. She said when it came to funding she was “lobbying for equal funding for all of our children.”

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The Wisconsin State Senate takes up a bill Tuesday that would tie Wisconsin student test scores to standards set by a federal agency President Donald Trump has promised to gut. 

Lawmakers introduced the bill — AB 1 and its companion bill SB 18 — in reaction to changes the state Department of Public Instruction made last year to testing standards. Those changes included unlinking the standards from the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) — also known as the “nation’s report card” — and changing the cut scores and terminology used for achievement levels. 

The bill would reverse the changes — requiring testing standards to go back to those used in 2019 and would require standards to be tied to the NAEP. Republican lawmakers have said the changes by DPI “lowered” the state’s academic standards.

“Let’s roll back to the standards that we had prior to the pandemic and move those forward as a way to gauge how our students are doing,” Rep. Robert Wittke (R-Caledonia) said at a hearing last week. 

The Department of Public Instruction (DPI) has denied the changes lowered standards, saying the changes align assessment cut scores to Wisconsin academic standards. After the Assembly passed the bill last month, threats to the federal agency that oversees NAEP have increased.

The NAEP is a congressionally mandated, representative assessment administered nationally to measure what students across the United States know and can do. The test assesses students in the fourth, eighth and 12th grade in various subjects, including reading and math, though not every student takes the NAEP. 

The National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), which was first established in 1867 to collect and report information about education for the nation, is responsible for administering the NAEP. It became part of the Department of Education after the agency was created in 1979.

The agency has been affected by the Trump administration’s moves to gut the Department of Education. First, an upcoming math and reading test for 17 year olds was canceled. Peggy Carr, the federal official in charge of the program, was placed on administrative leave. Last week, as a part of vast layoffs in the Department of Education, the statistics agency’s workforce was cut from about 100 employees to three, according to the Hechinger Report.

During a committee hearing on the bill last week, the status of the federal agency was a point of debate between lawmakers. 

Sen. Chris Larson (D-Milwaukee) asked lawmakers if they heard about the recent news and if the purpose of the bill was to say,  “we should not eliminate the nation’s report card.” 

“Would you agree that it’s important?” Larson asked. 

Wittke said that isn’t what the bill is about and said it’s “about Wisconsin standards.” 

“I anticipated this question because I see that in the news everybody’s talking about the education department and what’s being done. They had a $289 billion dollar budget, the things that are being done now are the different administration that’s taking a look at the operation of that,” Wittke said. He said the last standards would be “at least a good starting point for the basis of our standards.” 

“The issue is they’re eliminating it,” Larson said. He quoted an ABC News report in which one employee who was fired from the agency said producing the “nation’s report card” without a full staff “would be the equivalent of manning a 13-person sailboat with a 12-month-old” and isn’t possible.

Jagler countered that NAEP would not be affected by the cuts. 

“If you look deeper into the cuts, NAEP is not affected. NAEP is not affected by what the administration or the education secretary is doing,” Jagler said. He said the independent National Assessment Governing Board, which is responsible for setting NAEP standards, is separate from the NCES. 

“It’s a totally different thing, but I understand what you’re saying, but NAEP will not be affected, which is the heart of this bill,” Jagler said. 

While the National Assessment Governing Board is responsible for setting NAEP policy, it does not administer the test as the National Center for Education Statistics does. According to the NAEP website, the NCES also works to “collect and analyze information and statistics in a manner that meets the highest methodological standards” and “maintain data credibility through its assessment design, collection, analysis, release, and dissemination procedures.”

The DPI’s recent written testimony cites the upheaval within the federal government as one of the top reasons the state education agency opposes the bill. During an Assembly hearing in February the DPI focused on the ways that NAEP and state testing don’t align in defending the decision to uncouple state standards from the national rubric.

“Anyone who follows the daily news from Washington knows that this is only the beginning and what comes next is unknown to say the least. It is clear in this time of massive uncertainty, cuts and disruption at NAEP and the USDE that it is not the time to tie Wisconsin statute to anything related to NAEP,” Deputy State Superintendent Tom McCarthy said in written testimony. “These cancellations will have implications for the accuracy of national-level data.”

The DPI has said that the national report card is helpful to compare students’ performance among states, but is not as helpful for understanding whether students have met the state’s academic standards. During hearings on the bill,  McCarthy explained that in the 2010s many states were moving towards aligning their standards with NAEP, but since that time some states have moved away from the national report card for similar reasons. 

Some of those states include Alaska and New York. Meanwhile, states including Virginia are working to align their standards to NAEP. 

The bill passed the committee on Friday in a 3-2 party line vote, and is on track to pass in the Republican-led Senate Tuesday.

The bill would then go to Gov. Tony Evers, who has been critical of the testing standards changes but has said he will likely veto the legislation because he thinks the DPI should make decisions about state tests.

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Brittany Kinser headshot. Photo: courtesy of campaign. State Superintendent Jill Underly speaking at a rally in the Capitol. Photo: Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner.

Incumbent State Superintendent Jill Underly and education consultant Brittany Kinser, who are competing in the April 1 election to lead  the Department of Public Instruction, will both participate in a virtual forum Wednesday evening. Kinser agreed to join the forum after initially declining, making a meeting of the two candidates appear unlikely ahead of the April 1 election. 

Underly is running for her second term in office on a platform of supporting and investing more funding in public schools. She has the backing of the Democratic Party of Wisconsin. Kinser, an advocate for the state’s school choice program, says she wants to work to improve reading and math education and raise state testing standards. She has the backing of the Wisconsin Republican Party and financial backing from prominent GOP billionaire megadonors. 

A direct conversation between the two candidates seemed unlikely as of last week as Underly declined three invitations and Kinser declined an invitation for a forum hosted by the Wisconsin Public Education Network (WPEN), the NAACP, the League of Women’s Voters and Wisconsin Early Childhood Action Needed. WPEN said in an email about the event that Kinser’s campaign changed its mind and confirmed her appearance “after clearing up some confusion and adjusting the timeline of the event.”

The event is being held online at 7 p.m. on Wednesday and will be moderated by Kevin Lawrence Henry, Jr., Associate Professor of Educational Leadership and Policy Analysis at UW-Madison.

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Lawmakers on the Assembly Health, Aging and Long-Term Care committee weighed what happened during a tense hearing on a bill to ban gender affirming medical care and then voted along party lines to advance the bill. Rep. Lisa Subeck became emotional while speaking to her colleagues. Photo by Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner.

A little over 12 hours after a tense public hearing on a resurrected bill to ban gender affirming medical care for children, lawmakers on the Assembly Health, Aging and Long-Term Care committee weighed what happened and then voted along party lines to advance the bill.

AB 104 would ban gender affirming care, including prescribing puberty-blocking drugs or gender-affirming surgery, for those under 18. It would also require revocation of a medical provider’s license found to be providing the care. It is the fourth bill focused on transgender youth in Wisconsin to receive a hearing over the last two weeks. 

“After sitting through the hearing on this bill yesterday, I would hope some people are taking a step back and saying, wait a minute, maybe this isn’t the route that we should go,” Rep. Lisa Subeck (D-Madison) said during Thursday’s executive session. She noted that one person at the hearing even had a “change of heart.”

Larry Jones of Milwaukee spoke about seven hours into the hearing. Sitting in front of lawmakers, he began apologizing for being there and said he was invited to the hearing to show his support for the bill.

“I have very little knowledge of gay people and things like that there, so when I came here, my eyes were opened,” he said Wednesday at around 9:12 p.m. “I was one of the critics that sat on the side and made the decisions there was only two genders, so I got an education that was unbelievable and I don’t know just exactly how to say this but my perspective for people have changed. I’d like to apologize for being here and I learned a very lot about this group of people.”

Subeck, talking to her colleagues the next day, became emotional as she spoke about the committee’s upcoming vote on the bill.

“The governor is going to veto [the bill]. I feel really good about that,” Subeck said. “I don’t feel so good about the fact that we’re gonna have a vote here where people are gonna vote to support this.” 

Gov. Tony Evers vetoed a similar bill last session, and vowed to LGBTQ+ youth in January to continue vetoing any bill that “makes Wisconsin a less safe, less inclusive, and less welcoming place.”

Subeck said the bill causes harm. It is the latest in a slate of bills focused on LGBTQ+ youth introduced by Republican lawmakers in Wisconsin. The bills come as President Donald Trump has also made targeting transgender people a key point in the first couple months of his term. In a recent survey of Wisconsin LGBTQ+ youth by the Trevor Project, 91% of respondents reported that recent politics negatively impacted their well-being.

Subeck pointed to the emotional testimony lawmakers heard into the night, including from Charlie Werner, a teen, who testified with his parents, Allison and Dan Werner, around 8 p.m. The family was also present in 2023 at a bill hearing and when Gov. Tony Evers vetoed the bill. 

Werner told lawmakers that he was dealing with depression before realizing he was dealing with gender dysphoria. He said that therapy and finding community, especially among other queer and trans people, has “lifted” him.

Werner said the gender affirming care he has received, including puberty blockers and later receiving testosterone, has helped him go “from being so uncomfortable in my body to finally feeling a bit of clarity.” He said the care has allowed him to experience similar traits as his cisgender peers, including a lower voice.

“I finally feel like myself,” Werner said. “Gender affirming care saved my life… I don’t believe you are bad people. I simply think this is what you have been taught, but you still have the opportunity to change and make better decisions for the people that you serve.” 

Subeck had a similar message for her colleagues during the executive session. 

“Many of you I’ve known for a very long time, some of us came into this Legislature together. I know that you’re good people who care. I know that,” Subeck, who has served since 2014, said. “That is why it’s so bothersome to me to think … you can sit in this room and vote for this bill… We’re better than that as a body. This isn’t about doing what’s right.”

Rep. Adam Neylon (R-Pewaukee) said that he used the hearing time to listen and to learn, and pushed back on the idea that the bill is a “judgment on trans people.” Rather, he said, the bill comes from a “conservative approach to medical care that may be irreversible.”

“If you’re accusing us of wanting to be conservative when it comes to the medical care of minors, then that is true…,” Neylon said. “That doesn’t mean we want them dead, right? That doesn’t mean we don’t recognize their right to exist.”

However, Neylon also acknowledged that the bill may not be the exact right approach. 

“It might not be hitting directly where it should and it might come across political and I understand the pain and I wanted to stay [at the hearing] to make sure that people had an opportunity to share their things…,” Neylon said. “I would be angry if I was young too, but it’s not coming from a place of saying, like trying to other them or saying, like, you don’t belong in our society.”

Committee Chair Rep. Clint Moses said that the hearing was beginning to become unproductive because of “political theater” as some members were being yelled at. He had two people removed by officers from the committee room for yelling during the hearing. 

Throughout the hearing, there were moments of frustration for both lawmakers and members of the public who came to speak.

One of those moments came a little over 6 hours and 18 minutes into the hearing when FAIR Wisconsin Executive Director Abigail Swetz finally got her opportunity to speak to lawmakers. She used her time to tell transgender youth in the state that there are “many of us in this state who love you exactly as you are and exactly as you are becoming.” She reached the time limit before finishing her comments.

Rep. Tara Johnson (D-Town of Shelby) asked if Swetz had anything she wanted to add. Moses stopped this, saying it wasn’t allowed. Johnson replied that others had done the same earlier. 

Swetz started finishing her comments as the lawmakers went back and forth and others in the room started to clap. Moses then began banging his gavel and threatened to adjourn the meeting if the clapping continued.

Moses told the committee on Thursday that he “was ready to adjourn and just walk out because it was not productive.” He then suggested that members look at the Assembly rules again. 

“The chairman of the committee has a lot of power the way it’s set up, so I try not to abuse it — be a tyrant,” Moses said. “I want to hear from everybody. I don’t care if you agree with me or not. I want all perspectives in there, so I’m doing my best to do it, but yesterday it got a little much, a little much, so I think maybe dial it back on some of these with the theater.” 

Moses said he had to start cutting time because of the number of people who came to speak and how late the hearing was running. 

Johnson said the tension in the room was partially because people had been waiting so long to be heard by lawmakers. 

“Some of the escalation came because they felt disenfranchised,” Johnson said. “They felt like it was very lopsided that the pro-voices were heard at greater length, including when my colleagues also asked questions that extended testimony for very long stretches of time.” 

Hearings on bills focused on transgender youth have often been lengthy and emotional. Last week, a hearing on bills that would mandate how schools deal with transgender athletes and name changes lasted over 10 hours. In 2023, many showed up in opposition to a gender affirming care ban bill.

The hearing Wednesday lasted nearly nine hours, but mostly supporters spoke during the first three hours of the hearing despite being vastly outnumbered by opponents.

According to the record of committee proceedings, there were 79 people who appeared against the bill and 18 who appeared for, including the two bill authors. There were also 17 people who registered in favor of the bill, but didn’t speak and 103 people who registered against, but didn’t speak at the hearing. 

At one point during the hearing, Subeck asked Moses to begin alternating between supporters and opponents of the bill, but he responded by saying that was up to him.

Some opponents to the bill spoke about their frustration with this when they finally got their chance to speak.

“We sit here for all this time, all these people, you’re allowing the anti-trans voices to go first. It feels like the world is stacked against us and we’re getting tired of it,” Cory Neeley said. “My voice is cracking because I’m literally fuming at the fact that I’ve sat here all day long listening to people call me a groomer. People calling me a person who doesn’t care about their children… I’m a good parent.”

Subeck told the Wisconsin Examiner in a call Friday that she has seen chairs put certain voices first before, but the degree to which it was done was “unusual” and “pretty unprecedented.” The first three hours of the hearing were mostly supporters of the bill, aside from Sens. Mark Spreitzer (D-Beloit) and Melissa Ratcliff (D-Cottage Grove).

“Committee chairs often try to, if they can, literally go back and forth, one to one,” Subeck said. “But even if you’re not literally going one for, one against, certainly front loading it so heavily when you have a room full of people there to testify against, including families with children who are going to be impacted by the bill, it certainly felt more like a tactic than a simple oversight.” 

Subeck noted there was some disruption during the hearing and there can be consequences for that.

“I also can’t help but wonder how it could have been different if the chair had actually let some of the folks who were there to testify against the bill testify before we were already a couple of hours into the bill,” Subeck said. “Some of the hateful rhetoric of those early testifiers was directed directly at some of those young people who were coming to testify about how this bill impacted them.”

Moses told lawmakers Thursday he would take the criticism into consideration

“If there’s any issues anyone has, you know, how they’re running? Please come and see me,” Moses said. “We’ll try and work it out privately if I’m still doing it.”

Rep. Rob Brooks (R-Saukville) acknowledged that the conversation about the issue was painful for everyone involved, but he said he thinks the conversation does need to be had. He and Rep. Patrick Snyder (R-Weston) said that an informational hearing, rather than a hearing on a bill, may have been a more “prudent” approach for lawmakers to learn more. 

“You’re right, it’s not going to become law,” Brooks said. “I do think yesterday was beneficial from an educational standpoint for a lot of us, regardless of how you vote. I don’t know how you can’t come out of there a little richer with your knowledge on both sides. I’m going to support the bill.”

The committee voted 10-5 with Republicans for and Democrats against to advance the bill, setting it up to go to the Assembly floor.

Subeck told the Examiner that she was “disappointed and frustrated and upset” Republicans voted for it, saying “they are still putting what is truly partisan motivation… political agenda ahead of the kids and families who came and testified to us.”

However, she said the conversation during the Thursday executive session did give her some hope. 

“In private, legislators have a lot of conversations that don’t reflect the votes that are taken on the floor, and I think the tenor of the conversation in that room was a little bit closer to the conversations that we often have when we are sitting one on one, talking to each other,” Subeck told the Wisconsin Examiner. “It makes me a little bit hopeful, because while my Republican colleagues continue down the path of voting their party line — even when they have said they have things to learn and it gives them pause — the fact that they were willing to even sit in that room, in sort of a public sphere, and have a conversation means that there is room for change.”

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Correction: This story has been updated to correct the number of people that spoke for and against the bill.

Rep. Brent Jacobson (R-Mosinee) said extended supervision, probation and parole are tools that give people a second chance with the expectation that they will not commit other crimes. Screenshot via WisEye.

The Wisconsin Assembly passed a slate of criminal justice related bills Thursday, including a requirement to revoke probation or parole for people charged with crimes and implementing financial penalties if Milwaukee Public Schools doesn’t return police officers to school buildings.  

Republican lawmakers said the bills were necessary to improve public safety in Wisconsin. 

“Wisconsinites in almost every part of our state have seen that there are areas of our state that have sincere and real concerns,” Assembly Speaker Robin Vos (R-Rochester) said during a press conference.

Assembly Minority Leader Greta Neubauer (D-Racine) said during floor debate that lawmakers should be crafting “smart” legislation to ensure people are safe across the state, but that the bills fall short of that goal. She said lawmakers should be focused on investing in safety.

“We can use evidence based, data driven practices to lower recidivism, to save taxpayer dollars and invest in rehabilitation and treatment to keep our communities safe,” Neubauer said. “Democrats are serious about safety, but the majority of bills in front of us today are not.”

Rep. Ryan Clancy said in a statement after the session that lawmakers spent the day on “considering badly written, badly conceived bills that will harm people and waste public resources” and said Republicans were refusing to acknowledge that mass incarceration and prison overcrowding are problems for the state. 

“It’s wildly irresponsible to even consider increasing penalties and interfering with the very few tools of leniency we have with a prison system holding 5,000 more people than intended,” Clancy said. “But here we are.”  

A couple of the bills would implement stricter requirements for dealing with criminal charges for people released from prison. 

AB 85 would require supervising corrections officials to recommend revoking extended supervision, parole or probation for formerly incarcerated people who are charged with a new crime after their release. It passed 53-43.

The Department of Corrections found in a fiscal estimate that the bill would result in approximately 6,280 additional revocation cases each year. It also found that there would be an increase in operations costs by $85 million in the first year of enactment and a permanent increased operations cost of about $245 million after the population is annualized in the second year.

Vos said that the bill should be simple. He said that people who are out on parole have been given the “privilege” of being released from prison. 

“Do you stand with the victim and the public or do you stand with the criminal who has reoffended and given up the privilege that he was briefly granted?” Vos rhetorically asked. “I think the price is worth it — $300 million to keep the people safe.” 

Jacobson said the bill is necessary to address the “revolving door” in the prison system and ensure criminals don’t have the opportunity to victimize people. He said that extended supervision, probation and parole are tools that give people a second chance with the expectation that they will not commit other crimes. 

“In far too many cases, a person released under state supervision continues the behavior that resulted in them going to prison in the first place,” Jacobson said. “It seems like common sense that someone who’s been convicted of a crime, is released under state supervision and returns to committing crimes, should have their release revoked. Far too often that is not the case.” 

Clancy said in his statement that Republicans were “openly misleading the public and their colleagues about the contents and impacts of those bills.” He noted that the bill would be “triggered when someone is merely charged with a crime” but not found guilty.

AB 66 would require prosecutors to get a court’s approval to dismiss certain criminal charges. It passed 53-44.

Rep. Alex Joers (D-Middleton) said the bill would “remove prosecutorial discretion” and impose limits on those trying to uphold the law. 

Jacobson, who authored the bill, argued it would support law enforcement and protect Wisconsinites from being victimized. He noted that Wisconsin law allows prosecutors to dismiss or amend charges or enter into deferred prosecution agreements. 

“In the Legislature, we can pass all the penalties we like. It won’t matter if the justice system won’t apply those penalties,” Jacobson said. The bill, he said, would add an additional layer of oversight and transparency by requiring prosecutors to get court approval to dismiss or amend charges in cases involving one of seven serious crimes. Those include sexual assault, crimes against a child, theft of an automobile, reckless driving resulting in great bodily harm and illegal possession of a firearm by a felon. 

“These crimes leave lasting impacts and it’s our job as officials to take these seriously,” Jacobson said. 

Lawmakers also passed a couple of bills that would increase penalties for certain crimes.

AB 61, which would increase penalties for injuring or killing an animal used by police or firefighters, passed in a voice vote. 

Specifically, the bill would increase injuring an animal to a Class H felony, which is punishable by a fine of up to $10,000 or imprisonment for up to six years. Killing an animal would be increased to a Class G felony, which is punishable by a fine of up to $25,000 or imprisonment for up to 10 years.

AB 86 passed in a voice vote. The bill would increase the penalty for child sex trafficking if the crime involved at least three victims who were children at the time the crime was committed from a Class C felony to a Class A felony. As a Class A felony, the crime could be punished with life imprisonment.

AB 89 would allow multiple acts of theft or retail theft committed by the same person to be prosecuted as a single crime, and the value of the thefts to be combined in determining the penalty. It passed 71-26, with 18 Democrats joining Republicans in support. 

School resource officers in MPS 

Lawmakers also passed AB 91, which would implement financial penalties for Milwaukee Public Schools (MPS) and the city of Milwaukee if either stop complying with a state law that requires police officers in schools.

Wisconsin Act 12, which passed in 2023, provided increased state funding for local governments and also implemented requirements that MPS place 25 officers in its schools by Jan. 1, 2024. The district was late to begin following the law, and a judge recently ordered the district and city to comply with the state law and instructed the district and the city to split the cost for the officers evenly. The Milwaukee Common Council and MPS Board both approved an agreement to make this happen earlier this month. 

The bill was introduced, its sponsors said, to ensure the district complies both now and in the future. 

An amendment to the bill changed the cost-sharing from 25% for the city of Milwaukee and 75% for the district to an even split between the two entities. 

If there is noncompliance, 10% of the city’s shared revenue payment will be withheld by the state and 25% of the school district’s state aid payments would be withheld. 

MPS has not had officers in schools since 2016, and the district ended its contract with the Milwaukee Police Department in 2020 in response to student and community opposition to the practice, a point that Rep. Darrin Madison (D-Milwaukee) pointed out during floor debate. 

Madison said that when he was a student at a school staffed with officers a friend of his had an encounter that left him in the hospital. 

“Two students were fighting. School safety officers came in and de-escalated the situation. As a friend of mine went to go check on his sister, who had been involved in the incident, I got to see school resource officers grab him, lift him in the air and body-slam him on the concrete of our lunchroom floor,” Madison said. “His shoulder was dislocated and his lip was busted, and he had to undergo surgery to navigate that situation. That wasn’t the only time that this happened in our school, where students were harmed by school resource officers.”

Madison said police officers in schools are a “failed approach.” 

“Thanks to Act 12, and thanks to this bill. We’ll continue to create harms for our students… Our schools shouldn’t look like prisons. They shouldn’t work like prisons, and we shouldn’t treat students like prisoners in a space of learning, creativity and exploration. This takes Milwaukee schools in a bad direction.”

Clancy pointed out that MPS is not the only school district without officers in schools. Some other districts are Madison Metropolitan School District, Sherwood, Nicolet, Glendale River Hills.

“This is an attack on Milwaukee, and this is an attack specifically on the Black, brown, and Indigenous young people,” Clancy said. 

Bill author Rep. Bob Donovan (R-Greenfield) said that the bill is needed because Milwaukee schools continue to call the police to deal with incidents. He cited a recent Milwaukee Journal Sentinel report that found MPS averaged 3,700 police calls each year over 11 years. 

“If MPS doesn’t want cops in their schools, why do they keep calling them?” Donovan said. 

“Some say that this legislation or the penalties are not necessary. What is the alternative? The state just allow open defiance of state law? It took an MPS parent to sue the district before any movement was made,” Donovan said. “This legislation ensures this never happens again… There must be consequences for breaking the law, and how can we expect MPS to teach our children respect for authority and the rule of law when they apparently have none themselves.” 

Other bills passed include

• AB 75 to require the state Department of Justice to collect and report a list of facts about each criminal case filed in Wisconsin. It passed 54-43. Rep. Russell Goodwin (D-Milwaukee) joined the Republicans in voting for the bill. 
• AB 87 to require a person convicted of child trafficking to pay restitution immediately, and would authorize the seizure of their assets in lieu of payment. It also would require that anyone convicted of a felony must pay all outstanding financial obligations from their conviction before their right to vote is restored. It passed 53-44.

• AB 74 to require public school boards, private school governing bodies and charter school operators to notify the parent or guardian of a student who is an alleged victim or target of a school employee’s sexual misconduct. It passed in a voice vote.
• AB 78 to allow municipalities to impound a reckless driver’s vehicle whether or not it belongs to the driver. It also requires police to determine if the vehicle has been reported stolen, and if it has been, to release it to the original owner at no cost. It passed in a voice vote.

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An empty high school classroom. (Dan Forer | Getty Images)

It’s unlikely the candidates for state Superintendent will debate ahead of the April 1 election with incumbent Jill Underly turning down three opportunities and education consultant Brittany Kinser declining one. 

The race for the nonpartisan state superintendent will appear on voters’ ballots alongside the high-profile state Supreme Court race. While the race is not as high profile as the campaign for Supreme Court, the results will be consequential for education in Wisconsin. The winner will be responsible for overseeing Wisconsin’s 421 public school districts and leading the Department of Public Instruction (DPI) — an agency whose responsibilities include administering state and federal funds, licensing teachers, developing educational curriculum and state assessments and advocating for public education.

Underly, who is running for her second term in office, is running on a platform of advocating for the state’s public schools and has the support and financial backing of the Democratic Party of Wisconsin. Kinser, who is running on a platform of improving reading and math education, is a school choice advocate and has the backing of Republicans, with financial support from the Republican Party of Wisconsin and backing from billionaire Republican mega-donors.

Underly, after missing a Wispolitics forum ahead of the primary, told the Examiner that February was a busy month and she would be open to attending a forum in March before the primary. The day of the Wispolitics meeting Underly said that she had to attend a meeting of the UW Board of Regents and also attended a press conference about federal payments not going out to Head Start programs. 

“March is not as busy,” Underly said at the time. “I have other meetings and things that are standard, but like, February is just unreasonable… You’re traveling so much and you’ve got a lot of obligations, so it’s hard right now, so yes, you know, next month, if there are forums and I don’t have a standing conflict.”

Since the primary, Underly has declined three debate opportunities. 

The Milwaukee Press Club along with WisPolitics and the Rotary Club of Milwaukee will host an event March 25, and said it invited both candidates to participate but Underly’s campaign spokesperson said she was unavailable. 

Marquette Law School’s Lubar Center for Public Policy Research and Civic Education will host an event with Kinser on Thursday. Kevin Conway, Associate Director of University Communication, said the center extended invitations to both candidates for a general election debate ahead of the February primary. 

“While all candidates agreed in concept, the Lubar Center was subsequently unable to confirm a program time with the Underly campaign,” Conway said. “Given the circumstances, the Lubar Center pivoted to offering “Get to Know” programs to both candidates, and the Kinser campaign accepted.”

WISN-12 had invited both candidates a chance to debate on UpFront, the channel’s Sunday public affairs program. 

“So far, we cannot get both candidates to agree on a date,” WISN 12 News Director Matt Sinn said in an email.

Underly said in a statement to the Examiner that her job as superintendent “requires every minute I can give it, which means making choices which matter the most for our kids’ future, and advocating on their behalf every single day.” 

Underly has agreed to a forum being hosted by the Wisconsin Public Education Network, a nonpartisan public education advocacy group, and the NAACP. 

“Unfortunately the dates did not work for other debates, but we were able to agree to the Wisconsin Public Education Network forum, which is the forum for the education community,” she said. 

WPEN Executive Director Heather DuBois Bourenane said WPEN had communicated with all of the candidates about a general election forum before the primary and the NAACP followed up with Kinser after the primary. 

Kinser’s campaign ended up declining.

DuBois Bourenane told the Examiner that the group is hoping Kinser will reconsider, noting that they want to have a “fair and friendly” conversation with the candidates to talk about their “vision for Wisconsin kids.” She said the League of Women Voters was also supposed to cohost the event, but the group doesn’t sponsor events where only one candidate participates. 

“It’s unfortunate that voters aren’t going to have an opportunity to hear from the candidates directly,” DuBois Bourenane said. “We hope Ms. Kinser will reconsider… We would love to have her at the event, and as we said in our email, make every effort to make sure that it’s fair and that the questions reflect the concerns that are most pressing to Wisconsin kids.”

Underly said that Kinser’s decision to decline “speaks volumes that after working for years to defund public schools she doesn’t want to show up and answer questions from public school advocates.”

Kinser’s campaign noted Underly declined each forum being hosted by members of the press, and accused Underly of “hiding.” 

“Wisconsinites deserve to hear from the candidates who will be responsible for our children’s future. Brittany Kinser has, when possible, made herself available to any organization, group, or voter who wants to learn more about her plans to restore high standards so every student can read, write, and do math well,” the campaign stated, adding that Kinser would continue meeting with voters ahead of Election Day.

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Transgender flags being held by people during a demonstration. (Getty Images)

Republican and Democratic lawmakers engaged in heated back and forth during a Wednesday hearing on a bill that would ban gender-affirming medical care for Wisconsin youth.

The bill is among an increasing number of anti-trans bills being introduced across the country, and it’s the fourth bill related to transgender youth to get a hearing in the Wisconsin Assembly in the last two weeks.

According to the Trans Legislation Tracker, 738 bills have been introduced across the country in 2025. The increase in bills comes as President Donald Trump has signed a series of executive orders that target transgender people as well as gender-affirming care. 

Bill authors Sen. Cory Tomczyk (R-Mosinee) and Rep. Scott Allen (R-Waukesha) said they just want to “protect” children.  

“I am not here to tell any adult what he or she should do with his or her own body,” Tomczyk said. “A person who is 18 years of age or older has the ability to get a tattoo, get married, buy a gun, serve his or her country… without receiving permission from someone else. Getting irreversible gender reassignment surgery is another one of those things.”

The bill — AB 104 — would ban gender-affirming care for people under the age of 18. It would prohibit health care providers from engaging in or making referrals for medical intervention “if done for the purpose of changing the minor’s body to correspond to a sex that is discordant with the minor’s biological sex,” including prescribing puberty-blocking drugs or gender-affirming surgery for minors.

The bill includes a handful of exceptions — including if a “health care provider is providing a service in accordance with a good faith medical decision of a parent or guardian of a minor born with a medically verifiable genetic disorder of sex development” — but is otherwise a general ban on the care.

Under the bill, health care providers could be investigated if there are allegations that they have provided this type of care to a minor and could have their licenses revoked by the Board of Nursing, the Medical Examining Board or the Physician Assistant Affiliated Credentialing Board if the investigation finds that they did. 

Tomczyk said he wasn’t introducing the bill to “demonize” the transgender community — a comment that received groans and pushback from others at the hearing. “But as you can hear from the reaction from the gallery, I’m going to be accused of that.”

“Boo! Ridiculous!” one person called out after his testimony.

Committee chair Rep. Clint Moses (R-Menomonie) tried to keep the room calm — telling people not to jeer or boo or hold up signs. Throughout the hearing, he had a couple of people removed from the room by police.

Democratic lawmakers sharply criticized the bill, saying lawmakers did not have the experience or medical knowledge to interfere with decisions being made by families and medical providers and were causing harm by introducing the legislation.

“Do any of you have any training or background in the medical field, practitioners or have other training that I might not be aware of?” Rep. Lisa Subeck (D-Madison) asked the authors.

“I find the question irrelevant,” Allen said. 

“I just have a degree in common sense,” Tomczyk quipped. 

“Knowing that physicians follow what is considered the standard of care and that is set forth by organizations like the American Academy of Pediatrics … why is it that on this particular issue we should substitute the judgment of legislators for the judgement of physicians and families?” Subeck asked. 

“Did you listen to my testimony?” Tomczyck said. “I think we have a responsibility to protect these children under 18 and let them get to 18 to the point where legally they can then make that decision.”

According to KFF, receiving gender-affirming care is a lengthy, meticulous process, and for those under 18, decisions in the process are made with the input of the child, their families and health care providers, including mental health providers. Gender-affirming medical care before 18 mostly focuses on pubertal suppression or hormone therapy.

Surgeries are rare for those under 18. UW Health does not perform genital surgery on transgender girls or boys under 18. UW Health may consider performing chest masculinization, or “top,” surgery for patients under 18 “only after multidisciplinary evaluation, a letter of support from your mental health provider and with informed consent from all legal guardians,” according to a Wisconsin Watch report. 

A 2024 study published by JAMA Network found that transgender teenagers who have pursued medical interventions, including puberty blockers and hormones, have high levels of satisfaction and low levels of regret, with an overwhelming majority — 97% — continuing to access gender-affirming medical care.

Rep. Renuka Mayadev (D-Madison) asked lawmakers why they aren’t trying to solve any real problems and noted that the bill could contribute to increased hate towards transgender people. She pointed to  the case of Sam Nordquist, a 24-year-old transgender man from Minnesota recently killed in New York. 

“There’s a transgender man, who was tortured and assaulted and beaten to death. He was beaten because of the hate that people have, and I want to know why aren’t we protecting people like Sam?” Mayadev asked. “[The bill] is not solving any problems. It’s meddling in the patient, doctor relationship.” 

The lawmakers asked if the crime happened in Wisconsin and noted that it happened to an adult and they are focused on children. 

This is the third time the legislation has been introduced. Last session, a similar bill was vetoed by Gov. Tony Evers, who then vowed to reject any further legislation targeting LGBTQ+ youth.

Allen said he expects “victory” for the bill, saying that public opinion can change over time. 

“I’ve seen bills in the body — session after session after session after session — where the author refuses to give up because they believe that it’s a good idea,” Allen said. “I think that’s our responsibility as legislators, to represent our constituency and advocate for what we think is the right thing. We may not have popular opinion on our side, not at some point in time maybe we will.”

Allen said that the idea for the policy came from the Family Policy Alliance, a conservative Christian organization that has advocated for anti-trans legislation across the country.

Some of those that testified in favor of the bill included Do No Harm, a lobbying group that opposes gender-affirming medical care as well as diversity, equity and inclusion, Moms For Liberty, Wisconsin Family Action and Gays Against Groomers.

Groups registered against the bill include the American Civil Liberties Union of Wisconsin Inc, Children’s Hospital of Wisconsin, Fair Wisconsin Inc., Medical College of Wisconsin, Pharmacy Society of Wisconsin, Planned Parenthood Advocates of Wisconsin, Wisconsin Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics, Wisconsin Coalition Against Sexual Assault, Wisconsin Council of Churches and the Wisconsin Medical Society.

Sen. Mark Spreitzer (D-Beloit) and Sen. Melissa Ratcliff (D-Cottage Grove) called the bill “cruel” and said it would take the state backwards in time. Ratcliff, whose son is trans, said that he “would not be the thriving adult he is today without having the access to the care that allowed him to live his life as his authentic self.” 

“Why we would want to take away a parent’s ability to provide their children with life-saving care and also restrict their ability to access information to help their child be healthy and happy — it’s beyond me,” Ratcliff said. 

Spreitzer noted that the bill is part of a package of bills that have received hearings this week and last that are “attempting to roll back that progress to make it harder for transgender young people to grow into flourishing transgender adults.” 

Spreitzer said the bill is not going to become law, but just talking about the bill will have negative effects for some people’s mental health.

In a recent survey of 358 Wisconsin LGBTQ+ youths by the Trevor Project, participants reported significant mental health struggles. About 39% of LGBTQ+ youth surveyed reporting seriously considering suicide, including 44% of transgender and nonbinary youth, and 12% reporting a suicide attempt. In addition, 63% of LGBTQ+ surveyed reported experiencing symptoms of anxiety.

“Not everybody’s going to get that message [that the bill won’t become law],” Spreitzer said. “People are going to be afraid that they are going to lose access to care.” He added that Children’s Wisconsin in Milwaukee recently canceled and then rescheduled some appointments after Trump’s executive order. “This bill only adds to that… It creates a climate of fear.”

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The heads of the DOA and DSPS both spoke with lawmakers Tuesday. Wisconsin State Office Building. Photo by Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner.

The Wisconsin Assembly Government Operations, Accountability, and Transparency (GOAT) Committee questioned leaders of government agencies about telework policies, use of work space and cybersecurity during its first public meeting Tuesday. 

The committee was formed this session to serve as the Wisconsin version of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) project launched by President Donald Trump and led by billionaire Elon Musk. 

There are some similarities between the efforts. The acronyms come from internet pop culture: GOAT refers to the “greatest of all time” and DOGE comes from a 2013 meme and a later cryptocurrency. Both are purported to address potential “waste, fraud and abuse” in government. But whereas Musk and DOGE’s work has been quick and widespread, with attempts to fire thousands of federal employees and a goal of ending $1 trillion in government spending, the GOAT committee is starting off more slowly.

Committee chair Rep. Amanda Nedweski (R-Pleasant Prairie) said that Tuesday’s informational hearing was scheduled due to “increased demand from the public for transparency and efficiency in government” and to look at telework practices in state agencies. She also repeated her intent for the committee to be “very close to the public” and ensure there is transparency for how taxpayers’ money is being used.

The extent of remote work by state employees has been an ongoing point of criticism among Republican lawmakers since the COVID-19 pandemic. Nedweski and Sen. Cory Tomczyk (R-Mosinee) recently introduced a bill to require state agency employees to work in person at state agency offices starting on July 1. 

During the hearing, the committee heard from the Legislative Audit Bureau about a 2023 audit on telework. Hearing witnesses also included leaders of the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction (DPI), Department of Administration (DOA), Department of Safety and Professional Services (DSPS), Department of Health Services (DHS) and the Universities of Wisconsin, as well as some leaders of private businesses. 

Testifying for DPI, Deputy Superintendent Tom McCarthy said that telework policies have been helpful for allowing the agency to hire employees. DPI Superintendent Jill Underly was absent, which Rep. Shae Sortwell (R-Two Rivers) pointed out multiple times during the meeting. 

“We’re never going to compete. We’re never going to be able to punch dollar for dollar at salary for the private sector, especially in IT or high demand fields, so the flexibility that we can provide staff is the thing that continues to allow us to pull larger applicants around the state to some of those very hard to fill jobs,” McCarthy said. 

McCarthy also said the department has made changes since the audit. 

“We are constantly trying to find ways to improve the productivity of our workforce and make sure that we are serving our partners well in the field, as well as taxpayers in general, being available and being current with best practices,” McCarthy said.

One of the biggest changes, he said, was that the agency looked at the amount of time employees were working in-person versus remotely and said they have tied reductions in the amount of time working in person to a reduction in available work space. 

While Nedweski sought to keep conversation focused on telework throughout the hearing, Sortwell, who serves as vice-chair, asked about spending related to a diversity, equity and inclusion conference DPI hosted. Sortwell recently launched inquiries to county and city governments in Wisconsin about their DEI policies.

Nedweski sought to cut that conversation short, however. “We have lots of people here today, totally, and we’re going to try to stay on topic,” she said. 

Department of Administration Secretary-designee Kathy Blumenfeld agreed that allowing more remote work has helped the state fill openings more easily. She said the vacancy rate for the Division of Enterprise Technology, which is the agency’s IT department, dropped from 12% to under 6% after the start of its “Hire Anywhere in Wisconsin” program.

Blumenfeld also noted that the agency has made some changes since the audit by updating its space standards. Permanent desks are reserved for employees who typically need to be in the office three days a week, she said, while those in the office less than three days a week have access to smaller work stations. She said the state has also revised its policy for documenting work agreements. 

Nedweski questioned how the agency is managing its employees who  work remotely and how Wisconsin taxpayers can know that they are “getting maximum productivity” from state employees.

Blumenfeld turned the question back on the public. 

“Are they getting the services that they expect?” she asked. “I mean, when something goes south we usually hear about it and we investigate and look… is it a people issue? Is it a process issue? Is it a technology issue? What’s causing this?” She added, “I would say to the people of Wisconsin, if you’re not getting the services you expect, let us know.”

Rep. Mike Bare (D-Verona) asked what the consequences could be for rolling back state policies to what they were pre-pandemic. 

Blumenfeld said that the agency has worked to decentralize decision making when it comes to remote work so that people can evaluate each position and the amount of in-person versus remote work is necessary for the job. She said that eliminating remote work policies would also affect  the agency’s ability to compete for employees with private sector businesses. 

Blumenfeld noted that young employees especially have different expectations from those of  older employees.

“The way they work is so different. Of course, they expect to have flexibility in their job and they expect remote,” Blumenfeld said. “They’ve tasted it. They felt it. It’s what they know, and it is totally in our future.”

Universities of Wisconsin President Jay Rothman told lawmakers that in his perfect world everyone would be in the office every day, but that it would be hard to “put the genie back in the bottle” at this point. 

Rothman said the UW System has to be an attractive employer and would have trouble attracting and retaining people with  a strict five-day in office work policy. He said the UW system is also looking at combining office spaces.

“The cost of losing people is often more expensive,” Rothman said.

Nedweski pushed the question of productivity. 

“Has there been an analysis performed in positions as to is a job done more productively in person or remotely or in hybrid?” she asked. “Has an analysis been performed or are we just moving into this hybrid, telework world permanently because it’s what the workforce is demanding?” 

Rothman said there isn’t a simple way to measure productivity in the university system’s work. He said employees have specific objectives that they’re required to fill and that guide evaluations. 

“We don’t measure how many widgets did we manufacture today, because that’s not what we do,” Rothman said. “We don’t have the ability to check keystrokes… I’m fine if people are sitting there thinking about something really creative and something new to do. They may not touch a keyboard for two hours. They may have been incredibly productive in that environment, so I think it comes down to an individual by individual determination… I’m proud of the work that they are doing in support of the 164,000-plus students.” 

Nedweski also brought up the capital requests from the UW System. Gov. Tony Evers announced a sweeping proposal this week that includes $1.6 billion in investments for UW System capital projects. 

“If people are going to be teleworking more and more, I have a hard time justifying investment in new buildings that house people who are mostly going to be teleworking,” she said. 

Rothman noted that the majority of the system’s capital requests were not for administration, but are rather for students and staff. “We’re not trying to build substantial edifices for our administration,” he said. “We’re focused on our students.”

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Wisconsin 7th District Republican U.S. Rep. Tom Tiffany (left) and 8th District Republican U.S. Rep. Tony Wied held an over-the-phone town hall Monday evening. (Tiffany image: Official congressional photo; Wied image: WisEye screenshot. Wisconsin Examiner photo illustration.)

U.S Rep. Tony Wied defended President Donald Trump and billionaire Elon Musk’s work inside the Trump administration Monday evening during his first town hall, which was hosted by phone. 

Wied, who represents Green Bay and other parts of northeast Wisconsin, scheduled the call after GOP congressional leaders told members to avoid in-person town halls. The guidance came after several lawmakers, including Wisconsin U.S. Reps. Glenn Grothman and Scott Fitzgerald, were met with backlash at in-person town halls because of Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) project.

The call lasted a little less than an hour. Wied was joined by U.S. Rep. Tom Tiffany, who helped answer questions from callers. 

A few poll questions were asked during the call, with participants answering using their keypad. The first question was “Do you believe the federal government spends too much taxpayer money?” The results were shared on the call, with 43% of callers answering “yes” and 57% answering “no.” Another question asked was, “Do you believe men should be allowed to participate in women’s sports?” No results were shared. 

While Wied wasn’t met with the pushback his colleagues had, perhaps because of the controlled nature of a telecall, a handful of callers expressed worries about the potential for cuts to a number of federal programs and asked where Wied stood on the issues. He mostly defended the actions of Trump, Republicans and Musk. 

A nurse practitioner asked Wied about his position on Medicaid and Medicare. Questions about Medicaid cuts have been circulating and creating anxiety among many Wisconsinites who rely on the program. Trump has said he won’t cut the programs — or Social Security — but a recent report from the Congressional Budget Office found that lawmakers can’t meet their goal of cutting $880 billion without significant cuts to Medicaid. 

“A lot of my patients rely on [Medicaid and Medicare]. My parents are on Medicaid, and I’m sure both of your parents are also on Medicare. What are your plans as far as trying to save it?” the caller asked. “Lots of rumors going around that there’s going to be $800 billion that will need to be cut over the next decade, and while Trump says that he won’t be touching Medicare or Medicaid, there’s serious concerns about where that money will come from.”

Wied and Tiffany said they want to protect Medicaid, but lawmakers will be looking for savings, including by potentially establishing work requirements for the program and keeping “illegal immigrants” from accessing the program.

Tiffany said there are too many able-bodied adults on Medicaid and rhetorically asked if “we want them getting help there from the federal government, from you, the taxpayer?” He implied that people should get a job so they can get insurance through their employer. “The second thing is illegal immigrants.” 

Medicaid is funded partially with federal funds and partially with state funds, and approximately two-thirds of Medicaid recipients are working. Undocumented immigrants are already not eligible for federal Medicaid, though some states have expanded access using state funds, including California, which recently expanded its Medicaid program to cover all residents regardless of immigration status. 

Tiffany said that “if we have too many people that are on the program via waste, fraud and abuse, it jeopardizes the program. What we want to do is protect and save Medicaid for the future so people can count on it.” 

Wied said the government needs to be “prudent” and looking at the programs is part of getting rid of “bureaucratic waste, fraud and abuse,” and said Musk is helping with that. 

“[Musk is] somebody that has a lot of experience working on big budgets and finding efficiencies, and his job is only to identify, then it comes down to the elected officials to make the decisions and ultimately do what they need to do again, to make sure that we keep these programs,” Wied said. 

Another caller asked lawmakers whether they have a “red line” for where their support of Trump and Musk ends. 

Wied said Musk is “designated as a special government employee” and “there’s no evidence that he or the team has unlawfully accessed or used any sensitive data.” 

“If there is, I would certainly be concerned and make sure that I push back, but you know, the whole role of the Department of Government Efficiency is to streamline the government’s outdated and bloated systems,” Wied said. 

Musk’s DOGE team has been seeking access to databases that store personal information of millions of Americans. The administration has also been muddying who is in charge of DOGE and downplaying Musk’s role by appointing a new “acting administrator,” though Trump recently said Musk is in charge of DOGE.

“Trump is in charge, he’s our president. He’s making the decisions. Elon Musk has not fired anybody,” Wied said. The comment is in line with what Musk has reportedly told other Republicans. 

A Green Bay caller had concerns about benefits for veterans, given the Trump administration’s goal of cutting over 80,000 Department of Veterans Affairs employees, who provide health care and other services for millions of veterans.

“My son served in Afghanistan twice and uses the VA insurance. Our clinic here in Green Bay is awesome. I’ve been there a couple times with him, and he gets his surgery done there,” the caller said. “What are you going to do with 83,000 jobs that are cut in the VA, and where are the people that I love when they have their health care?”

The caller also added that tax cuts for the rich are “not worth it if it means hurting our veterans for they have served our country.” 

Wied said he would “make sure that we continue to fund that at the appropriate level, so that people have the best care possible within the VA system.” 

Some callers were supportive of Trump. 

“There’s a lot of waste in government,” said one. “We have to cut back. We just have to — on the waste. I see people who are alcoholics, get early Social Security disability. I’ve worked with people who are overweight and get out and take early disability. I don’t think people realize the numbers of abuse and it takes from our Medicare, Medicaid, it takes from all of us.”

The caller added, “I’m middle class. I’ve worked hard all my life. We have to give President Trump a chance.”

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Gov. Tony Evers said Monday the state needs to approve projects as costs could rise due to President Donald Trump's tariffs. Here, Evers is shown speaking to reporters last week. (Photo by Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner)

Gov. Tony Evers announced a $4.1 billion capital budget proposal on Monday that would include new buildings at University of Wisconsin campuses and for prison building overhaul. 

Evers said in a statement the investment would be critical to addressing Wisconsin’s aging infrastructure and to “build for our state’s future.”

“We can’t afford to kick the can down the road on key infrastructure projects across our state, most especially as the cost of building materials may only get more expensive with each day of delay due to potential tariff taxes and trade wars,” Evers said. 

President Donald Trump’s plans of implementing tariffs on goods from Mexico, Canada and China, which have been delayed multiple times, are expected to put added stress on the construction industry as the costs of raw materials, including steel, aluminum and cement could grow.

“We must take the important steps necessary to invest in building a 21st-century infrastructure, workforce, and economy,” Evers said. “I am hopeful that these recommendations will receive bipartisan support to get these projects done that communities across our state are depending on.”

The State Building Commission — which is made up of eight members including Evers, four Republican lawmakers, two Democratic lawmakers and one citizen member — will meet on March 25 to vote on the capital budget recommendations. It’s likely his proposal will be blocked by Republican lawmakers, who have done so in previous budgets, to allow the Republican lawmakers who are a majority on the Joint Finance Committee to create their own proposal. 

During the last budget session, Evers proposed a $3.8 billion proposal that was cut down to $2.69 billion. 

In a joint statement Sen. Howard Marklein (R-Spring Green) and Rep. Mark Born (R-Beaver Dam) called Evers’ plan “another example of his irresponsible spending.” They said Republicans would “craft a responsible capital budget that Wisconsin can afford.” 

“It will balance the needs of our state with sound fiscal responsibility. We must ensure that our operating budget and capital budget will work together to fund the priorities of the state. Legislative Republicans will work to right-size these proposals and craft a budget Wisconsin can be proud of,” the lawmakers said.

One of the largest parts of Evers’ plan — nearly $1.6 billion — would be for the University of Wisconsin System. His recommendation is 90% of the $1.78 billion that was requested from UW and would go towards an array of projects across UW campuses. 

UW System President Jay Rothman said in a statement the plan would provide “key funding necessary for building repairs and renovations as well as critical new projects that modernize classroom and research facilities” and ensure the state is “continuing to build opportunities for future generations of students.”

One large project includes $292 million for the demolition and replacement of the Mosse Humanities Building at UW-Madison by February 2031. The building was constructed in 1966 and opened in 1968 and has recently suffered from structural and environmental deficiencies, including asbestos, putting students at risk. 

“The building is well past its expected useful life, with a significantly deteriorated building envelope and exterior window/wall system, uncorrectable humidification conditions and insufficient environmental controls,” the proposal states.

The plan would also include $293 million for new residence halls at UW-Madison.

UW-Madison Chancellor Jennifer Mnookin said in a statement that the proposal recognizes the “infrastructure improvements that are critical to maintaining UW–Madison’s competitive edge in education and research.” 

“We are grateful for the governor’s commitment to investing in essential projects that will ensure the state’s flagship will continue to meet the needs of our state and its workforce. We also deeply appreciate the continued advocacy on our behalf from the Universities of Wisconsin and the Board of Regents,” Mnookin said. 

Evers’ proposal would also dedicate $194 million for UW-La Crosse to complete its Prairie Springs Science Center and demolishing Cowley Hall, which lacks fire suppression, has failing mechanical systems and doesn’t meet modern science and research needs. 

The first phase of this project was completed in the summer of 2018, but the second part needs to be approved. New building additions would include instructional and research laboratories with associated support spaces, classrooms, greenhouse, observatory, specimen museum and animal care facility, which is meant to help support STEM education and workforce development.

The plan also includes $189 million for UW-Milwaukee to renovate the Northwest Quadrant complex for its College of Health Sciences. The project, which has been needed for years, was not included in Evers’ budget last session. 

UW-Oshkosh would get $137 million for the Polk Learning Commons — a project that would include the demolition of its library facility, which was constructed in 1962, and replacing it with a new facility. 

Whether lawmakers will be supportive of projects for UW system schools is unclear. During the last budget cycle, Republican lawmakers withheld funding for building projects to use in negotiations over diversity, equity and inclusion on campus. Major projects, including an engineering building at UW-Madison, were only approved after the UW system agreed to change certain policies related to DEI.

Evers’ plan would also dedicate $634 million to the Department of Corrections for his proposed “domino” prison reform plan and other projects. This would include infrastructure upgrades and capital improvements to Waupun Correctional Institution, Lincoln Hills School, Stanley Correctional Institution, Sanger B. Powers Correctional Center and John C. Burke Correctional Center. In addition, the improvements would enable the final part of the proposal, which is closing the Green Bay Correctional Institution. 

Other projects in the proposal include: 

• $195 million for health facilities, including $44 million for renovating the food service building at Central Wisconsin Center, $55 million for upgrading utility infrastructure at the Mendota Mental Health Institute and $61 million for similar upgrades at Winnebago Mental Health Institute.
• $170 million for Department of Veterans Affairs’ projects, including $101 million for food service and laundry facilities at Wisconsin Veterans Home at King.
• $164 million in projects requested for the Department of Natural Resources to invest in Wisconsin’s state parks and forests and fund bridge replacements, trail upgrades and fire response ranger stations upgrades.
• $40 million for elevator and fiber and cable upgrades at the Wisconsin State Capitol
• $36.6 million, which is only about 20% of the requested funds, for the Department of Military Affairs.
• Nearly $22 million for State Fair Park.
• $25 million for planning, design, and sitework at the Milwaukee County Courthouse Complex. County Executive David Crowley said in a statement that the public safety building is “crumbling, inefficient and poses significant risks to community safety” and that it must be removed and replaced.

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Gov. Tony Evers delivers his state budget address on Feb. 18, 2025. (Photo by Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner)

The Wisconsin Policy Forum cautions state lawmakers and Gov. Tony Evers to consider the state’s past financial hardships when writing the next state budget in a new brief released Friday. 

The report considers the state’s current financial position, Evers’ budget proposal, potential wants from Republican lawmakers and outside factors, including federal funding uncertainty, to explore questions lawmakers may consider in the coming months. And it suggests the state could be nearing a dramatic turn in its fortunes.

Evers introduced a vast budget proposal last month, and the process is now in the hands of lawmakers, who are likely to throw out Evers’ version, host public hearings and then write their own proposal. Lawmakers will then need to pass the bill in the Senate and Assembly before it goes to Evers, who will either sign it as is, sign it with partial vetoes or veto the whole bill.

“Throughout the 2000s, the state carried almost no reserves, leaving it exposed to the terrible fury of the Great Recession,” the report states. “Most of today’s lawmakers were not in their current offices during that dark time, and did not face the multi-billion-dollar shortfalls that had to be bridged in both 2009 and 2011 at great cost and sacrifice by taxpayers, schools, local governments and public workers.” 

The report notes that “prudent decisions” by Republican and Democratic leaders have helped bolster the state’s finances and put Wisconsin in a position to “weather a recession much more effectively.” 

By the end of the current budget, the state’s budget surplus will have gone from $7.1 billion to $ 4.3 billion, and Republicans and Democrats are both looking at the remaining surplus to fund their priorities for the next budget. The state also has a $1.9 billion rainy day fund. The report noted that this balance is greater than the state had throughout the 2000s and into the 2010s. 

Gov. Tony Evers has introduced a budget that would increase state spending by 19% to fund increased investments in K-12 education, health care, child care and transportation. It would cut taxes for low- and middle-income residents and raise them on the state’s highest earners. 

The spending would be paid for using the budget surplus, federal funds and revenues from  raising taxes on the wealthiest Wisconsin residents. Evers’ proposal would leave the state with $646 million. Evers has said he’s reserved that amount due to potential uncertainty about federal money, though he recently questioned whether that is enough. 

“If adopted, Evers’ plan would leave the state with a two-year structural deficit of roughly $4 billion,” the report states. “This would make it difficult to balance the 2027-29 budget, even if the economy remains strong and does not succumb to recent drops in the stock market and consumer sentiment.”

Legislature’s contrasting priorities

The final budget will likely look vastly different. 

Republican lawmakers have said that they are likely to throw out Evers’ entire proposal, and that they want to use the budget surplus to prioritize widespread tax cuts and one-time projects. Lawmakers said they may propose their tax cut plans to Evers ahead of the budget in a separate bill, which they want him to sign before the budget as a whole. Last session, Evers vetoed GOP proposals that would have cut income taxes by over $1 billion a year.

“The state’s main fund is now spending more than it takes in, and its budget reserves, while sizable, are shrinking,” the report states. “Meanwhile, the Democratic governor and GOP Legislature are eying the state’s reserves and offering tax and spending plans that would deplete it and potentially leave the state with future budget gaps.” 

The report notes that bipartisan compromise will be necessary to find a balance among varying priorities. 

“Elected officials will have to consider the advantages of retaining [the state’s] fiscal safeguards and weigh those concerns against priorities such as investing in education and holding down increases in local property taxes,” the report states. “At the moment, the two sides appear sharply divided, but it is worth remembering that they have overcome such obstacles in the past and may yet do so again.”

The report considers the uncertainty for federal money given actions in Washington by President Donald Trump and the Republican majority in Congress to cut federal spending. 

Evers’ budget leans in part on $18 billion in federal funding for programs including Medicaid, research and financial aid at UW schools and transportation projects.

The report says two objectives — preserving state funds and using state revenues to replace federal funds that are lost — “might come into tension with one another, since state spending now to make up for any cuts would leave less of a financial cushion for the state in the future.” 

School spending, child care

The report also considers the growing number of school referendum votes across the state and ways to slow them, and it says lawmakers will want to ask how “aggressively” they want to act in response to that trend. Evers has proposed tying revenue limits to inflation, increasing state per-pupil aid and special education funding.

“If all of these increases came to fruition, they would likely curb referenda and property tax increases,” the report states. “However, they would also sharply increase state spending and are unlikely to pass the Legislature as written.” 

It also touches on the challenges facing the child care industry. Evers is proposing dedicating $480 million to invest in the industry to continue the Child Care Counts program, which provides money to child care providers to help them meet costs but will run out by July. 

The report cites tens of thousands of parents unable to find care as well as large numbers of centers unable to fill all their openings for care for lack of staff.

“We highlight these sobering figures not to advocate for or against such an investment but to note that child care accounts for a sizable chunk of the overall economy. To make an impact on child care costs, access, and quality that families in particular would notice, policymakers would have to free up substantial resources within the state budget from one of a limited number of revenue options,” the report states. 

Other potential avenues to address the child care industry’s needs include using the TANF block grant to tap  federal funds, implementing a mechanism to split child care costs among  families, employers and the state, and enacting tax incentives.

The report also considers Evers’ $500 million prison reform proposal to close Lincoln Hills School for boys and Copper Lake School for girls, renovate Waupun Correctional Institution and close Green Bay Correctional Institution. It notes that even if Evers’ plan was approved there could be some challenges to implementation given that rates of reconviction and re-arrest haven’t changed significantly.

“The governor’s ‘domino’ plan also requires many steps to fall into place correctly in order to reshape the state’s correctional system,” the report states. “If any step fails, the state’s prisons could remain overcrowded with even less time to find a solution.” 

The report expects the budget will draw on the budget surplus in light of the state’s ongoing challenges. It cautions, however, that “taxpayers have good reason to watch both sides in this process carefully to ensure the final budget does not erode too many of the state’s hard-won financial gains.”

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