Reports in 2024 and 2025 said China controls up to 90% of global drone markets.
Mediareports citing market research firm Drone Industry Insights said China controls nearly 90% of the global commercial drone market.
The U.S., reliant on Chinese-made parts, is “years behind building the manufacturing infrastructure that could come close to rivaling China’s,” Forbes reported.
MIT Technology Review reported that DJI, one China-based drone maker, has more than a 90% share of the global consumer market and that the supply chain there is “so competitive that the world can’t really use drones without it.”
The Atlantic Council think tank said China’s market dominance means Chinese-made drones operating in the U.S. can send sensitive information to China and gives China a military advantage.
U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, a former Wisconsin congressman, raised the issue Aug. 5.
This fact brief is responsive to conversations such as this one.
A recent law President Donald Trump signed July 24 cuts funding for public broadcast stations, including those that provide local emergency alerts.
The law rescinded $9 billion in previously approved funding – $8 billion for foreign aid and $1.1 billion for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, a private nonprofit – for fiscal 2026 and 2027.
CPB, which announced it would shut down because of the rescissions, has funneled federal dollars to radio and TV networks such as NPR and PBS.
NPR, PBS and their member stations are mostly funded by private donations, but smaller stations, especially in rural areas, relied more on CPB funding. And people in those areas rely on local stations for emergency weather and other alerts.
Wisconsin stations received $8.5 million in CPB funding in fiscal 2024.
The rescissions don’t affect the Emergency Alert System, for national emergency announcements, or the Wireless Emergency Alerts.
This fact brief is responsive to conversations such as this one.
Aborted fetal cells are not used to manufacture the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine today, though the original rubella vaccine was made using human fetal embryo fibroblast cells obtained from two elective abortions in the 1960s.
The rubella vaccine is one of many vaccines that use the cell lines from those aborted fetuses, meaning they descend from the original fetal cells, but are not taken directly from new fetal tissue. These cells were chosen because the womb’s sterile environment does not contain the viruses often found in animal cells.
During the manufacturing of the MMR vaccine, the vaccine virus is purified and cellular debris and growth reagents are removed, breaking down trace DNA until there is none or almost none left.
Most of the major world religions that oppose abortion, including the Roman Catholic Church, have deemed vaccines permissible to prioritize the health of pregnant women, children and the wider population.
This fact brief is responsive to conversations such as this one.
Wisconsin doesn’t require daily exercise for students.
Physical education must be given weekly to students in kindergarten through sixth grade and, for older middle school students, with “sufficient frequency and instructional time to meet the objectives outlined in the district’s curriculum plan.”
High school students must follow a curriculum “designed to build lifelong fitness habits.”
In 2024, GOP lawmakers as part of a child obesity task force introduced legislation to require 180 minutes of weekly “physical activity” for K-8 students. One lawmaker said the aim was to require movement, such as playing tennis, rather than teaching tennis.
State revenue is projected to outpace spending during the next two years leaving a $770 million surplus as of July 1, 2027. If spending and revenue are the same over 2027-29, the state will have a deficit of -$1.4 billion in its general fund by the end of that biennium, the nonpartisan Legislative Fiscal Bureau reported.
That excludes the state’s $2.1 billion rainy day fund.
Wisconsin ended 2023 with a record $7.1 billion surplus and the last budget cycle with $4.4 billion.
The current state budget spends down $3.6 billion as Gov. Tony Evers prioritized spending increases for education and childcare while Republicans pushed tax cuts.
The state’s general fund in 2027 is projected to be at the lowest level since 2018. Wisconsin faced structural deficits from 1996-2011, with a projected $3.6 billion deficit during the 2011-13 biennium. That prompted steep public employee benefit cuts under the controversial Act 10 law.
This fact brief is responsive to conversations such as this one.
Violent crime, nationally and in major cities, is lower than 25 years ago.
Marquette University criminal justice professor Theodore Lentz charted rates for violent crime – murder, rape and sexual assault, robbery, and assault.
The overall rate was below 400 violent crimes per 100,000 people for the past decade, down from about 500 per 100,000 people 25 years ago.
The rates are based on FBI Uniform Crime Reporting figures, which track crimes reported to law enforcement.
The nonprofit Pew Research Center reported that between 1993 and 2022, violent crime dropped 49%, according to the FBI; and 71%, according to the federal Bureau of Justice Statistics, which surveys Americans.
In cities of 250,000 people or more, the violent crime rate was 771 per 100,000 people in 2023, down from 1,093 in 2000.
Republican U.S. Rep. Glenn Grothman, who represents part of eastern Wisconsin, said July 14 that major-city violent crime is much higher than 25 years ago.
This fact brief is responsive to conversations such as this one.
Federal law prohibits students in the country without authorization from receiving federal financial aid.
Two Clinton-era laws — the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act and the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act — require all students to provide a valid Social Security number or otherwise demonstrate lawful-presence status to receive federal aid.
The Federal Student Aid website confirms that unauthorized students — including DACA recipients — are ineligible for federal student aid. However, it notes that unauthorized immigrants can still seek financial support through other channels, such as state grant programs, institutional aid, and private scholarships.
The American Journal of Economics and Sociology points out that although there are alternative avenues, they are often limited and inconsistent. Even when available, it is last-dollar aid, covering only remaining costs after all other aid is applied. As a result, this rarely meets the total cost of tuition, fees, and living expenses.
This fact brief is responsive to conversations such as this one.
There has been broad agreement about the greenhouse effect for over a century.
In 1824, Joseph Fourier calculated that Earth ought to be much colder given its distance from the sun, and theorized that the atmosphere acts as a blanket, trapping heat and keeping the planet warmer than it would be otherwise.
Scientists later hypothesized that higher concentrations of greenhouse gases could raise temperatures. In 1896, Svante Arrhenius attempted to quantify this; his predictions remain on the high end of current climate models.
The basic science of the greenhouse effect is fairly simple: certain atmospheric gases such as carbon dioxide trap and redirect outgoing heat; some is radiated back downward, causing heat build up and temperatures to rise.
In 2021, the IPCC concluded it is unequivocal that human emission of greenhouse gases are the primary cause of modern warming.
Pharmaceutical companies spent over $10.1 billion on drug advertising in 2024 with the top 10 drugs accounting for a third of spending. Over $5 billion of the spending was on TV ads, with the other half spent on radio, print, streaming and online ads.
The advertising for these pharmaceutical companies made up 24.4% of evening ad minutes on news programs through ABC, CBS, CNN, Fox News, MSNBC and NBC between Jan. 1 and May 31 of this year.
Drug company AbbVie spent the most, totaling over $1 billion on ads for Skyrizi and Rinvoq, which are used to treat inflammatory conditions. AbbVie increased spending on advertisements for Skyrizi by 150%.
Between 2023 and 2024, consumer advertising of the weight management drug Wegovy increased 330%. During that period, usage among teens increased 50%.
In 2023, the average S&P 500 CEO earned $17.1 million in total compensation compared with $63,800 earned by the average worker in an S&P 500 company. For the CEO that works out to $46,849 a day.
Because average compensation rates include extreme outliers, it’s notable that median pay differences between CEOs and workers in 2023 also yielded similar results.
The median S&P 500 CEO earned $16.3 million in 2023 while the median worker for those companies earned around $81,400. Outliers notwithstanding, CEOs still earned their workers’ annual pay in a little less than two days.
This phenomenon continued in 2024 as the median S&P 500 CEO pay jumped nearly 10% and worker compensation increased by less than 1.05%.
This fact brief is responsive to conversations such as this one.
President Donald Trump’s recently enacted big bill removes the federal income tax on certain tips and overtime, but those tax deductions end in 2028 and have other limitations.
Under the new law, restaurant servers, barbers and other workers who typically work for tips can deduct up to $25,000 of tip income – meaning that amount isn’t taxable.
For overtime pay, the tax deduction is up to $12,500.
Both deductions generally are for people who earn less than $150,000 annually.
Federal payroll taxes for Social Security and Medicare (FICA), and state and local taxes, stillapply.
The tipped income provision would affect about 2% of households, and they would receive an average tax cut of $1,800 annually, the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center estimated.
About 8% of hourly workers and 4% of salaried workers regularly work overtime, according to the Yale Budget Lab.
The average annual savings for the overtime provision is $1,400, according to the White House.
This fact brief is responsive to conversations such as this one.
We’ve written more extensively about this topic in a different article. You can read more about it here.
Gov. Tony Evers’ 2023 partial veto increased K-12 public school districts’ revenue fundraising limits by $325 per student each year until 2425, but that doesn’t guarantee property tax increases each year.
Revenue limits set how much a district can increase funding through a combination of property taxes and general state aid. School districts could raise property taxes in order to reach the maximum revenue, or the Legislature and governor could provide more general aid through the biennial budget. The average limit across districts last year was $13,363.
This year, the Republican-controlled Legislature kept general state aid flat. School boards can raise property taxes up to their allowed maximum funding in their annual budgets.
In future budgets, the Legislature and governor could provide enough state aid to cover the limit increase in whole or even exceed it, which would force districts to reduce property taxes. They also could repeal the 400-year revenue limit provision.
This fact brief is responsive to conversations such as this one.
Wisconsin will receive an estimated $1 billion more annually in federal funds for Medicaid because the state budget includes a change that pre-empts a provision in President Donald Trump’s big bill.
Trump’s bill would have prevented Wisconsin from raising its hospital tax.
But days before Trump signed it, the Republican-led Legislature and Democratic Gov. Tony Evers approved a 2025-27 state budget that raises Wisconsin’s hospital tax from 1.8% to 6%.
The increase will raise some $1 billion more annually in federal matching funds that the state can use to pay hospitals for care they provide Medicaid patients.
Wisconsin’s largest Medicaid program is BadgerCare Plus, which provides health insurance to about 1 million low-income people age 64 and under.
Republican U.S. Rep. Derrick Van Orden, who represents western Wisconsin, claimed that Trump’s bill “secured” the $1 billion.
We’ve learned a bit about American society amid the rhetoric over President Donald Trump’s “big beautiful bill.” For example, unauthorized immigrants don’t get Medicaid, but millions of working-age adults have gone on it. We’ve also knocked down some false claims about the bill along the way.
As of July 3, the nearly 900-page measure, filled with tax breaks and spending cuts, had moved toward passage but was still being debated in Congress.
Wisconsin Watch fact briefs have cleared up misstatements about the bill itself and about programs it would cut, such as Medicaid and food stamps.
Note: Our fact briefs answer a factual question yes or no based on the facts available when the brief is published.
Here’s a look.
Would the ‘big beautiful bill’ provide the largest federal spending cut in US history?
The largest-cut claim was made by Republican U.S. Rep. Scott Fitzgerald, who represents part of southeastern Wisconsin. His office cited a $1.7 trillion claim made by the Trump administration.
Even if the net cut were $1.7 trillion, it would be second to a 2011 law that decreased spending by $2 trillion and would be the third-largest cut as a percentage of gross domestic product, according to the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.
But when Fitzgerald made his statement, the bill’s net decreases were $1.2 trillion, after taking its spending increases into account, and $680 billion after additional interest payments on the debt.
Have millions of nondisabled, working-age adults been added to Medicaid?
Millions of nondisabled working-age adults have enrolled in Medicaid since the Affordable Care Act expanded eligibility in 2014.
Medicaid is health insurance for low-income people.
The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimated that in 2024, average monthly Medicaid enrollment included 34 million nonelderly, nondisabled adults — 15 million made eligible by Obamacare.
Republican U.S. Rep. Tom Tiffany, who represents most of northern Wisconsin, complained about “able-bodied” adults being added, saying they are “draining” Medicaid.
The nonpartisan health policy organization KFF said 44% of the working-age adults on Medicaid, some of whom are temporarily disabled, worked full time and 20% part time, many for small companies, and aren’t eligible for health insurance.
Are unauthorized immigrants eligible for federal Medicaid coverage?
Trump’s bill proposedreducing federal Medicaid funds to those states.
Opponents of the bill, including Democratic U.S. Rep. Mark Pocan, who represents the Madison area, said Trump administration officials claimed that unauthorized immigrants receive traditional Medicaid.
Do half the residents in one rural Wisconsin county receive food stamps?
In April, 2,004 residents of Menominee County in northeast Wisconsin received benefits from the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).
SNAP, formerly known as food stamps and called FoodShare in Wisconsin, provides food assistance for low-income people.
Menominee County’s rate was cited by U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock, D-Ga., at the Wisconsin Democratic Party convention. He commented on the bill’s provision to remove an estimated 3.2 million people from SNAP, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.
Is Donald Trump’s megabill projected to add more than $2 trillion to the national debt?
Nonpartisan analysts estimate that the “big beautiful bill” would add at least $2 trillion to the national debt over 10 years.
The debt, which is the accumulation of annual spending that exceeds revenues, is $36 trillion.
U.S. Rep. Gwen Moore, D-Milwaukee, and U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., claimed the bill would add trillions.
Among other things, the bill would make 2017 individual income tax cuts permanent, add work requirements for Medicaid and food assistance, and add funding for defense and more deportations.
After we published this brief, the Senate passed a version of the bill that would increase the debt by $3.3 trillion.
Would ‘the vast majority’ of Americans get a 65% tax increase if the GOP megabill doesn’t become law?
The Tax Foundation estimates that if the cuts expire, 62% of taxpayers would see a tax increase in 2026. The average taxpayer’s increase would be 19.4% ($2,955).
GOP U.S. Rep. Derrick Van Orden, who represents western Wisconsin, made the 65% claim.
Do you have questions about this bill and how it affects Wisconsin? Submit them here, through our Ask Wisconsin Watch project.
Wisconsin Watch is a nonprofit, nonpartisan newsroom. Subscribe to our newsletters for original stories and our Friday news roundup.
Millions of nondisabled working-age adults have enrolled in Medicaid since the Affordable Care Act expanded eligibility in 2014.
Medicaid is health insurance for low-income people.
The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimated that in 2024, average monthly Medicaid enrollment included 34 million nonelderly, nondisabled adults – 15 million made eligible by Obamacare.
Two smaller estimates used U.S. Census survey data.
The White House Council of Economic Advisers said there were 27 million nondisabled working-age (age 19-64) Medicaid recipients in 2024.
That’s similar to the 26 million for 2023 estimated by the nonpartisan health policy organization KFF. That figure includes people who are disabled.
KFF said 44% worked full time and 20% part time, many for small companies, and aren’t eligible for health insurance.
Medicaid costs nearly $900 billion annually, two-thirds from the federal government, one-third from the states.
Forty states, excluding Wisconsin, adopted the Obamacare Medicaid expansion. Congress is considering President Donald Trump’s proposal adding work requirements for Medicaid.
This fact brief is responsive to conversations such as this one.
Spending cuts proposed in President Donald Trump’s “big beautiful bill” would not be the largest ever, according to nonpartisan analysts.
The largest-cut claim was made by Republican U.S. Rep. Scott Fitzgerald, who represents part of southeastern Wisconsin, ahead of the House vote. His office cited a $1.7 trillion claim made by the Trump administration.
The House-passed version of the bill nominally would have cut $1.6 trillion in spending over 10 years.
But the bill’s net decreases were $1.2 trillion, after taking spending increases into account, and $680 billion after additional interest payments on the debt.
The heaviest spending reductions don’t begin until around 2031, increasing the chances that they could be changed by future legislation.
A $1.7 trillion net cut would be second to a 2011 law that decreased spending by $2 trillion and would be the third-largest cut as a percentage of gross domestic product, according to the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.
This fact brief is responsive to conversations such as this one.
Recent presidents have repeatedly ordered military attacks on other countries despitequestions over whether congressional approval was needed.
The latest was Republican Donald Trump’s June 21 bombing of Iran’s nuclear facilities. His administration said he had authority to limit nuclear proliferation.
Trump in 2017 cited national security interests for a missile strike on a Syrian base that was used to launch chemical weapon attacks on Syrian civilians.
In 2021, Democrat Joe Biden ordered an airstrike on Iran-backed militia groups in Syria, citing “self-defense.”
In 2011, Democrat Barack Obama ordered “limited” airstrikes on Libya. He said he was trying to protect pro-democracy protesters targeted by Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi.
The Constitution saysonly Congress has the power to declare war.
But that provision “has never been interpreted — by either Congress or the executive branch — to require congressional authorization for every military action that the president could initiate,” a Council on Foreign Relations legal expert wrote.
This fact brief is responsive to conversations such as this one.
Unauthorized immigrants arenoteligible for traditional, federally funded Medicaid, which helps cover medical costs for low-income people.
They havenever been eligible. A 1996 welfare reform law signed by Democratic President Bill Clinton also requires most authorized immigrants to waitfive years for eligiblity.
President Donald Trump has proposedreducing federal Medicaid funds to those states. That would cause 1.4 million people to lose coverage, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimated.
Medicaid costs nearly $900 billion annually, two-thirds from the federal government and one-third from the states.
In Wisconsin, Medicaid serves 1.28 million people, more than a third of them children. Among adults, 45% work full time, 28% part time. The annual cost is $12.1 billion, $4.2 billion of it in state spending.
While unauthorized immigrants can’t get Medicaid in Wisconsin, they can apply to receive emergency care covered by state Medicaid.
This fact brief is responsive to conversations such as this one.
In April, 2,004 residents of Menominee County in northeast Wisconsin received benefits from the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).
SNAP, formerly known as food stamps and called FoodShare in Wisconsin, provides food assistance for low-income people.
Other reports show similar rates.
As of March 2024, 51% of residents in the Menominee tribal nation received SNAP, according to the nonpartisan Wisconsin Policy Forum.
The latest U.S. Census data, for 2022, showed the rate for Menominee County was 49%.
American Indians constitute nearly 80% of the county’s population.
Menominee County’s rate was cited June 14 by U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock, D-Ga., at the Wisconsin Democratic Party convention. He commented on President Donald Trump’s tax cut bill pending in Congress. It would remove an estimated 3.2 million people from SNAP, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.
But for all its risks, AI also presents opportunities we are just now starting to understand. For example, Wisconsin Watch has been an early user and partner with Gigafact on an AI-powered tool they have built that can help analyze the thousands of hours of podcasts, social media videos and talk radio programs that could be spreading misinformation every day.
The tool, known as Parser, can process an hourlong audio file in a matter of minutes and not only provide a transcript, but also identify specific claims made during the audio segment and even the person making the claim.
A screenshot of the Parser profile for U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin. The AI-powered tool can help analyze audio/video interviews for specific claims that can then be fact-checked. (Courtesy of Gigafact)
Wisconsin Watch fact briefs reporter Tom Kertscher has been using Parser to make it easier to find surprising and dubious claims. Before Parser he would listen to those hourlong podcasts and radio shows himself, trying to pick up on what Wisconsin politicians were saying. In tracking how much time it took to produce a fact brief, we found in some cases almost half the time was spent just searching for a claim.
Parser has sped up that process, making it possible to scan through far more audio recordings of interviews.
“We can cover so much more ground with Parser, checking many more politicians and interviews than we could manually,” Kertscher said.
Gigafact began developing Parser after Wisconsin Watch provided that feedback on how much time it can take to stay on top of every claim that every politician makes. But the problem of misinformation is far bigger than just keeping tabs on politicians.
A screenshot of a Parser transcript of an interview with U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson, including on the right-hand side some of the specific claims that Johnson made during the interview. (Courtesy of Gigafact)
Last year the investigative journalism class at UW-Madison worked on a project about talk radio in Wisconsin. One of the key findings was the notable amount of misinformation being spread on the airwaves, especially among conservative pundits.
To do that project, students spent a significant amount of time listening to six radio hosts whose viewpoints spanned the political spectrum. They took four hours for each host from the week after the Super Bowl — 24 hours of audio total — and manually processed the audio into a database of claims. Even with a transcription tool, the process took easily over 100 hours to produce a list of claims to fact-check.
Earlier this year, I worked with Gigafact using Parser to process 24 hours from the same hosts the week after this year’s Super Bowl. We came up with a list of claims in two hours.
Wisconsin Watch and Gigafact presented that case study in using AI at a recent Journalism Educators Institute conference hosted by the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s School of Journalism and Mass Communication. We’ll present it again this week at the Investigative Reporters and Editors conference in New Orleans.
And if you haven’t read it yet, add our investigative journalism project Change is on the Air to your summer reading list. Unfortunately, for the students who devoted so many hours to listening and re-listening to those talk radio hosts, it was not produced using AI. But maybe next time.
Wisconsin Watch is a nonprofit, nonpartisan newsroom. Subscribe to our newsletters for original stories and our Friday news roundup.
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