Former Sun Prairie West High School principal Jennifer Ploeger will be charged with two counts of failing to report child abuse.
The post Former Sun Prairie principal faces charges related to handling of abuse accusations appeared first on WPR.
Protests are expected across the state on Friday in reaction to this week's fatal shooting in Minneapolis by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent.
The post Wisconsin communities protest fatal ICE shooting in Minneapolis appeared first on WPR.
Democratic U.S. Rep. Mark Pocan is calling for further oversight of Immigration and Customs Enforcement after an agent shot and killed a woman driving her vehicle in Minneapolis.
The post Pocan calls ICE ‘rogue agency’ after Minneapolis killing appeared first on WPR.
The Green Bay Packers will go on the road to take on the Chicago Bears in the NFL Playoffs for just the third time in the century-old rivalry.
The post The NFL’s oldest rivalry is set for its most consequential matchup in over a decade appeared first on WPR.
A Monroe County dairy farm will pay $120,000 under a settlement over alleged violations of the state’s environmental laws.
The post Monroe County dairy agrees to pay $120K fine tied to manure spill appeared first on WPR.
Wisconsin’s Deedra Irwin is returning to the Winter Olympics in Italy next month and will have fans in both Angelica and Pulaski rooting for her.
The post Small-town Wisconsin biathlete prepares for second Winter Olympics appearance appeared first on WPR.
Treading on Wisconsin’s frozen lakes has gotten more dangerous, creating cost for taxpayers and business owners and calling into question the future of an important state pastime.
The post On thin ice: Falls through the ice on Wisconsin lakes are becoming more common. There’s more than just warm weather to blame appeared first on WPR.
In a surprise reversal, Republican Congressman Derrick Van Orden voted for a three-year extension of enhanced Affordable Care Act tax credits despite previously calling for the law to be repealed.
The post Van Orden sides with Democrats on ACA subsidy extension vote appeared first on WPR.
A memorial grows Thursday, Jan. 8, 2026 on the spot where an ICE agent shot and killed Renee Good, 37, the previous day. (Photo by Nicole Neri/Minnesota Reformer)
Renee Nicole Good, who was fatally shot by an ICE agent in Minneapolis on Wednesday, was a poet and a mother of 3. She moved to the city with her wife and 6-year-old son almost a year ago.
Good’s wife, Rebecca Good, told the Washington Post that they had stopped to support neighbors when she was shot by the ICE agent, who has been identified as Jonathan Ross by the Star Tribune.
“On Wednesday, January 7th, we stopped to support our neighbors. We had whistles. They had guns,” Rebecca Good said in a statement to the Post and other media outlets on Friday.
“We were raising our son to believe that no matter where you come from or what you look like, all of us deserve compassion and kindness,” the statement continues. “Renee lived this belief every day. She is pure love. She is pure joy. She is pure sunshine.”
Renee Good, 37, was a mother to a 15-year-old daughter and two sons, ages 12 and 6, her first husband told the Post. Online records and interviews with media outlets from family and friends paint her as a caring person and an avid writer who enjoyed movies, making art, singing and playing guitar. Her first husband described her as a devoted Christian to the Post.
She studied creative writing at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia, graduating in December 2020. She won an undergraduate poetry prize in 2020 for her poem “On Learning to Dissect Fetal Pigs,” which the contest judge described as “a meditation that leads the reader into the unknown.”
“May Renee’s life be a reminder of what unites us: freedom, love, and peace,” university president Brian O. Hemphill said in a statement. “My hope is for compassion, healing, and reflection at a time that is becoming one of the darkest and most uncertain periods in our nation’s history.”
She was originally from Colorado Springs, Colo. She lived in Kansas City, Mo., with her wife before moving to Minnesota. Their former neighbor in Kansas City told the Post that the couple said they wanted to move out of the red state after President Donald Trump was elected in 2024.
Her second husband, Tim Macklin, died in 2023 and was a military veteran who suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder, reported the Post. He was also a comedian with whom she co-hosted a podcast, according to a post on the Old Dominion University English department Facebook page.
A faculty member who taught her, Kent Wascom, described her to the Post as a poet who was focused on improving her fiction writing and who, unlike peers, never talked about politics.
“She was kind and talented, a working class mom who put herself through school despite circumstances that would’ve crumpled the pathetic rich boy politicians who sadistically abetted her murder,” Wascom said in an X post.
Good described herself as a “poet and writer and wife and mom and sh*tty guitar strummer from Colorado” who is “experiencing Minneapolis” on what appears to be her now-private Instagram page.
Good’s life was honored by thousands at a vigil Wednesday in Minneapolis. The site of her killing has become a memorial to her, where people have placed candles and flowers.
This story was originally produced by Minnesota Reformer, which is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network which includes Wisconsin Examiner, and is supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity.
Local police officers stand guard as Renee Good's car is towed away after ICE officers shot and killed a woman through her car window Wednesday, Jan. 7, 2026 near Portland Avenue and 34th Street. (Photo by Nicole Neri/Minnesota Reformer)
The Trump administration made its opinion known almost immediately after an ICE agent shot and killed a woman in Minneapolis on Wednesday: The officer acted heroically in defending himself from Renee Nicole Good, who was intent on running him over with her Honda Pilot in an act of “domestic terrorism.”
“The officer, fearing for his life and other officers around him and the safety of the public, fired defensive shots. He used his training to save his own life and that of his colleagues,” Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said in a news conference in Minneapolis.
A jury might very well disagree after seeing footage of the incident, like Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey who called ICE’s claim of self-defense “bullsh*t.”
But the Trump administration seems intent on blocking local prosecutors from even bringing charges against the ICE officer, who the Star Tribune identified as Jonathan Ross.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office took the unusual step soon after the shooting of ousting the state Bureau of Criminal Apprehension from the investigation into the killing.
The BCA typically investigates police shootings in the state, and was on the scene in south Minneapolis on Wednesday collecting evidence as part of a joint investigation with the FBI.
Then the U.S. Attorney’s Office “reversed course” and decided the investigation would be led solely by the FBI, said Drew Evans, BCA superintendent, in a statement.
“Without complete access to the evidence, witnesses and information collected, we cannot meet the investigative standards that Minnesota law and the public demands,” Evans said. “As a result, the BCA has reluctantly withdrawn from the investigation.”
Gov. Tim Walz during a Thursday press conference expressed doubt about the results of any investigation conducted by the federal government because Minnesota officials have been purposefully excluded.
“Now that Minnesota has been taken out of the investigation, it feels very, very difficult that we will get a fair outcome,” Walz said. “People in positions of power have already passed judgment … and told you things that are verifiably false.”
If federal investigators don’t share their findings with local prosecutors, they’ll struggle to put together a case to bring charges, said former Acting U.S. Attorney for Minnesota Anders Folk, who brought federal charges against former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin for killing George Floyd in 2020.
“I don’t know how any prosecutor could make a charging decision without facts,” Folk said. “The local authorities are going to have to figure out a way to do their own investigation if they want to be able to evaluate whether a criminal charge can be brought.”
Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty, who has jurisdiction in Minneapolis, said in a statement on Thursday that her office is searching for a way for a state level investigation to continue.
“If the FBI is the sole investigative agency, the state will not receive the investigative findings, and our community may never learn about its contents,” Moriarty said in a statement.
The FBI and the U.S. Attorney’s Office did not respond to requests for comment.
A spokesperson for U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi, who will make charging decisions based on the FBI investigation, pointed the Reformer to a post on X when asked if she has commented on the case and if she believes the use of force was justified.
“Obstructing, impeding, or attacking federal law enforcement is a federal crime. So is damaging federal property. If you cross that red line, you will be arrested and prosecuted. Do not test our resolve,” the post says.
Who might do a local investigation is unclear. Folk, who is now running for Hennepin County attorney, said he’s not aware of any cases of officers shooting someone in Minnesota in which the BCA was not involved.
“They are the law enforcement organization that we as Minnesotans look to do this kind of investigative work,” Folk said.
If the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office is able to complete a criminal investigation and file charges, they face another difficult task: convincing a federal judge that the ICE officer was not acting reasonably in carrying out his lawful federal duties.
If state charges are filed, the officer will likely ask to move his case to federal court to assert immunity under what’s known as the Supremacy Clause, which protects federal officials from state criminal prosecution if they are reasonably carrying out their duties. Attorneys with the Department of Justice may then assist with his defense.
Whether the officer’s actions are deemed reasonable could hinge on a range of facts from his training to his duties to his subjective beliefs and the U.S. Supreme Court has provided only minimal guidance on how to answer that question, according to Bryna Godar, a staff attorney with the State Democracy Research Initiative at the University of Wisconsin Law School.
Still, she emphasized local prosecutors can and have brought charges against federal officials.
“The baseline understanding here is that states can prosecute federal officials when they violate state criminal laws,” Godar said.
If state prosecutors convince a federal judge the officer’s actions were not reasonable, they could continue bringing the case in federal court on state crimes. That’s significant because a conviction for a state crime cannot not be pardoned by the president.
Godar points in a recent article to cases going back to antebellum, when free states charged U.S. marshals for capturing enslaved people under the Fugitive Slave Act. During the Prohibition Era, local prosecutors charged federal officers for using excessive force in shutting down distilleries.
More recently, local prosecutors in Idaho brought a charge of involuntary manslaughter against an FBI sniper who shot and killed an unarmed woman during the siege on Ruby Ridge in 1992. A divided federal appeals court ruled that the case could proceed because of disputed facts over whether the agent acted “reasonably.”
“Where we see those state prosecutions going ahead is where the use of force is deemed unreasonable or excessive or unlawful,” Godar said.
But that case may offer a cautionary tale for Minnesota: The case wasn’t allowed to proceed until 2001, nearly a decade later. Then the case was dropped by the newly elected prosecutor.
Good’s killing was the ninth shooting by an immigration officer in just the past four months and at least the second killing, with all of them involving firing at people in vehicles, according to a New York Times report. On Thursday, federal agents shot two more people in Portland, Ore.
In each of the recent ICE shootings, the government has claimed the officer was acting in self-defense.
A 2024 investigation by The Trace and Business Insider found in 23 fatal shootings by ICE officers from 2015 to 2021, no officers were indicted.
Minnesota prosecutors have won convictions in recent years against officers for killing people in the line of duty — Chauvin, Kim Potter and Mohamed Noor — but they are rare and juries are generally reluctant to convict.
Yet even if a conviction seems unlikely, filing charges allows local prosecutors to register a strong protest against ICE’s aggressive enforcement actions in the state and communicate that officers may not operate with impunity. Not charging would be an admission that federal agents are immune from local accountability as the Trump administration pushes for mass deportation.
Folk said a transparent investigation with clear standards is also important for the public’s faith in the justice system.
“Minnesota has seen firsthand how important it is to do these high-profile investigations the right way,” Folk said. “We deserve a good, thorough investigation, free of any kind of influence.”
This story was originally produced by Minnesota Reformer, which is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network which includes Wisconsin Examiner, and is supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity.
Teng Vang, 43, assigned to Oshkosh Correctional Institution died Thursday at a hospital. | Photo courtesy Wisconsin Department of Corrections
A ‘physical disturbance’ involving three incarcerated people occurred on Wednesday afternoon at Oshkosh Correctional Institution, Oshkosh police said in a statement. The department said it is investigating a death that occurred after the disturbance.
Beth Hardtke, communications director for the Wisconsin Department of Corrections, told the Examiner that Teng Vang, 43, died Thursday at a hospital. He was assigned to Oshkosh Correctional Institution.
Police said a 43 year-old incarcerated person who assaulted another incarcerated person was secured by prison staff. He experienced a medical emergency and was transported to a local hospital.
Hardtke wrote that the Oshkosh Police Department is investigating the death and the Department of Corrections is fully cooperating with the investigation.
Vang was found guilty of crimes including attempted first-degree intentional homicide and first-degree recklessly endangering safety. He was released on extended supervision in 2022, which was revoked in 2024.
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A section of the U.S.-Mexico border wall near El Paso, Texas, on June 6, 2024. (Photo by Ariana Figueroa/States Newsroom)
WASHINGTON — Senate Majority Leader John Thune, joined at the U.S.-Mexico border Friday by a handful of other Republican senators, highlighted the president’s signature tax cuts and spending package passed last year that provided billions for immigration enforcement.
The press conference in McAllen, Texas, came after a federal immigration officer shot and killed a woman in Minneapolis on Wednesday, and two people were shot by Border Patrol agents late Thursday in Portland, Oregon.
Thune, a South Dakota Republican, touted how the tax cuts and spending package signed into law last summer also provided “for additional reinforcements,” such as the hiring of more Border Patrol and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents.
On Jan. 3, ICE announced it hired 12,000 new officers, more than doubling its force from 10,000 agents to 22,000. Thousands more are set to be hired.
The GOP-passed bill also included $4.1 billion for Customs and Border Protection to hire 5,000 customs officers and 3,000 Border Patrol agents over the next four years.
Thune said because migration at the southern border has slowed, the time has come for President Donald Trump to shift his focus to immigration reform. CBP data from November, the most recent available, shows total apprehensions at the southwest border slowed to 7,350 that month.
“I think President Trump is probably the president best equipped to lead the effort to reform immigration law in his country in a way that it creates, again, those better paying jobs, opportunities for people who come to the country legally,” Thune said. “We are a nation of immigrants, but we’re also a nation of laws, and we have to make sure we’re enforcing our laws, and that’s where it starts.”
The Trump administration has continued with its aggressive mass deportation efforts throughout the interior of the country and has moved to revoke the legal status of more than 1.5 million immigrants since taking office last January.
Thune added that the GOP bill, known as the One Big Beautiful Bill, also provided billions for border security.
“As a result of the passage of the One Big, Beautiful bill … we got more resources down here, not only for physical infrastructure, for the wall, but for also that virtual infrastructure, for technology and counter drone technology, all those sorts of things that make it possible for the Border Patrol to do their job,” he said.
Thune was joined by Whip John Barrasso of Wyoming and Sens. John Cornyn of Texas, Ashley Moody of Florida, Jon Husted of Ohio, Mike Rounds of South Dakota and Pete Ricketts of Nebraska.
Rounds said that under the Trump administration the southern border has undergone “a remarkable transformation.”
“There is no such thing as a country that can be a superpower, or, for that matter, be free if they can’t defend their own borders,” Rounds said.
Cornyn also highlighted how the bill will reimburse, up to $13.5 billion, those border states who have spent money on immigration enforcement. He said of that money, Texas will get $11 billion.
A hemp plant at a Cottage Grove farm. Hemp, used for industrial purposes and now grown legally in Wisconsin, is made from a variety of the cannabis plant that is low in THC, the active ingredient that is responsible for the intoxicating effect of marijuana. (Wisconsin Examiner photo)
Wisconsin lawmakers are backing competing visions for the future of hemp in the state. One proposal, (SB 682), was discussed during a Thursday meeting of the Senate Committee on Agriculture and Revenue. The bill would create a regulatory structure for hemp-derived cannabis products which would preserve the state’s hemp industry despite a federal ban set to take effect in November. Without state-level intervention, or the federal government choosing to reverse course, hemp growers and distributors fear that Wisconsin’s $700 million industry and about 3,500 jobs will disappear.
Sen. Patrick Testin (R-Stevens Point), chair of the Agriculture and Revenue Committee presented the bipartisan hemp bill to his committee, which he authored with bipartisan support. Testin’s legislation would define hemp as cannabis plants with no more than 0.3% of delta-9 THC (or the maximum concentration allowable under federal law up to 1%, whichever is greater) and define “hemp-derived cannabinoids” as any such compound extracted from the hemp plant. THC concentrations would be determined using specific high-performance testing methods.
Wisconsinites would need to be at least 21 years old to purchase hemp-derived cannabinoid products under the bill, which mandates that products undergo independent lab testing to ensure that they contain the amount and type of cannabinoids described on the product’s label. This practice, known as truth-in labeling, is something the hemp industry has called for in recent years.
Products could not be sold under the bill without labeling including contact information for the manufacturer or brand owner, serving sizes per container of product, ingredient lists including allergens, potency labeled in milligrams, and any necessary warnings. Under the bill, hemp-derived products could not contain more than 10 milligrams of THC in a single serving.
Testin said Thursday that globally, the industrial hemp market was valued at roughly $11 billion in 2025, and is expected to reach $48 billion by 2032. “Despite its wide availability, the regulation of [hemp-derived cannabinoid] products is essentially non-existent, leaving a patchwork of different approaches taken by states across the country,” he said.
In Wisconsin, such products “are generally recognized as legal but unregulated,” Testin said. “There are no state laws that restrict the sale to minors, regulate the potency or content of [hemp-derived cannabinoid products], or establish labeling or packaging requirements.” Minnesota, Kentucky, Tennessee and other states have moved to enact their own regulations, Testin said. “Regulations are needed to eliminate the current uncertainty regarding the status of [hemp-derived cannabinoid products], provide stability and certainty for businesses looking to enter this segment of the economy, and enact public safety regulations.”
Both Testin and Rep. Tony Kurtz (R-Wonewoc) have worked on hemp laws for Wisconsin since the federal Farm Bill passed in 2018. “I’ve actually grown hemp,” said Kurtz, recalling that in 2019 “it was kind of a wide open market.” People that Kurtz and others called “bad actors” throughout the hearing also rode the hemp wave, seeing it as a “get rich quick scheme.” Kurtz said that today, the hemp industry is filled with people who want to do the right thing, but that “bad actors” have persisted.
Kurtz said SB 682 is designed to ensure that Wisconsinites “get the very best product, and they know what they’re getting.” He stressed that “if we do nothing, then hemp is going to be illegal at the federal level…but it will still be legal here in the state of Wisconsin. So I think it would behoove us to work together, get a good compromise, a good common sense piece of legislation to make sure that we — in my humble opinion — protect our constituents, but also protect an industry that I think is needed.”
Although hemp would be illegal at the federal level, a state-level industry could still operate similarly to the way some states have fully legal recreational or legalized cannabis programs, largely because the federal government has not cracked down on those industries.
Testin added that “regardless of anyone’s thoughts as it relates to cannabis and cannabinoids, it’s here. And obviously we have a lot of different approaches as to how to best move forward.” He repeatedly took aim at the “stupidity” of what he described as “our overlords” in Washington D.C., but also criticized other hemp-related bills being pushed in Wisconsin. Whereas some Republicans are seeking to ban hemp products outright, others have differing ideas about how a legal industry should be regulated.
A bill introduced by Sen. Eric Wimberger (R-Oconto), SB 681, would require that manufacturers and distributors of hemp-derived cannabinoid products have permits. Products would be sold under a three-tier system, and would be regulated similarly to alcohol under the Division of Alcohol Beverages, a component of the Department of Revenue, which would be renamed to the Division of Intoxicating Products.
Although both Testin and Wimberger’s bills have gained bipartisan support, Testin described Wimberger’s bill as “the dead bill” and “deader than dead.” Testin argued that SB 681 would over-regulate the hemp industry, and even lead to a monopolization effect where a small number of entities could control who gets hemp permits, shape an otherwise competitive market, and operate in a “good ol’ boys club” manner.
Sen. Sarah Keyeski (D-Lodi) highlighted the divide among state Republicans over hemp and cannabis products, stressing that Democrats are not the ones holding up legalization and regulation.
The committee room was filled with people from across the hemp industry who listened to the conversation. When lawmakers questioned how to ensure that children do not acquire intoxicating hemp products, distributors and manufacturers pointed to age-verification software even for online sales, which require a photograph and image of a driver’s license to approve an order. There was also discussion about how to prevent products from being marketed to children using cartoon-like advertising and appealing candy wrappers.
Some veterans testified, describing how hemp helped them alleviate pain, kick addictive pain killers, soothed PTSD symptoms, and calmed the body for sleep. Other testimony centered on the danger involved in crossing state lines to Michigan or Illinois to acquire cannabis to treat various medical conditions. Hemp farmers stressed that they need to know now how they will be affected by a looming federal ban as they decide when or whether to plant their crops in the spring.
Much of the public testimony was supportive of Testin’s bill, though some speakers said that it needed to be amended to protect farmers and growers, and also expand the kinds of products it would cover including drinks and gummies.
“Yes, we are now in a scenario where there are intoxicating hemp products,” said Testin. “But just no different than anything like beer, wine, or alcohol, we need to have some sensible regulations put in place, which this bill aims to do just that.”
As for “concerns about getting baked or getting high from these products,” Testin added, “it’s no different than those individuals who go out and consume too many old fashioneds at fish fry on a Friday night, or have too many beers. It’s about personal choice and responsibility, but at the same time making sure that we have some regulations put in place.”
The hemp industry deserves to “thrive and grow,” Testin said, while the public deserves protection and to know “that this stuff isn’t falling into the hands of people it shouldn’t be in, like kids.”
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Deputy State Superintendent Tom McCarthy speaks to Rep. Amanda Nedweski (R-Pleasant Prairie) after delivering testimony on AB 678. (Photo by Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner)
Wisconsin school districts would be required to establish policies on appropriate communication between students and staff members before the next school year, under a bill that received a public hearing Thursday.
The bill comes in reaction to a report from the Capital Times in November that found over 200 investigations into teacher licenses due to allegations of sexual misconduct or grooming from 2018 to 2023. Another bill coauthored by Nedweski, AB 677, making grooming a felony crime in Wisconsin received a public hearing earlier this week.
“Many of these cases begin with the erosion of professional boundaries when a school employee starts communicating with the students inappropriately often outside of school hours and without parent knowledge usually through the use of text messaging and social media,” Nedweski told the Assembly Education Committee. “While the vast majority of school staff use these tools responsibly, a small number have exploited that access — sometimes leading to devastating consequences.”
AB 678 would require Wisconsin school boards to adopt a policy on appropriate communications between students and employees or volunteers in the school district.
“This bill preserves local control. It does not mandate a one-size-fits-all policy; instead it allows each school district to determine what communication policies work best for its own community,” Nedweski said.
The policies would need to include specific consequences for staff who violate the policy and specify that it applies to communications during and outside of school hours. The policy would need to include standards for appropriate content and methods of communication.
An amendment to the bill, which Nedweski said came at the request of the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction (DPI) and other stakeholders, would require annual training for employees on identifying, preventing and reporting grooming and professional boundary violations.
The Department of Public Instruction has worked with Nedweski on the legislation and supports it.
“We think this is a good effort to get the conversation started,” Deputy State Superintendent Tom McCarthy said, noting the agency has been working on policy related to appropriate communication for over eight years. He said there are a lot of districts that are using technology for software that allows them to track communications.
“There’s a bit of a dichotomy with this issue. We know that in order to educate kids we need to foster and build relationships with students and families, and so we do encourage appropriate communication in every school district,” McCarthy said, adding that the policy and training would be critical. “You will find some circumstances where you’re going to want communication and it might not be as neat and tidy as you’d expect it to be. There are always emergency circumstances where a teacher might need to call a student directly… so we want some policies to be flexible to address those areas.”
Chris Kulow, director of government relations for the Wisconsin Association of School Boards (WASB), said the organization had some concerns about the language in the bill related to consequences. He testified for information only, noting the issue of communication between staff and students is not new to school districts.
“Although recent news coverage and increased interest from state policymakers may make this appear to be a new issue, it is not new to schools. School boards have long recognized the need for policies addressing appropriate communication and professional boundaries between pupils and staff. Many districts have already adopted such policies,” Kulow said. “This bill may require some districts to update existing policies to reflect its specific language and to the extent it prompts boards to review and strengthen policies is beneficial.”
Kulow said complying with the provision related to consequences as currently written would be challenging as violations can vary widely and require a wide range of responses. The organization wanted the provision removed, but said Nedweski wanted something related to be included in the bill.
“Attempting to predetermine specific consequences for every specific scenario may be impractical and could complicate the disciplinary process,” Kulow said. “We suggested revising the language in the bill to read that ‘the school board shall include in the policy a range of consequences up to and including termination.’”
The bill currently only covers Wisconsin public schools, though Nedweski told Democratic lawmakers, who expressed concerns about the bill not including the state’s private voucher schools, that she is working on an amendment.
“We need to protect all kids. This is such a growing problem. We’ve seen just an increase in inappropriate communication,” Nedweski said.
Democratic lawmakers, including Rep. Francesca Hong (D-Madison), also asked whether lawmakers would be open to including funding for school districts to support the implementation of the bill.
Nedweski said she hasn’t had any requests for funding from schools or the DPI throughout the development of the bill.
“I think it’s a serious enough issue, a weighty enough issue, that all schools can find the resources to craft a policy and do some training to make sure they are protecting children,” Nedweski said, adding that DPI already has modules related to this type of training.
McCarthy said additional funding, including the release of $1 million set aside for the agency in the state budget, could help speed along the process. Those funds, which sit in a supplemental fund, can only be released by the Joint Finance Committee. He said without the funds the agency could potentially have to cut down on staff and other areas of its operations, which could affect how quickly work is done.
Under the bill in its current form, school boards would need to adopt a policy by July 1, 2026.
McCarthy said DPI would like to see an amendment that would move the deadline for policy adoption to a later date, saying DPI may need a longer “runway” to ensure the agency has time to change and update policies and training if needed. He told the Wisconsin Examiner that some of the changes could be necessary if Nedweski’s grooming bill becomes law.
Rich Judge, assistant state superintendent for the division of government and public affairs, also noted that school boards would need to have time to meet, develop and approve policies.
Nedweski said in a written statement to the Examiner that she is taking the agency’s suggestion under consideration and is discussing potential dates. One potential date could be Sept. 1, 2026, she said.
“If AB 678 is signed into law, the goal is for school districts to have these policies in place for the 2026–27 school year,” Nedweski said. She noted that some of the agency’s concerns are tied to her other bill. “This only underscores the importance of passing AB 677 and getting it signed into law promptly to ensure that districts across Wisconsin can take the necessary steps to better protect students in school.”
Wisconsin Watch partners with Gigafact to produce fact briefs — bite-sized fact checks of trending claims. Read our methodology to learn how we check claims.
Wisconsin, which produces less electricity than it consumes, imports on average 15% of its electricity from other states, federal statistics show.
In 2024, Wisconsin used about 73 million megawatt-hours of electricity. That included about 8 million – 11.1% – imported from other states.
Minnesota imported 10.3%.
Iowa (14.5%), Illinois (22.7%) and Michigan (14.6%) were net-exporters.
Wisconsin imported more in previous years:
2023: 14.8%
2022: 18.4%
2021: 14%
2020: 15.7%
About 10% of U.S. electricity generation is traded across state lines.
Wisconsin participates in a grid run by Midcontinent Independent System Operator (MISO), which aims to ensure power flows across 15 central U.S. states.
Electricity rates in Wisconsin, which produces most electricity from coal and natural gas, have exceeded regional averages annually for 20 years.
Wisconsin utility ratepayers owe nearly $1 billion on coal-powered plants that have been or soon will be shut down, Wisconsin Watch recently reported.
This fact brief is responsive to conversations such as this one.
Does Wisconsin import about 15% of its electricity from other states? is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.
The city of Madison and its former clerk are arguing in court that they can’t be sued for failing to count 193 absentee ballots in the 2024 presidential election, in part because a Wisconsin law calls absentee voting a privilege, not a constitutional right.
That legal argument raises questions about how much protection absentee voters have against the risk of disenfranchisement — and could reignite a recent debate over whether the law calling absentee voting a privilege is itself unconstitutional.
That law, which appears to be uncommon outside of Wisconsin, has been cited repeatedly in recent years in attempts to impose more requirements and restrictions on absentee voting, and, at times, disqualify absentee ballots on which the voters have made errors. It does not appear to have been invoked to absolve election officials for errors in handling correctly cast ballots.
Nonetheless, the law has become central to the defense presented by Madison and its former clerk, Maribeth Witzel-Behl, in a novel lawsuit seeking monetary damages on behalf of the voters whose ballots went missing.
The suit, filed by the law firm Law Forward, names the city and the clerk’s office as defendants, along with Witzel-Behl and Deputy Clerk Jim Verbick in their personal capacities, and cites a series of errors after the 2024 election that led to the ballots not being counted in alleging that they violated voters’ constitutional rights.
In defending against that claim, attorneys for Witzel-Behl argued in a court filing that by choosing to vote absentee, the 193 disenfranchised voters “exercised a privilege rather than a constitutional right.”
Witzel-Behl’s filing argues that the 193 disenfranchised voters did, in fact, exercise their right to vote, but chose to vote absentee and therefore place the ballots into an administrative system that “can result in errors.”
“The fact that Plaintiffs’ ballots were not counted is unfortunate,” the filing states. “But it is the result of human error, not malice. And that human error was not a violation of the Plaintiffs’ constitutional right to vote.”
Matthew W. O’Neill, an attorney representing Witzel-Behl, declined to comment.
The city’s attorneys have now adopted the same argument, filings show.
Asked about the city’s legal defense, current Madison clerk Lydia McComas didn’t address the argument directly but told Votebeat that the city is committed to counting all eligible votes “regardless of how they are cast.”
Phil Keisling, a former Oregon secretary of state, said he wasn’t aware of other states with similar laws. He said he found the city’s argument wrong and offensive.
“The right to vote, if there is a state constitutional right to vote, should have nothing to do with the form that a voter chooses,” he said.
The law that Madison cites in its legal defense was enacted in 1985, long before absentee voting became widespread. The stricter language about the regulation of absentee voting came after judges in a series of Wisconsin court cases called for more liberal interpretation of those regulations.
The law states that while voting is a constitutional right, “voting by absentee ballot is a privilege exercised wholly outside the traditional safeguards of the polling place.” A subsequent provision states that absentee ballots that do not follow required procedures “may not be counted.”
The law appears similar to a 1969 U.S. Supreme Court decision that drew a distinction between the right to vote and the right to receive absentee ballots. That decision has since been interpreted — and misinterpreted — in a “number of ways by a number of people wanting to trim back mail voting,” said Justin Levitt, an election law professor at Loyola Marymount University.
After the Wisconsin law was enacted, the state election board clarified the Legislature’s position that failing to comply with procedures for absentee ballot applications and voting would result in ballots not being counted. The board did not suggest the law could be used to excuse municipalities that improperly discard legally cast ballots.
Absentee voting has long been available in Wisconsin but surged in 2020 amid the COVID-19 pandemic and has been extensively litigated since then.
The law calling absentee voting a privilege was central to a lawsuit that resulted in a 2022 statewide ban on ballot drop boxes; another lawsuit to prohibit voters from being able to spoil ballots and vote with a new one; and President Donald Trump’s attempt to overturn the 2020 election outcome in Wisconsin.
A later lawsuit led to the reinstatement of drop boxes in 2024. In that case, plaintiffs argued that the law “unconstitutionally degrades the voting rights of all absentee voters by increasing the risk of disenfranchisement.” The court, then led by liberal justices, declined to overturn the statute but disagreed with an earlier interpretation that absentee voting requires heightened skepticism.
Rick Hasen, a professor at UCLA Law School and expert on election law, said he didn’t think the law itself was problematic, adding that states have various laws controlling absentee voting. The U.S. Constitution, he noted, doesn’t require any state to offer absentee voting.
But “once the state gives someone the opportunity to vote by mail,” he said, “then they can’t — as a matter of federal constitutional law — deprive that person of their vote because they chose a method that the state didn’t have to offer.”
The city and Witzel-Behl’s use of the law in this instance “seems to be wrong,” Hasen said.
Attorneys for Law Forward in a court filing called Witzel-Behl’s argument a “shocking proposition.”
“There is no right to vote if our votes are not counted,” Law Forward staff attorney Scott Thompson told Votebeat. “And this is the only case I’m aware of where a municipal government has argued otherwise.”
Alexander Shur is a reporter for Votebeat based in Wisconsin. Contact Shur at ashur@votebeat.org.
This coverage is made possible through Votebeat, a nonpartisan news organization covering local election administration and voting access. Sign up for Votebeat Wisconsin’s free newsletter here.
Madison’s defense in missing ballot case: Absentee voting is a ‘privilege,’ not a right is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.
Zabi Sahibzada’s team of refugee resettlement caseworkers has shrunk. The Trump administration’s pause on refugee admissions in January 2025 dealt a blow to Sahibzada’s employer, Jewish Social Services of Madison, which previously counted on federal funding tied to each new refugee arrival to support its resettlement program.
A few new arrivals trickled in over the following months, entering the U.S. with special immigrant visas available to Afghan and Iraqi nationals who worked with the U.S. government or its international partners. The same visa enabled Sahibzada, a former USAID employee from Afghanistan, to reach the U.S. in 2022.
But even those admissions have now halted. The State Department in November stopped issuing any visas to Afghan nationals after authorities identified the man who shot two West Virginia National Guard members near the White House as an Afghan special immigrant visa holder.
Though the Trump administration says it will permit up to 7,500 refugees to resettle in the U.S. this fiscal year, it plans to prioritize South Africans – primarily Afrikaners, a white minority descended largely from Dutch, French and German settlers.
Eleven South African refugees arrived in Wisconsin in September, followed by another 32 in late 2025. They were the only refugees resettled in the state since last January, U.S. State Department records show.
The dramatic slowdown leaves agencies searching for ways to maintain Wisconsin’s resettlement infrastructure until the refugee pipeline widens again. For some agencies, that includes resettling South African refugees, even if some remain skeptical of the Trump administration’s motives for privileging them in admissions. Jewish Social Services lacks that option: Federal officials did not include the nonprofit in the South African refugee program.
Providers warn that if Wisconsin’s resettlement infrastructure – trained caseworkers, volunteers and employer partnerships — withers, the state won’t be prepared for any future surge of refugees.
The near-total shutdown of refugee admissions followed the most active period for resettlement in decades.
More than 5,000 refugees reached Wisconsin between October 2020 and September 2024 – a span in which refugee resettlement in the U.S. reached the highest annual peak since the early 1990s.
Most recent refugee arrivals came from Myanmar and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
Those figures do not include special immigrant visa holders, asylees or immigrants with humanitarian parole, many of whom come from the same countries as those admitted as refugees. Roughly 370 Afghans with special immigrant visas settled in Wisconsin between October 2020 and October 2025.
Refugees reach Wisconsin through a network of international, federal and state agencies, national nonprofits and state-level partners. In the process, they pass through a series of screening interviews, background checks and medical examinations.
Six organizations currently contract with Wisconsin’s Department of Children and Families to provide resettlement services, connecting new arrivals to housing, employment and English language courses. Relying on a mix of federal and state funding, they provide some services for up to five years after an arrival. The federal government ties much of its funding to the number of refugees resettled.
Lutheran Social Services of Wisconsin and Upper Michigan planned to resettle more than 400 people in fiscal year 2025. Instead, it resettled 163 people between October 2024 and January 2025, after which it received only a half-dozen new arrivals, resettlement director Omar Mohamed said. All were Afghans with special immigrant visas who arrived in Wisconsin without ties to a resettlement agency and reached out for help.
“At least 27 people were scheduled to arrive in January when the stop work order happened,” he added. President Donald Trump’s inauguration day order to suspend the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program rendered their plane tickets useless.
The sudden shift prompted Lutheran Social Services to cut nearly a third of its resettlement program staff, Mohamed said.
Most Wisconsin refugee resettlement agencies face similar predicaments. Jewish Social Services in Madison laid off two case workers and a housing specialist. Hanan Refugee Relief Group, a relatively new nonprofit operating out of an office above a South Side Milwaukee pizzeria, cut 10 members of an already small team. World Relief Wisconsin, which resettles refugees in the Fox Valley, also laid off staff.
Catholic Charities of the Diocese of Green Bay, which has resettled hundreds of refugees in northeast Wisconsin in recent years, ended its resettlement program after its national affiliate, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, severed its partnerships with the federal government in April.
But Sean Gilligan, the diocese’s refugee services director, says Catholic Charities is still providing housing referrals, English classes and other basic services to refugees who already settled in greater Green Bay.
Resettlement agencies are still receiving some federal funds to support refugees who arrived within the past five years, along with state grants for educational and health programs.
That funding may temporarily help the agencies stay afloat.
Hanan Refugee Relief Group is ramping up its focus on employment training, Executive Director Sheila Badwan said. That includes offering on-the-job English language training for refugees employed at a Milwaukee Cargill meat processing plant.
But the loss of funding from new arrivals leaves Hanan and other agencies scrambling to find donors to support their work.
“We are hoping just to keep our doors open to serve not just the ones we welcomed (recently),” said Uma Abdi, the nonprofit’s refugee program director, “but all of those refugees and immigrants that still need support.”
The International Institute of Wisconsin, an older and well-established resettlement agency, is an outlier. It’s growing as others scale back. Revenue from contracts with medical clinics and other businesses to provide translation services has allowed it to grow as others scale back.
“We can operate without any government contracts,” President and CEO Paul Trebian said.
With the doors closed to refugees from most of the world’s conflict zones, some Wisconsin resettlement agencies are now turning their attention to South Africans.
The Trump administration launched the South African refugee admissions program through a February executive order, filling in the details after the fact. Alleging a “shocking disregard of its citizens’ rights,” the order pointed to a 2024 South African law that allows the state to seize land without compensation in limited circumstances.
The law’s supporters call it necessary to redistribute land from the country’s white minority, who own much of South Africa’s farmland, to a Black majority still recovering from decades of racial apartheid that ended in the 1990s. Trump decried the law as “racially discriminatory” and accused the South African government of “fueling disproportionate violence against racially disfavored landowners.”
South African President Cyril Ramaphosa has not set a date for the law’s implementation, and police statistics do not bear out claims that white farmers are more likely to be targets for violence than Black farmers.
Trump’s order specifically offered refugee status to Afrikaners, but his administration has since said the resettlement program is open to members of any racial minority in South Africa, including those of English or South Asian descent, so long as they can “articulate a past personal experience of persecution or fear of future persecution.” Unlike most refugees, South Africans may apply for refugee status only while living in South Africa.
Refugee advocacy groups and the South African government have criticized the program for legitimizing false claims of “white genocide” and bypassing some steps through which refugees from other countries must pass.
But the Wisconsin resettlement agencies participating in the program say their responsibility is to welcome refugees, not to determine who deserves refugee status.
“We’re here to serve everybody,” said Lutheran Social Services President and CEO Héctor Colón, whose nonprofit expects next year to resettle up to 75 new arrivals, mostly or all South Africans in the Milwaukee area.
Colón adds that working with South Africans keeps his organization’s resettlement infrastructure in working order during the pause in other admissions.
“We’ve been through ebbs and flows, we understand how this works,” he said, “but our organization has made a commitment that we want to keep this program up and running. There are many programs all across the country that cannot absorb the hit.”
But World Relief Wisconsin Regional Director Gail Cornelius, whose nonprofit helped resettle South Africans this year, noted that some of the South Africans who arrived in Wisconsin last year have already moved on to other states.
A wave of federal rules changes following the November attack of National Guard members further complicates the work of resettlement agencies.
Among the changes: halting green card and citizenship applications for immigrants and refugees from 39 countries, including Afghanistan and Myanmar.
“People that were going in for their citizenship oath were actually pulled out of line,” Cornelius said.
The Trump administration also vowed to revet and reinterview all refugees who entered the U.S. during the Biden administration, regardless of their current legal status. Such a review could affect thousands of Wisconsin refugees, but resettlement agencies are still awaiting clarity about how the administration will follow through.
“How are they going to review all of these cases?” Badwan asked. “Do we even have the resources to do that?”
Sahibzada wonders whether he, too, will face revetting. Meanwhile, the White House’s bar on immigrant visas for Afghan nationals placed his plans to reunite with his wife and children on hold. They remain in Kabul, his daughters confined to their home after the Taliban forbade girls from attending school.
“I was waiting for things to be calm,” he said, referring to the conflict between Afghanistan and Pakistan that previously stalled his efforts to secure visas for his family. “I talk to my kids every morning, and they’re asking me that question, like, what’s gonna happen? I have no answer to them. I’m just saying, maybe things will get better.”
Working with Afghan families who made it to Wisconsin before the door closed is bittersweet, Sahibzada added. “Even if my kids are not here, at least they are here.”
Wisconsin Watch is a nonprofit, nonpartisan newsroom. Subscribe to our newsletters for original stories and our Friday news roundup.
Refugee resettlement agencies try to keep doors open as White House shuts out new arrivals is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.
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