Rep. Supreme Moore Omokunde said Black History Month is about recognizing the history people should be learning year round. Screenshot via WisEye.
The Wisconsin Assembly unanimously passed a resolution Tuesday recognizing February as Black History Month without significant roadblocks or delays for the first time in many years.
“I’m so glad that we are finally able to bring this bipartisan effort to the floor of the Assembly without all of the challenges that we’ve had before,” Rep. Supreme Moore Omokunde (D-Milwaukee) said.
Black History Month resolutions have faced pushback from Republican lawmakers in previous years. Issues started in 2019 when the resolution included Colin Kapaernick, the Wisconsin-native former NFL player that knelt during the national anthem to protest police violence. In 2021, Republicans rejected a resolution due to the individuals included. A Republican resolution, which was written without the support of the Legislative Black Caucus, was passed in 2022 without Democratic support. A resolution passed in 2023 declaring February Black History Month — but did not receive a vote until March, and no resolution passed in 2024.
Moore Omokunde said the month is about recognizing the Black history that people should learn year round, not just for one month.
The resolution acknowledges that enslaved Africans were first brought to Virginia over 400 years ago and acknowledges the history of Black History Month, which has its roots in Carter G. Woodson’s “Negro History Week” established in 1926.
The resolution recognizes 14 Black Americans, including several Wisconsinites. They include Elisterine Clayton, a 100-year-old Milwaukee resident who helped build one of the longest-standing Black residential neighborhood, Halyard Park; Paul Higginbotham, the first African-American judge to serve on the Wisconsin Court of Appeals; Marcia Anderson, a retired senior officer of the United States Army Reserve from Beloit, Wisconsin, who was the first Black woman to become a major general; Anthony McGahee, a Milwaukee gospel musician and choir director, and Shakita LaGrant-McClain, the executive director of the Milwaukee County Department of Health and Human Services.
An amendment to the resolution removed Samuel Coleman, who is currently serving as the assistant superintendent of instruction for the Oshkosh Area School District, from those being recognized. In 2022, Coleman was part of a controversy related to text messages he sent about white people while employed at another Wisconsin school district. The office of Rep. Kalan Haywood — who authored the amendment — hasn’t responded to a request for more information.
Rep. Sequanna Taylor (D-Milwaukee) said that Black history is American history.
“It is woven into every fabric of this nation — building and shaping this nation, the economy of this nation and the progress of this nation,” Taylor said. “From the resilience of those who fought against oppression, to the brilliance of those who have shaped our industries, science and art, Black Americans have been at the heart of every chapter of this nation’s story.”
“[Black history] did not start with slavery and it does not end with the cutting of DEI,” Taylor said.
Diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) efforts have been targeted by the state and federal lawmakers over the last several years. While the new Trump administration issued a proclamation declaring February Black History Month, he also signed an executive order in January to end DEI efforts. The move led the Wisconsin Department of Military Affairs to remove web pages related to DEI. The U.S. Defense Department has also declared “identity months dead.” Republican lawmakers in Wisconsin have also been taking actions with the goal of eliminating DEI initiatives throughout the University of Wisconsin System and other state agencies.
Taylor recognized her colleagues in the Legislative Black Caucus, including Sen. LaTonya Johnson (D-Milwaukee), Sen. Dora Drake (D-Milwaukee), Rep. Kalan Haywood (D-Milwaukee), Rep. Darrin Madison (D-Milwaukee) and Rep. Margaret Arney (D-Wauwatosa), for their work.
“Black history is alive in the work we do today in the fight for equity in the demand for fair policies and the commitment to ensure that future generations inherit a nation that truly lives up to its promise of liberty and justice,” Taylor said.
Rep. Benjamin Franklin speaks about his bill to require 70% of funding in schools go towards "classroom" expenses. (Photo by Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner)
Wisconsin Republicans in the state Assembly passed a package of education bills Wednesday to implement new standards for standardized test scores, school funding allocations, responding to curriculum inspection requests and for keeping cell phones out of schools.
Republicans argued that the state needs to ensure that schools are meeting certain standards, especially as they’ve provided some state funding increases in recent years and as school enrollments have declined. While Wisconsin schools did receive an increase in the last state budget, many schools continue to struggle to meet costs as funding has failed to match the rate of inflation.
“We need to make sure that, as we are increasing funding for education, we are also doing a better job, ensuring that the standards and the expectations that parents and taxpayers have across the state are being met,” Assembly Speaker Robin Vos (R-Rochester) said at a press conference.
Vos called some school districts “disappointing” and named Milwaukee Public Schools as an example. The district, which was an ongoing target of Republican lawmakers throughout the debate, has experienced turmoil over the last few years with turnover in staff, a financial crisis after delays in delivering required documents to DPI and reading and math scores that show continued disparities between Black and white students.
“I’m a huge supporter of local control. There are some districts that are so broken and expect us to have to pay for it as taxpayers, either on the front end through funding the school district or on the back end with the bad decisions that are made where people make bad choices,” Vos said. “Having that statewide standards is good for Wisconsin while still maintaining the flexibility to try to get there.”
Democrats said Republicans’ focus was in the wrong place and that the proposed solutions would not help address the real challenges that schools are facing.
Minority Leader Greta Neubauer (D-Racine) criticized Republicans for rejecting Gov. Tony Evers’ budget proposal that would invest heavily in Wisconsin K-12 education.
Evers unveiled his complete state budget proposal Tuesday evening, calling for more than $3 billion in additional funding for K-12 schools, including to support operational costs, special education and mental health supports.
“The level of investment from the Legislature is just not enough to provide these essential investments in our schools,” Neubauer said. “Here in the Capitol, the Legislature has failed our students … we just have not kept up our end of the bargain.”
“Instead of bringing legislation to the floor to support our schools, teachers and students, the best the majority party can do is to fast-track a bill that would require cursive instruction,” Neubauer said. That bill — AB 3 — passed 51-46 with Reps. Joy Goeben (R-Hobart), Shae Sortwell (R-Two Rivers) and David Steffen (R-Howard) joining Democrats to vote against it.
Test scores
Another bill focused on reversing changes to standards on state tests that were approved by the DPI last year. GOP lawmakers slammed State Superintendent Jill Underly, who is running for reelection against Republican-backed education consultant Brittany Kinser, for approving the changes in the first place.
“Something is wrong in our communication system. It is not a lack of resources. It’s a lack of willpower to do something about the problems that we know are obvious because it is the fact that we have kids who can’t read,” Vos said. He added that only lawmakers should be allowed to “dumb down” the state’s standards.
Vos said there was only one person — referencing Underly — that “needs to pay a price” and “hopefully she will in April.”
Wisconsin students take standardized tests each year including the Forward Exam for third graders through eighth graders and the ACT and PreACT Secure for high school students.
Underly approved changes to the standards last year that included new terms — “developing,” “approaching,” “meeting” and “advanced” — to describe student achievement. Previously, the terms were “below basic,” “basic,” “proficient” and “advanced.” The changes also included new cut scores — which are the test scores cutoffs needed to qualify to be placed in each performance level.
Underly and DPI have defended the changes, saying they were necessary to more accurately measure achievement; that educators and other stakeholders worked together to create the new measures with Underly signing off; and that it’s too late to take the state back to 2019-20 standards.
Republican lawmakers said the changes “lowered” state standards and were an attempt to “cook the books.”
AB 1 directs DPI to use score ranges and qualitative terms used on school report cards for the 2019-2020 school year and to tie the Forward exam score ranges and pupil performance categories to those set by the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP).
“There’s no legislative oversight on the scoring and assessment of our kids, so this bill will establish that,” bill coauthor Rep. Robert Wittke (R-Caledonia) said at a press conference.
“We will be once again allowed to compare ourselves to other states — let us know who’s doing well, are we on pace with them or not,” Wittke said. “Then it provides legislative oversight, so the only time these scores can be adjusted or changed is when we actually legislate.”
Rep. Angelina M. Cruz (D-Racine), who has worked as an educator for the last 20 years, said during floor debate that a variety of student assessments are used to measure students’ learning with each serving a “unique purpose” and reflecting the “expertise of professional educators.” She said that goes for the state tests as well and said the updates to standards weren’t made in a “vacuum,” noting that this isn’t the first time DPI has made changes and it shouldn’t be the last.
“Education is dynamic,” Cruz said. “The disconnect between the reality of classroom teaching and this body and the understanding of assessments has never been more clear… This bill is not about improving education. This bill is about playing political games.”
Cruz said lawmakers would be better served fully funding the state’s public schools.
During floor debate, Wittke said that Democrats were repeating political talking points by talking about increasing funding for public schools.
The bill passed 55-44 along party lines with Republicans for and Democrats against it.
Ban cell phones
Lawmakers also passed a bill that would mandate cell phone bans in schools statewide.
Under AB 2, school boards must require districts to adopt cell phone ban policies in their schools during instructional time. Policies would need to be implemented by July 2026 and would need to include certain exceptions in emergencies, cases involving student’s health care, individualized education program (IEP) or 504 plan and for educational purposes.
Kitchens said it was a “modest” proposal and would help schools enforce policies if they already have them and get other school districts on the same page.
“Part of that is putting them away when it’s time to do work,” Kitchens said, adding that the bill would provide a “unified” approach for the state. During the 40 minutes of debate on the bill, some lawmakers in the Assembly chamber could be seen with their phones out.
Of the 320 school districts that participated in DPI’s 2024-25 State Digital Learning survey approximately 90% of districts reported already having some sort of restrictive cell phone policy in place.
Rep. Robyn Vining (D-Wauwautosa) said she thinks the original intent of the bill was genuine in trying to address challenges posed by phones in classrooms. However, she noted that it wouldn’t apply to the state’s private and charter schools that participate in voucher programs. Vining said the bill was modeled after legislation in Indiana, but Wisconsin Republicans intentionally carved out the voucher schools.
Rep. Robyn Vining (D-Wauwautosa) called attention during floor debate to the fact that the cell phone ban requirement wouldn’t apply to voucher schools. (Photo by Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner)
“It’s not fair when the concerns of voucher lobbyists are considered valid by Republicans in the Legislature that while the same concerns are ignored when they come from public schools,” Vining said.
Kitchens said the issue shouldn’t be partisan and noted that Louisiana, a red state, and New York, a blue state, both have strict statewide cell phone ban policies.
The bill passed 53-45 with Rep. Rob Swearingen (R-Rhinelander) joining Democrats against.
Materials inspections within 14 days
AB 5, which would require school districts to comply with requests within 14 days, passed 54-43, also on a party-line vote, with Republicans for and Democrats against.
Parents can already submit open records requests to school districts to receive school materials. The bill adds that entities should respond “as soon as practicable and without delay.”
Rep. Barbara Dittrich (R-Oconomowoc) said during the press conference that the bill seeks to help parents get information about materials more quickly. She noted that there are no time requirements included in state statute for responding to open records requests.
“I’m old enough to remember a time in our Wisconsin schools where our schools were begging parents to become engaged and then there came a huge fracture when COVID-19 hit,” Dittrich said. Some parents, she said, aren’t having their requests fulfilled before their child is out of the class. “[The bill] works at bridging this gap between schools and families so they can work together for the benefit of our students.”
This is the third time lawmakers have introduced a bill to implement a time frame for complying. In the 2021-23 session, the bill passed the Legislature and Evers vetoed it. Last session, the bill passed the Assembly and never received a vote in the Senate
Other laws in Wisconsin include one that requires a list of textbooks be filed with the school board clerk every year on an annual basis. Another state statute requires school boards to provide the complete human growth and development curriculum and all instructional materials for inspection to parents who request it.
Rep. Francesca Hong (D-Madison) said the bill is unnecessary given the current state laws.
“It’s trying to solve a problem that doesn’t exist,” Hong said.
Requiring 70% of money to go to “classroom” expenses
AB 6 would require school boards in Wisconsin to spend a minimum of 70% of operating money on direct classroom expenditures and limit annual compensation increases for school administrators to the average percent increase provided to teachers in the school district.
An amendment to the bill would clarify that “direct classroom expenditures” would not include costs for administration, food services, transportation, instructional support including media centers, teacher training and student support such as nurses and school counselors. Those costs would need to fall under the other 30% of spending.
Rep. Benjamin Franklin (R-De Pere) said the state has “a system that fails to put the money in the classroom where the education is happening” and said the bill would implement “guardrails” for school districts to ensure money is going to classrooms and teachers.
Rep. Joan Fitzgerald (D-Fort Atkinson) said she was voting against the bill — and others on the calendar — because they appeared to be written without “meaningful input” from teachers, administrators, superintendents, parents, students or community members.
“I’m here to let you know that if you want support in the educational community for any education bill, you should do your homework,” Fitzgerald said, “including having conversations with the public and reaching across the aisle.”
Fitzgerald said Franklin’s bill would take away local control from school districts and school boards and criticized the bill for including “vague” wording and “undefined terms,” saying the bills are unserious.
“What about all the additional staff needed to meet the special needs of my students — people like speech pathologists, nurses, counselors? People I could not have done my job without,” Fitzgerald said. “That definition does include athletic programs…. Does it include bus transportation to get to games because I’ve heard that actual bus transportation is not included as a direct class transmission? Although I’ll admit I’m incredibly confused about that one, since I would not have had kids in my classroom in my rural district without bus transportation.”
Rep. Christian Phelps (D-Eau Claire) called the proposal an “arbitrary, one size fits all budget crackdown that limits our ability to meet moral and constitutional obligations.”
The bill passed 53-44 with only Republican support.
The Assembly also passed AB 4, which would require civics instruction in K-12 schools, in a 52-46 vote. Sortwell and Goeben voted against the bill with Democrats.
Gov. Tony Evers delivers his 2025 state budget address. (Photo by Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner)
Gov. Tony Evers unveiled a sweeping 2025-27 state budget proposal Tuesday evening that would come at the cost of $55.5 billion in state funds across the biennium — an increase of about 18%. The proposal lays out many priorities including investments in education and initiatives to protect the environment, tax relief for middle class Wisconsinites, tax hikes for the wealthy Wisconsinites and expansion of Medicaid access.
Evers’ address was his fourth budget address since taking office in 2019 and comes at the beginning of a state budget cycle when Wisconsin is expected to end the 2023-25 biennium with $4.3 billion in its general fund. The state had a record-high balance of $1.9 billion in its rainy day fund at the end of fiscal year 2023-24.
Altogether, with federal and other revenue, the state would have an operating budget of $119 billion over the next two years under Evers’ proposal and a total increase of about 20%. In addition to the funding, Evers’ budget would add about 880 state positions with federal funds for a total of about 75,613 state employees by July 2026. It would also add 1,302 positions, a total 36,766 positions, using state funds.
During his approximately 40-minute address to the state Senate and Assembly, Evers laid out major parts of the proposal to the standing applause of Democratic lawmakers and the seated stares of Republican lawmakers.
“The budget I’m proposing balances our priorities of investing in our kids and needs that have long been neglected while providing real and sustainable tax relief and saving where we can,” Evers said during his address. He declared that the budget would be the most “pro-kid” budget in state history.
Towards the end of his speech, Evers called on lawmakers to focus on “doing what’s best for our kids, delivering real solutions for real problems Wisconsinites face every day and doing the right thing.”
Republican lawmakers, however, said that most of Evers’ budget proposal would be “dead-on-arrival” and criticized him for trying to increase spending and grow the size of government.
Environment and water quality
Evers proposed more than $300 million towards eliminating lead from service lines, bubblers, schools, homes and child care centers. He also called for the state to invest $145 million towards combating PFAS contamination statewide and providing emergency resources, including bottled water for communities affected by water contamination.
The state allocated $125 million towards the effort in the last budget, but lawmakers and Evers never agreed on a bill that would allow the money to be used, so it remains unused.
“Addressing PFAS and other contaminants grows harder and more expensive with each day of delay,” Evers said. “Republicans and Democrats have to work together to finally get something done on this issue.”
Evers also proposed dedicating $100 million annually towards reauthorizing the Knowles-Nelson Stewardship Program for an additional 10 years — a total $1 billion investment aimed at supporting projects that improve the state’s water quality, protect key habitats and support investments in state and local parks and other public lands.
Adds $4 billion for K-12 and higher education
Building on his declaration in January of 2025 as ‘The Year of the Kid,’ Evers announced a vast education budget proposal that would invest $856 million for the University of Wisconsin System, nearly $60 million for the technical colleges and $3.15 billion in K-12 education across the state.
“Every Wisconsin kid should have access to a high-quality public education from early childhood to our K-12 schools to our higher education institutions,” Evers said. “I’m urging the Legislature to do what’s best for our kids by approving significant investments in public education at every level in Wisconsin.”
Evers acknowledged recent actions from the Trump administration and federal lawmakers affecting higher education. Most recently, the administration told universities to get rid of diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives or risk losing funding. Universities, including UW-Madison, have also been grappling with the potential impacts of cuts to research funding.
“Politicians in Washington don’t know a darn thing about what’s going on at campuses across Wisconsin,” Evers said. “They don’t understand that our UW System has been part of Wisconsin since we first became a state — it’s enshrined in our state constitution. They don’t know how important our UW System has been to our state’s success or how important it is for our future.”
Evers’ UW System proposal would be one of the largest investments in the system in state history. He said the reinvestment in the UW System is necessary due to impacts of attacks and disinvestment over the last many years and the ongoing challenges that the state’s 13 campuses are facing.
“UW is facing campus closures and program cuts, students are facing tuition increases, and faculty and staff are facing layoffs, and with new federal efforts to cut higher education funding, things for UW could get a whole lot worse,” Evers said. “It’s up to us — each of us, together — to invest in our UW System, to defend it and to protect its promise for future generations.”
Some of the funding would include $128 million for financial aid; $308 million to support expanding access to schools through dual enrollment, direct admissions and transfer pathways; $56 million to support recruiting and retaining educators and staff; $22 million to support mental health services; $104 million to invest in innovative technologies and $166 million to increase wages.
He called on lawmakers and elected officials to help increase funding for public education, saying that many of them benefited from it when they were younger.
“Don’t tell our kids they don’t deserve to have the same opportunity you did,” Evers said.
Evers’ largest education investment proposal would be to the state’s K-12 schools, and he argued that the investments are necessary to help address student outcomes.
“I know some legislators have tried using student outcomes to argue against investing in our kids and our schools. Folks, you’ve got it backwards,” Evers said. “The outcomes we’re seeing are exactly why we must do more to do what’s best for our kids.”
The budget proposal includes $212 million towards raising per-pupil funding by $108 across the biennium, with additional support for economically disadvantaged students. He also wants to link the state’s per pupil revenue limits for school districts to inflation starting in fiscal year 2025-26. His budget projects that the change would raise limits by $334 per pupil in 2025-26 and $345 per pupil in 2026-27.
Evers called on lawmakers to approve his $147 million plan to provide free school meals to students, his nearly $300 million plan to invest in mental health support in schools and to ensure clean drinking water in schools.
“If the state isn’t committed to meeting our kids’ basic needs, then we can’t have serious conversations about improving outcomes,” Evers said. “It’s that simple.”
Evers also called for investing $80 million to support new literacy initiatives in the state, including literacy coaches and tutoring, that are meant to help improve reading scores statewide.
The proposed funding would include the $50 million to support a new literacy law enacted in the 2023-25 budget cycle, but after disagreements over implementation and a veto by Evers, most of the money remains stuck and unused. If it isn’t released by the end of the fiscal year in June, it will lapse back into the state’s general purpose revenue.
Evers also proposed dedicating $1.1 billion towards raising the state’s special education reimbursement to 60%. The current rate is about 30% for public schools.
The governor said the current system for funding schools isn’t working and called attention to the trend of districts asking taxpayers to raise their property taxes through referendum measures so schools can cover operational and building costs.
“This system isn’t sustainable — it creates winners and losers, haves and have-nots, but referendums are not inevitable,” Evers said. “Wisconsinites wouldn’t have to raise their own property taxes to keep school lights on and doors open if this Legislature invested in K-12 education from the get-go.”
Evers’ budget proposal also calls for making changes to Wisconsin’s voucher programs including the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program, the Racine Parental Choice Program and the Wisconsin Parental Choice Program.
He wants to freeze the number of slots available to students, a proposal that comes as the caps on enrollment are slated to come off in 2026. He also wants to require participating schools to license educators by July 2028 and to require schools to allow students participating in the Special Needs Scholarship Programs to opt out of religious activities at written request. Evers also proposes putting the cost of Wisconsin’s voucher programs on people’s property tax bills.
Evers also wants to support the child care industry by investing $440 million in state funds to subsidize providers with the Child Care Counts program.
$2 billion in tax relief, raising taxes for wealthiest
Evers called for nearly $2 billion in tax relief and for raising taxes on the wealthiest Wisconsinites.
Part of the relief would be targeted at trying to limit further property tax increases. Property tax burdens across the state have grown in recent years in part because schools and local governments have turned to referendums as a way of securing funding.
“My budget would create a new incentive for local governments to freeze their local property taxes. If local governments agree not to raise local property taxes, they’ll get a direct payment from the state,” Evers said. “This will ensure local partners can still afford to pay for basic and unique local needs alike without property taxes going up.”
Under his proposal, about $1 billion would be directed towards aid for local governments that pause property taxes and direct property tax credits to taxpayers over the biennium.
His proposal would also increase the school levy tax credit by $375 million across the biennium.
Evers is also proposing eliminating taxes on tips — similar to a recent proposal from Republican lawmakers — and eliminating sales tax on electricity and gas for Wisconsin homes and on over-the-counter medications.
“Working to prevent property tax increases is a key part of my plan to lower costs for working families, but we can do more to reduce everyday, out-of-pocket costs for folks across our state,” Evers said.
One major proposal that went unmentioned in Evers’ speech would create a new, higher income tax bracket for high-income residents. The administration’s budget brief said the measure would “ensure millionaires and billionaires in Wisconsin pay their fair share.
Evers’ proposal calls for a new individual tax income tax bracket with a marginal rate of 9.8 % on taxable income above $1 million for single filers and married joint filers, and above $500,000 for married taxpayers who file separately. The current top tax bracket has a 7.65% rate and applies to single filers making $315,310 and joint filers making $420,420.
The proposal would bring Wisconsin an additional $719 million in the first year of the biennium and $578 million in the second.
Expand access to health care
Evers called for his fourth budget in a row to expand Medicaid to cover people up to 138% of the federal poverty level — a proposal that would expand eligibility to approximately 95,800 low-income individuals and allow the state to save $1.9 billion in state money and receive an additional $2.5 billion in federal funds over the biennium.
“Health care should not be a privilege afforded only to the healthy and the wealthy,” Evers said.
Wisconsin is one of 10 states to not expand Medicaid, according to KFF.
The budget also includes a proposal to extend Medicaid coverage for postpartum mothers to a year after the birth of a child. Wisconsin is one of two states that haven’t accepted the federal expansion.
“Nothing against Arkansas, but come on, folks. I’ve proposed this in every budget I’ve introduced as governor. There’s also a bipartisan bill to get it done that almost 90 legislators support,” Evers said. “One legislator should not be able to single-handedly obstruct a bill that’s supported by a supermajority of the Legislature.”
The comments got some of the loudest cheers from Democrats during the whole night.
Evers was alluding to Assembly Speaker Robin Vos (R-Rochester), who held the policy up last session after the proposal passed the Senate and has said this session that he doesn’t support expanding “welfare” in response to questions about the policy. A bill that would accomplish this, with 23 Senate cosponsors and 67 Assembly cosponsors, recently received a hearing in the state Senate.
Evers also is proposing making Wisconsin the first state to start auditing insurance companies over denying health care claims. The state would provide a corrective action plan for insurers found to have too high denial rates. The plan would also create a “Public Intervenor Office” that would focus on helping Wisconsinites who have claims denied.
The governor said the measure would increase accountability and transparency for health insurance companies.
“If an insurance company is going to deny your health care claim, they should have a darn good reason for it. It’s frustrating when your claim gets denied and it doesn’t seem like anyone can give you a good reason why,” Evers said.
Preparing for Trump administration, potential tariffs
Evers’ budget would leave the state with about $646.3 million at the end of June 2026. Evers said this would be to ensure the state remains in a good financial position into the future and because of the unpredictability of the Trump administration.
“We must continue our work to be reasonable and pragmatic. The needless chaos caused by the federal government in recent weeks has already made preparing a state budget that much more difficult,” Evers said. “We prepared for the worst: popular programs that kids, families, schools, veterans, seniors and communities rely upon every day being drastically cut; resources and investments that Wisconsin is counting on and budgeted for, suddenly stalled or gutted; trade wars with Wisconsin’s largest export partners hurting our ag industries and our economy; costs for working families skyrocketing to the point they can’t make ends meet.”
Evers said that with the unpredictability, it wouldn’t have “been wise or responsible” to spend everything.
Evers also took aim at the Trump administration and the potential impact a trade war and tariffs could have on agriculture one of Wisconsin’s ’s largest industries.
The state, according to the USDA’s 2022 Census of Agriculture, has 58,521 farms with 13.7 million acres producing $16.7 billion in agricultural products.
Trump threatened to place 25% tariffs on goods from Mexico and Canada in January, then paused implementing them for a month. While it was unclear which items would be included, fresh produce could be one category of goods.
“Wisconsin is on its way to becoming a top 10 state for ag exports — we can’t afford to lose our momentum because of tariff wars in Washington,” Evers said.
To help blunt impacts should the tariffs return, Evers proposed creating an agriculture economist position in the state government to help farmers navigate market disruptions and volatility caused by tariffs. He also wants to increase investments in the Wisconsin Initiative for Ag Exports and invest $50 million in the Agricultural Roads Improvement Program, which was created in the last budget to enhance roads, bridges and culverts in rural communities.
Lawmakers’ reaction
With Evers’ budget proposal introduced, the Republican-led Legislature’s 16-member Joint Finance Committee will go to work writing the state budget. The committee will hold some public hearings in the coming weeks.
Assembly Speaker Robin Vos says Evers’ budget is “dead on arrival.” (Photo by Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner)
GOP leaders were quick to throw cold water on Evers’ plan. “We are not going to let Wisconsin become Tim Walz’s Minnesota,” Vos said after the address.
JFC Co-Chair Sen. Howard Marklein said all the policy changes that Evers included would be stripped out and the next budget will be built from the current state budget, “the base.”
“We’re going back to base like we have for the last several budgets. We’re going to build a budget that’s fair, that’s sustainable into the future and doesn’t impact our businesses and our families adversely,” Marklein said.
Marklein also emphasized that the budget surplus is “largely one-time money” and said it should be used to support one-time spending, not ongoing programs.
JFC Co-chair Rep. Mark Born (R-Beaver Dam) said that Evers budget was “bloated” and included “reckless spending.”
“Just finding ways to grow the government, making up all sorts of new agencies or sub-agencies or offices again tonight,” Born said. “We know we have to toss it to the side.”
Born said that instead, Republicans will focus on finding ways to shrink the size of government and find ways to support families and businesses “without the heavy hand of government.”
Republicans reiterated their intention to cut taxes, which they’ve repeatedly called a major priority.
Senate Majority Leader Devin LeMahieu (R-Oostburg) said at a GOP press conference that the budget surplus only exists because Evers rejected the majority of their tax cut proposals last session. He called Evers’ tax relief proposals “gimmicky.”
“What we’re going to do is provide broad-based tax cuts to all taxpayers in Wisconsin, and that’s what we’re going to do before we send a budget to him,” LeMahieu said.
Vos and LeMahieu both said that President Donald Trump winning Wisconsin in November is a sign that voters don’t want increased government spending.
“Wisconsin voted for Donald Trump and his agenda to cut spending and find inefficiency in government,” Vos said. “Giving a 20% increase to the bureaucracy is the exact opposite of what people voted for.”
Vos said that Republicans would unveil specific tax cut proposals in the coming weeks.
In contrast to Republicans’ scorn, Democratic lawmakers called on their colleagues to get on board with Evers’ budget.
Senate Minority Leader Dianne Hesselbein (D-Middleton) said in a statement that the budget proposal would help “lower everyday costs for working people and improve the lives of residents across our state” and said it would do what is best for kids.
The budget, Hesselbein said, showed Evers’ “commonsense and comprehensive leadership on issues that matter to working people and families.”
“I hope my Republican colleagues put partisanship aside and do what is best for our state,” Hesselbein said.
Assembly Minority Leader Greta Neubauer (D-Racine) called the proposal “ambitious” and said it would “move our state forward, deliver good things for the people of Wisconsin and set our state up for long-term success.”
An empty high school classroom. (Dan Forer | Getty Images)
Democratic-backed incumbent State Superintendent Jill Underly and Republican-backed education consultant Brittany Kinser will advance to the April 1 primary in the race for state superintendent.
With more than 95% of precincts reporting at midnight, Underly won 38% of the vote and Kinser won 34.5% of the vote. Sauk Prairie Schools Superintendent Jeff Wright came in third with 27.5% of the vote, eliminating him from the primary.
Wright thanked his supporters in a statement, saying he was proud of the campaign that he ran.
“I got into this race because I believe that Wisconsin should always be at the forefront of innovation and excellence in public education,” Wright said. “Our districts deserve better from the Department of Public Instruction because Wisconsin’s kids and communities deserve the absolute best from our schools.”
The state superintendent is responsible for overseeing Wisconsin’s 421 public school districts and leads the Wisconsin 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.
The position is nonpartisan, but the Democratic and Republican parties have both waded into the race providing support, including financial backing to their preferred candidates.
Underly is running for her second term in office, saying that she wants to continue to advocate for the state’s public schools and most recently proposed that the state provide an additional $4 billion in funding for school. She has the backing of the Democratic Party of Wisconsin and the American Federation of Teachers-Wisconsin, the state’s second-largest teachers union.
Jill Underly addresses the State Council on Affirmative Action in December 2024 after accepting the group’s 2024 Diversity Award on behalf of her agency. (Screenshot via Wisconsin DOA YouTube)
In a fundraising appeal after the ballots were counted, Underly touted her support of bipartisan literacy legislation, new math and science standards and expanded career and technical education. “Today, our graduation rate is the highest in state history and our schools are ranked 6th in the nation by U.S. News and World Report — up from 14th in 2020,” she said.
Democratic Party of Wisconsin Chair Ben Wikler said in a statement that the party is ready to “wage a strong door-to-door campaign” to help reelect her to a second term. He said Underly’s record “stands in stark contrast to lobbyist Brittany Kinser, who has never even held a teaching license in Wisconsin.”
According to the most recent campaign finance filings, the Wisconsin GOP has contributed $200,000 to Kinser’s campaign. She has also received contributions from Elizabeth and Richard Uihlein, the billionaire owners of the Uline shipping supply company, and Beloit billionaire Diane Hendricks. Her campaign is being managed by Republican former state Rep. Amy Loudenbeck.
“Kinser’s campaign is funded by Republican megadonors and stage-managed by a former Republican legislator because they love that Kinser has promised to drain funds from our public schools and give them to private for-profit schools. Kinser even advocated to remove teacher licensing requirements,” Wikler said. “Our kids don’t need a right-wing puppet to lead our schools.”
Kinser has dubbed herself the only “pro-school choice” candidate in the race and has said she would support increased funding to the state’s school voucher programs. Kinser has said that she wants to improve reading and math education in schools. While supporting increases in special education and rural transportation funding, Kinser has said more transparency and accountability is needed when it comes to funding rather than large increases.
Brittany Kinser. Photo courtesy of campaign.
Kinser previously served as principal and executive director of Rocketship schools in Milwaukee and worked for the City Forward Collective, a Milwaukee-based advocacy group that lobbies for school choice.
Kinser said in a statement Tuesday evening that she was “inspired and humbled” by the support for her campaign, and she plan to travel the state in the lead up to the general election and “share my plan to bring a clean slate, a fresh start, and a fundamentally new approach to DPI.”
Wright’s campaign was recommended for the position by the political action committee of the Wisconsin Education Association Council (WEAC), the state’s largest teachers union. While he never received the union’s full endorsement, the primary created a split among public education advocates. Neither Wright nor Underly acknowledged each other’s campaigns in their respective statements.
Kinser, meanwhile, sought to call Wright supporters into her campaign.
“Jeff Wright ran a strong race and we agree on several important issues like restoring the high standards Jill Underly lowered for our children. I am committed to restoring those standards and ensuring every child has the opportunity to go to college, get a meaningful job, or master a trade,” Kinser said. “I welcome Jeff, his supporters, and all Wisconsinites — regardless of their political beliefs — who agree that our kids deserve so much better to join our campaign.”
Wisconsin GOP Chair Brian Schimming called Kinser the “common-sense” candidate in a statement and said Tuesday’s results were a “stand against the far-left policies of Jill Underly. They are fed up with liberal ideas being prioritized over their children.”
“Her life and work has impacted countless Wisconsinites, so much so that all Wisconsin students should know about and recognize her,” Rep. Supreme Moore Omokunde said. Screenshot via WisEye.
The Legislative Black Caucus proposed Tuesday that Wisconsin make Vel Phillips’ birthday — Feb. 18 — a special day of observance in Wisconsin schools.
Rep. Supreme Moore Omokunde (D-Milwaukee), a bill coauthor, recognized Phillips’ lengthy list of ‘firsts’ at a press conference Tuesday morning, saying that “far too few” Wisconsinites know about her legacy.
Phillips was Wisconsin’s first Black statewide elected official, serving as secretary of state from 1979 to 1983. She also served as Wisconsin’s first Black judge and the first woman judge in Milwaukee County and was the first Black woman to graduate from University of Wisconsin Law School.
Phillips was the first African American and the first woman to be elected as a Milwaukee Common Council alder. She was an activist who advocated fair and affordable housing in Milwaukee, including introducing the Phillips Housing Ordinance in 1962, which would have outlawed racial discrimination among landlords and real estate agents in Milwaukee. The Milwaukee Common Council finally adopted an open housing ordinance in April 1968 after the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated and the U.S. Congress passed the Fair Housing Act of 1968.
Phillips passed away on April 17, 2018. Her 101st birthday was Tuesday.
“Her life and work has impacted countless Wisconsinites, so much so that all Wisconsin students should know about and recognize her,” Moore Omokunde said.
Sen. LaTonya Johnson (D-Milwaukee) said at a press conference that Phillips “wasn’t just a leader. She was a force of nature. She refused to accept the limits placed on her as an African American woman and as a woman in general, and she made sure that no one coming after her had to suffer those barriers,” Johnson said. “Milwaukee is the city that it is today in part due to Vel Phillips.
“She wasn’t just making history. She was paving the way for the rest of us — for Black women in Wisconsin who still face barriers, for girls who need to see what’s possible and for every person who has ever been told to wait their turn,” Johnson said. “That’s what this bill is about — ensuring Vel Phillips’ story is told for generations to come. Making Feb. 18 a special observance day isn’t just about remembering Vel Phillips. It’s about teaching our kids what she stood for, making sure her name, her fight, her legacy lives on.”
There are 21 special observance days in Wisconsin’s school calendar, including Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, Susan B. Anthony’s birthday, Environmental Awareness Day, Bullying Awareness Day, September 11 Observance Day, Veterans Day and Robert La Follette Sr. Day.
The Department of Public Instruction (DPI) states on its website that observance days can “teach the elements of tradition that preserve U.S. society and foster an awareness of our cultural heritage” and “can be part of a rich social studies curriculum that gives these individuals and events proper emphasis, both in the context of Wisconsin and U.S. history and in relation to their effect on or improvement of our political, economic and social institutions.”
Mikki Maddox, a teacher at Necedah Area High School, is part of the reason the caucus brought the legislation forward. She said she started doing announcements for the school and marking the observance days in her calendar.
“I noticed that there are quite a few gaps,” Maddox said, adding that she contacted DPI and wrote to Senate and Assembly members about observance days.
“I knew this was a person that needed to be recognized all over the state for her courage and for her willingness to stand up,” Maddox said.
Secretary of State Sarah Godlewski honored her predecessor at the press conference, recalling that she learned about Phillips in school only after taking her own initiative to look for women important to Wisconsin history and coming across her in a textbook.
“As Wisconsin’s secretary of state I stand on Vel’s shoulders. … She is a trailblazer and Wisconsin is better because of Vel’s leadership,” Godlewski said. “Too many students [are] just like the one that I was sitting in the classroom flipping through my history books and not seeing that full picture of who actually shaped our state.”
The bill, Godlewski said, would ensure “every student learns about her, not just as an afterthought, but as a fundamental part of our state history.”
The bill, which is currently being circulated for co-sponsorship, will need bipartisan support to pass in the Republican-controlled Legislature. Moore Omokunde said he doesn’t think recent hostility towards diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) efforts from Republicans will hinder it, adding that many observances of Phillips already exist throughout Wisconsin. An outdoor statue of Phillips was installed outside the Wisconsin State Capitol in September 2024 — an action that received bipartisan approval in 2021. Phillips also had a Madison high school renamed for her in 2021 and a road in Milwaukee is named after her.
“We already have the statue. Vel Phillips has a street in Milwaukee… it’s really a no-brainer,” Moore Omokunde said.
The bill is a continuation of lawmakers’ work to recognize and celebrate Black Wisconsinites during Black History Month. Early this month, lawmakers re-introduced a resolution to proclaim February as Black History Month.
The polling place at Village on Park on Madison's South side in 2023. (Henry Redman | Wisconsin Examiner)
Wisconsin polls are open Tuesday from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. so voters can weigh in on the three-way primary race for the nonpartisan state superintendent. It’s the only statewide election on ballots in February.
The state superintendent is responsible for overseeing Wisconsin’s 421 public school districts and leads the Wisconsin 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.
Incumbent State Superintendent Jill Underly is running for her second term in office and faces two challengers — Sauk Prairie Schools Superintendent Jeff Wright and education consultant Brittany Kinser.
Underly, a Democrat, has said she wants to continue her work advocating for Wisconsin public schools, including calling for increased funding from the state, limiting school vouchers and supporting schools through the impacts of the new Trump administration. In her reelection campaign, she has defended herself against critiques on changes to the way the state measures standardized tests and her attempts to work with the Republican-led Legislature. She has the backing of the Democratic Party of Wisconsin and AFT-Wisconsin.
Kinser, a school choice proponent, has said she wants to improve reading and math education, “restore high standards” and supports increased state spending for Wisconsin’s school voucher programs. She previously served as principal and executive director of Rocketship schools in Milwaukee, worked for the City Forward Collective, a Milwaukee-based advocacy group that lobbies for school choice, and has worked as a special education teacher. She has raised the most money of any candidate with financial help from Republican megadonors.
Wright, a Democrat, has said that he wants to improve communication between DPI, the Legislature and the public, supports increasing funding for public schools and wants greater transparency and accountability for voucher schools. He is endorsed by the Association of Wisconsin School Administrators, and was recommended for the position by the political action committee of Wisconsin Education Association Council (WEAC), the state’s largest teacher’s union, although the full union hasn’t made an official endorsement.
The top two vote getters will advance to the general election for the position on April 1.
Wisconsin voters may also see local primary elections for mayor, city and town council, county supervisor, school board members or school referendum requests on their ballot. Five school districts across the state — Tomahawk School District Kenosha School District, Northland Pines School District, Waterford Union High School District and Mauston School District — will vote on whether to approve a total of $176 million in funding requests.
Voters can check their voter registration status here, see what will be on their ballot here and find their polling location here.
There will be no primary on Tuesday in the race for an open state Supreme Court seat, since there are only two candidates in the race — Susan Crawford, a Dane County Circuit Court judge and former prosecutor for the state Department of Justice, and Brad Schimel, a Waukesha County Circuit Court judge and former Republican attorney general.
Wisconsin residents can register to vote at their polling places on Election Day. To do so, they need to show a proof of residence document, which must contain the voter’s name and current residential address such as a bank statement, recent electric bill, or a current and valid Wisconsin driver’s license or state ID card.
Voters need to present an acceptable photo ID to vote. Acceptable IDs include a Wisconsin driver’s license, state ID card, U.S. passport, military or veteran’s ID, tribal ID, a certificate of naturalization or a student ID with a photo.
Gov. Tony Evers at a press conference about his DOC budget proposal on Friday. Photo by Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner.
Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers wants to dedicate over $325 million of the state budget to updating aging correctional facilities. The plan he laid out Friday would end with the closure of Green Bay Correctional Institution in 2029 and involves spending more than $40 million for policies meant to help stabilize the prison population.
Serious problems have plagued the state’s correctional facilities for many years, exacerbated by aging facilities that lack adequate space for the number of incarcerated people.
While the state’s correctional facilities have the capacity to house 17,638 people, there are 23,074 people being held in facilities across the state. The total population is expected to grow to 24,000 people by the end of the biennium.
Evers said Wisconsin needs to do the work to move its correctional operations into the 21st century and help ease some of the challenges.
“Wisconsin spends more on corrections than most states, including all of our Midwest neighbors,” Evers said. “That’s because, unlike red and blue states across the country, Wisconsin has refused to move our approach to corrections into the 21st century. The bottom line is that this trajectory is not sustainable.”
“We can address long-term staffing challenges, expand workforce training, implement evidence-based practices that reduce recidivism and save taxpayer dollars all while — most importantly — improving public safety,” Evers said.
Evers said he was planning to speak with Republican lawmakers about the plan in the near future and called for their support.
On Tuesday evening, Evers will deliver his full budget address. After he submits his budget proposal to the Legislature, lawmakers will write their own version that will go to Evers for final approval.
‘Stabilize’ population
The first part of Evers’ correctional plan focuses on “stabilizing” the state’s growing prison population through policy changes meant to help limit recidivism.
“About 90% of the people incarcerated will be released back into our communities, so we must reduce the likelihood that people will commit another crime when they’re out in our communities,” Evers said. “Our work to prevent people from reoffending must start long before they ever leave our correctional institutions.”
He proposes expanding access to workforce training and substance use treatment for people who have 48 months or less left in their sentences for nonviolent offenses. Evers said the programs will help support people to reenter the workforce once they are out of prison and to help people who are working to overcome drug and alcohol use disorders.
The changes to the Earned Release Program would help support about 2,500 people.
To support the policy changes, Evers also wants to dedicate $3.7 million in the budget to pay progression for social workers and treatment specialists.
In addition, Evers’ budget proposal will include $8.9 million for expanding the Alternatives to Revocation Program, $1 million for community supervision regional coaches to help the high number of people with substance use recovery needs, $3.1 million to expand the number of community corrections supportive housing beds for people with hardships, $10.7 million for cost of living increases for the division of community corrections and reentry unit, $1.9 million for 13 new DOC positions and $9.6 million for pay progression and parity for probation and parole agents and correctional field supervisors.
Modernizing correctional facilities
The largest allocation in the plan would got to the “domino” plan to update the state’s correctional facilities — a plan that ends in the closure of the Green Bay Correctional Institution by 2029.
“In order for my plan to work, several crucial steps must happen, and they must happen together,” Evers said.
“There cannot be delays or obstructions like we’ve seen with Lincoln Hills and Copper Lake,” he added.
2017 Act 185 signed by Gov. Scott Walker, set a deadline to close the Lincoln Hills and Copper Lake youth correctional facilities in January 2021. Evers later extended that to July 2021, but that deadline also passed and plans to close the facilities have continued to get pushed back.
Evers plan would convert the youth facilities into a 500-bed medium security facility for adult males.
Under the plan, a Type I facility would be completed in Dane County at the cost of $168 million to house 32 male and 8 female youths.
The plan also calls for using $245.3 million to update Waupun Correctional Institution, the state’s oldest prison, built in 1851. Cell halls would be demolished and some areas of the prison would be remodeled to create vocational programming.
A new “vocational village” at Waupun would be modeled on efforts undertaken in Louisiana and Missouri. Under the plan, it would be prepared to open by 2031.
The plan would also have Stanley Correctional Institution converted into a maximum security facility with the ability to “flex” as a medium security facility.
Green Bay Correctional Facility would close by 2029 at a cost of $6.3 million.
According to the Evers administration, the plan opts to close the Green Bay facility over the Waupun facility because there is local support for closing the Green Bay facility and because it will cost less to update the Waupun facility.
The plan also includes expanding Sanger B. Powers Correctional Center located in Outagamie County by 200 beds. Employees at the Green Bay facility would have the option of transferring to the Sanger Powers facility.
In addition, John Burke Correctional Center would be converted from an adult male to an adult female facility with 300 beds.
“We need Republican lawmakers to get onboard with this plan,” Evers said. “There is not an alternative to my plan that is safer, faster and cheaper… My plan is the most cost effective for taxpayers. It’s the most efficient for alleviating the challenges facing our correctional institutions.”
DOC Secretary Jared Hoy said during the press conference Evers’ plan is exciting because it is “a comprehensive and cohesive plan to address long standing issues within our correctional system while investing taxpayer dollars wisely.”
“The effort comes down to safety in our institutions and our communities,” Hoy said.
Gov. Tony Evers ordered the two audits into Milwaukee Public Schools in 2024. Evers meets children at a Dane County child care center in 2023. (Erik Gunn | Wisconsin Examiner)
An audit released Thursday found that Milwaukee Public Schools faces challenges due to declining enrollment, competitive school-choice dynamics, a teacher shortage and staff turnover as well as a “culture of fear” and resistance to change. The district needs to make systemic changes, the audit found, in order to adequately support its students, especially those who are the most vulnerable.
The operational audit was ordered by Gov. Tony Evers after news broke that the district has been excessively late in submitting required financial documents to the Department of Public Instruction. The crisis led to the resignation of Keith Posley as MPS superintendent and the state Department of Public Instruction withholding $16.6 million from the district.
The independent audit, conducted by MGT of America Consulting LLC, is the first of two ordered by Evers, who formerly served as state superintendent and as a public school teacher. The second, ongoing audit is meant to examine the effectiveness of teaching and instruction in classrooms.
“This audit is a critical next step for getting MPS back on track and, ultimately, improving outcomes for our kids,” Evers said in a statement. “I urge and expect the district to take these recommendations seriously and move forward quickly with implementing this audit’s findings.”
Evers allocated $5.5 million from federal American Rescue Plan funds for the audits and said there is a remaining $3 million that will go towards ensuring the district can start implementing the recommendations.
Evers said that he will also propose allocating an additional $5 million in his 2025-27 budget to provide ongoing support to address audit results and implement audit recommendations, though he would need the Republican-led Legislature to allocate the money. The money would only be awarded to the district if the state thinks MPS has made substantial and sufficient progress implementing the audit recommendations.
“MPS must make systemic changes to ensure that students — particularly the most vulnerable — are at the center of every decision,” auditors wrote. “Ultimately, this work is in service of students, whose future success hinges on a district capable of delivering equitable, high-quality education.”
The audit acknowledged that “proficiency rates sit at just 9% in math and 12% in reading, far below state and national averages, signaling a systemic failure to prioritize student outcomes.”
The audit identified internal and external factors that have contributed to the challenges the district has faced.
Internal factors included leadership instability, including a series of superintendents with short tenures and revolving leaders, a “culture of fear and reluctance to change,” high turnover and recruitment challenges, ineffective reporting protocols that have hindered accountability and financial mismanagement, lack of honesty, transparency and ineffective public communications that have contributed to a lack of public trust.
External factors included stalled population growth and enrollment declines, “competitive school-choice dynamics,” national teacher and staff shortages, MPS students who face significant economic challenges and outdated facilities that have made it difficult to maintain healthy, safe and adequately equipped learning environments.
“These challenges, coupled with outdated facilities and a history of financial mismanagement, have eroded public trust and disproportionately affected the District’s most vulnerable students,” auditors wrote.
The audit laid out goals that the district should prioritize that include creating a “coherent central system,” “fostering meaningful communication and collaboration across departments within the District” and operating and funding strategically by investing in strategies and systems that prepare the District for financial sustainability, operational efficiency and long-term success.
Some of the specific recommendations include hiring a chief communications officer and chief operations officer, restructuring the central office to clarify roles, investing in the Office of Human Resources, redesigning employee reporting processes, investing in training for the Department of Research, Assessment and Data, continuing to use support offered by DPI and improving collaboration between the MPS Board of Directors and district leadership.
MPS said in a press release that the audit “validates the progress we are making while also serving as a guide for continued improvements.”
“It highlights the strength of our existing systems and the dedication behind key initiatives, reinforcing the steps we have taken to move our students forward. At the same time, it identifies areas for growth, reaffirming our commitment to continuous improvement,” MPS stated. “While acknowledging the need for focused support, the report makes clear that we have an opportunity to build on this momentum, strengthening our schools and communities while creating a more unified path forward.”
DPI Superintendent Jill Underly said in a statement that the audit “offers a clear and practical blueprint for getting the district back on course, ensuring it better serves students and families.”
Underly said she was optimistic that the district would turn the recommendations into “meaningful change” with the leadership of Brenda Cassellius, who was selected this week by the Board to be the new MPS superintendent and previously served as superintendent of Boston Public Schools and commissioner of education in Minnesota.
“This report also underscores the importance of the DPI’s ongoing efforts to support MPS in financial reporting, including the development of a Corrective Action Plan. These efforts are both realistic and essential for helping the district regain compliance and thrive,” Underly said.
Sauk Prairie Superintendent Jeff Wright, who is running for state superintendent, with a student. Photo courtesy of campaign.
Sauk Prairie Superintendent Jeff Wright says he would work to improve communication between the Department of Public Instruction, the Legislature and the public if he’s elected to be Wisconsin’s state schools superintendent.
Wright, a Democrat, is challenging incumbent state Superintendent Jill Underly. Education consultant Brittany Kinser, a school choice advocate who has the backing of Republican donors, is also running in the Feb. 18 primary for the nonpartisan office. The top two vote getters will advance to the general election April 1.
The state superintendent is responsible for overseeing Wisconsin’s 421 public school districts and leads the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction (DPI), which has an array of responsibilities including administering state and federal funds, licensing educators, developing educational curriculum and state assessments and advocating for public education.
Wright said in an interview with the Wisconsin Examiner ahead of the primary that throughout his campaign, which launched in October, he has met with Republicans and Democrats at the county level, the Metropolitan Milwaukee Association of Commerce (MMAC), small town business groups, faith leaders and teacher groups.
“That’s been part of the fun is just how many different types of groups have welcomed me in to share my story and my own hopes for public schools,” Wright said.
Wright comes to the race with significant experience in Wisconsin public education.
Wright has served as the superintendent of Sauk Prairie School District since 2019 and was named Administrator of the Year in 2024 by the Wisconsin Rural Schools Alliance. During his time in the district, Wright has worked to help improve mental health supports in schools, reduce energy consumption by putting solar panels on the high school and helped open a child-care center that is owned by the village but will be run by the district. He also previously served as a principal in Chicago.
Sauk Prairie is one of the most purple counties in Wisconsin, Wright noted.
“[In this district], we cannot get anything done if we don’t create room at the table for people with different political beliefs, business leaders, faith leaders, parents, educators, and that’s how I’ve led as a superintendent,” Wright said, adding that that’s how he would lead as head of the DPI as well.
Wright has never held public office, though he previously ran unsuccessful campaigns for the state Assembly in 2016 and in 2018.
Wright laid out three issues he wants to tackle as part of his “strategic plan” for the agency: improving the relationship between DPI and the state Legislature, addressing the Wisconsin educator shortage and improving the achievement gaps facing the state.
Bringing people together, he says, is critical to making improvements to education in the state.
Improving communication with educators, Legislature and agency staff
When Wright entered the race, he said there was a “disconnect” between DPI and schools and the agency could do better by including different groups in conversations about its decisions.
Wright said having staff work virtually during the first couple years of Underly’s term, which started in 2021 during the COVID-19 pandemic, created “some of the loss in trust and relationship with people, with school leaders.” He said he thinks there is a place for remote work, but that it was overused at DPI.
In his own experience as a superintendent, Wright said there were multiple times his team was scheduled to meet with Underly or her leadership team.
“We all gathered at a location, and then, not long before the meeting started, the leader of the meeting was told that the meeting would now be taking place virtually,” Wright said.
Wright said that a “promise” he makes for the office “is being present in Wisconsin schools and being directly connected to the work of education.”
In addition, Wright has said that he thinks he can repair damaged relationships between DPI and state lawmakers.
The agency has regularly come into contention with the Republican-led Legislature on a variety of issues and Underly has been outspoken about her disagreements with Republican lawmakers, including when they have withheld money from schools.
Wright said he would hope to improve the relationship by ensuring everyone is welcome to the table and there is open communication.
“We may not want the exact same way to get there, but if we’re not in this room with each other talking about how we could accomplish shared goals, it makes it easier to be really political and to say outlandish things about the other side and to demonize them when there probably is some point of agreement if we just forced ourselves to be in the same room, and that’s how we’ve led in Sauk Prairie,” Wright said. “All the projects that I just listed, my school board voted for unanimously, but I know that they have different yard signs in front of their homes when it comes to the national election.”
Wright said he knew when he entered the race that work needed to be done to help the relationship between the agency, school districts and the Legislature. However, he said he also has come to another realization: “I underestimated how much work would also have to be done to heal the relationship between the department’s leadership and the teammates who are doing the work of the department,” Wright said.
His campaign brought attention to a spending pause at the agency in early January.
The agency has paused new hiring and travel outside of Wisconsin through June 30. The agency said that a $2.3 million reduction in state funding for the DPI’s administrative costs is a key contributor to the agency’s fiscal strain. DPI said it made the decision to focus on directing resources to supporting schools and students “even if it means sacrificing some of the agency’s own needs,” according to CBS58. The agency sent a memo to staff about the pause in January.
Wright claims the freezing pause is the result of overspending in the first half of the fiscal year and the agency has been trying to correct the budget by the end of the fiscal year.
He said the recent financial strains at the agency and criticisms from over changes to the way the state measures scores on standardized tests are examples of Underly failing to be an effective leader.
“The lack of communication about the budget problems to people that are on the team has been of great concern. I think that a lot of legislators did not realize the level of financial issues either,” Wright said.
“I’ve talked with people, who are supposed to be working like shoulder to shoulder with educators and schools, that now have to do that work virtually… or they’re now doing two jobs or three jobs because of retirements or resignations, and the positions were not being able to be filled,” Wright said.
Test scores and the educator shortage
Wright also said the recent changes to the way DPI measures the state’s standardized reading and math test scores weren’t transparent or well communicated. Underly, for her part, has defended the changes, saying they were necessary because standards changed several years ago and state tests had to be updated. She also said the new cut scores better align with state standards.
“It caught way too many schools, the governor, the Legislature by surprise, and I think that that shows that broken trust,” Wright said. “That lack of communication is what people are really challenging in this.”
In reaction, Wright said his district made a spreadsheet to help measure scores from earlier years to the most recent year under the new changes. One of the biggest complaints about the changes was how it made it more difficult to track changes in student performance over multiple years.
Lawmakers introduced a bill to reverse the changes and Wright said he supports the goal of the bill, but doesn’t agree it is something that should be legislated.
“The fact that it’s being legislated is a result of a lack of trust and a broken relationship between the Department of Public Instruction and the Legislature,” Wright said. If the process for the changes were more transparent and open and there were a better relationship with lawmakers, Wright said he doesn’t “think we’d be in the same spot.”
To address the teacher shortage, Wright said the state needs to ensure that teachers have a voice in the workplace and feel respected in their jobs. Recent DPI data found that four out of every 10 first-year teachers either leave the state or the profession altogether after just six years.
Wright said he wants to ensure the state education department is collaborating with colleges of education, educator associations and leadership teams to try to find best practices in other states or within the state’s districts that can be used across Wisconsin.
Wright’s supporters
One Wright supporter is Dan Bush, a Madison resident and former employee of DPI. He worked for DPI for several years, including during the first seven months of Underly’s term, as director of the school finance team. He said it was a “really professionally and personally satisfying opportunity to be able to get,” but when Underly took office, “things started going downhill very quickly.”
“I really needed some urgency and some movement on helping me fill some vacancies because just personally, between COVID and doing double, triple duty, I was pretty exhausted at that point, but I just wasn’t getting your support in getting that filled,” Bush said.
In addition, Bush said there was “a lot of dysfunction and confusion with the new leadership team and coming in, not really communicating with managers what the direction was, what the issues were.”
Bush said he started looking for a new job within three months, and since leaving he has watched turnover in the department from the outside.
“Since I left, so much experience has just been gone. … Staffing was always kind of tight on that team, but losing so much expertise and so much experience in so short of time has really put the folks there in a tight place,” Bush said. He said he kept up with the Milwaukee Public Schools financial scandal, where the district was late in returning required documents to the state, and thinks that if “there had been folks who were more experienced, more knowledgeable,” he thinks the issue could have been addressed sooner.
Bush said he has been hoping someone “good” would challenge Underly. Though he added that it’s “tough because for politics, you know, how much do voters really care about the internal administrative workings of a public agency?” He said, however, that those issues do have a “real impact for people.”
“The way we fund schools in Wisconsin, most school funding is kind of zero sum. For some districts to get more money, other districts have to get less, and it does impact people,” Bush said.
Bush said after speaking with people he knows in Sauk Prairie and surrounding communities and meeting with Wright on several occasions, he came to the opinion that he is the right person for the job.
“I think he’s someone who’s going to be a more effective advocate for kids in schools, you know, that’s the bottom line… I have a seventh grader here in Madison, and I care about what she learns, what happens to her, and so in that sense, I’m personally invested. But I also have this whole — the personal side of this area that I spent 10 years working in, that I still feel very close to, just has not been going well, and that part does bother me,” Bush said.
Wright has the endorsement of Association of Wisconsin School Administrators (AWSA).
AWSA Executive Director Jim Lynch said the organization interviewed all three candidates in its endorsement process. Lynch said he’s known Wright during he tenure at Sauk Prairie schools, and has worked closely with him.
When it comes to DPI right now, he said “there’s room for improvement in terms of how you bring people to the table, when you bring people to the table and how that translates into sound management and really strong leadership,” Lynch said. However, he added that the endorsement is “mostly about we see a game changing candidate, and we think it’s incumbent upon us to say we think this is a special person.”
Lynch said the organization found Wright to be “a highly effective leader, highly competent, skilled, very personable” and “modest.”
Wright was recommended for the position by the political action committee of Wisconsin Education Association Council (WEAC), the state’s largest teacher’s union. However, the full union hasn’t acted on a full endorsement.
Funding public education
Wright said he is supportive of increasing funding for Wisconsin public schools and said the number of districts turning to referendums as a way to fund operational and building costs is evidence that the current system for funding public education is “inadequate and broken.”
“We have a system of haves and have nots across the state where districts that are in communities that have the capacity of passing a referendum and potentially have more income capacity to afford it, can pass referenda to expand programming and enhance their schools. While other districts are unable to pass referendum and are in a constant state of budget cuts and potentially considering dissolving the district completely,” Wright said.
The special education reimbursement is the first funding issue that he wants the state to change. The reimbursement for public schools was raised from 30% to 33% in the last state budget.
“In the early ’90s, the state paid for over 60% of special education costs. We have a moral imperative to provide these services to kids who need them,” Wright said. “The state should be helping us pay for them right now.”
Wright said he would also advocate for raising the spending limits for districts.
“If we raised the floor … we could bring 90% of districts in the state within 10% of each other on that revenue limit, which I think is fundamentally more fair and not forcing some districts to live under low spending conditions from the 90s, while others have continued to outspend neighboring districts,” Wright said.
Limit state vouchers
Meanwhile, Wright said that he is not in favor of the voucher programs in Wisconsin growing any larger and wants greater transparency and accountability for the current programs.
First, Wright said that there should be a line on property tax bills so that people can see on those bills how much is going towards the choice programs. He also said that there should be more accountability.
“Any time that you take public money to educate a student,” Wright said, “there should be similar rules of accountability of how you spend that money and how you serve those children.”
He also said he would be open to discussing changing the income limits for students’ participation in the voucher programs. Currently, for a family of four the income limit for the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program and the Racine Parental Choice Program is $93,600 and the limit for the Wisconsin Parental Choice Program is $68,640.
Wright said the cut offs are too high.
“We either should be doing more of a graduated system so that if your family makes more, you qualify for less government assistance, or lower that cap, which also may help families who qualify for a voucher… A graduated system would be more fair,” he said, adding that it “would make it so that families that do have income levels that are beyond the average in their community are not receiving a full voucher from the state.”
Federal level issues
The DPI also helps districts navigate the impact of federal decisions. President Donald Trump recently signed executive orders that attempt to eliminate diversity, equity and inclusion in government, the private sector and schools and ban transgender girls from participating in girls sports.
Wright said the issue is “personal” for him.
“I have been on the phone with parents in my school district who have been in tears because of being sincerely scared for their own kids,” Wright said. “While they are grateful for the love and support that their kids have felt in my school district and in my schools, when they see their own children, or children that are like theirs, being demonized in the national rhetoric, it really hurts.”
Wright said statewide leaders need to focus on ensuring that school districts are supported and students can be in school and feel like they belong.
“It’s really hard to learn math when you’re scared or when you’re really, really anxious, so making sure that schools have the resources to support students when they’re going through times of trouble, and just doing all we can to be working with families and educators,” Wright said.
The administration is also considering eliminating the Department of Education. Wright said that there are important programs that the department oversees including Title I funding for districts that serve students that have the highest levels of free and reduced lunch eligibility and college financial aid.
“We need to make sure that these programs continue, and that people understand exactly what the U.S. Department of Education does, and that the programming that we see from the federal government affects our littlest learners at Head Start, but also our adult learners that are accessing grants or loans for college or university education,” Wright said.
The primary election is Tuesday, Feb. 18, and the general election is on Tuesday, April 1.
The Examiner spoke with all three candidates ahead of the election. Read about incumbent candidate Jill Underly here. Read about Brittany Kinser’s campaign here.
Sen. Jesse James is the coauthor on the postpartum Medicaid expansion bill. Screenshot via WisEye.
Members of the Wisconsin Senate Health Committee expressed support on Wednesday for a bill that would extend Medicaid coverage for postpartum mothers to a year after the birth of a child.
Typically, people in Wisconsin are only eligible for Medicaid coverage if they make up to 100% of the federal poverty level, but pregnant women can receive Medicaid coverage in Wisconsin if they have an annual income of up to 306% of the federal poverty level. While a newborn whose mother is a Medicaid recipient receives a year of coverage, mothers risk losing their coverage after 60 days if they don’t otherwise qualify for Medicaid.
The bill — SB 23 — seeks to change this by extending Medicaid coverage for postpartum mothers from 60 days to a full year after childbirth.
“This bill does not change that income threshold so no new women would qualify for Medicaid,” bill coauthor Sen. Jesse James (R-Thorp) said at the hearing. “It would just allow for those women, who are already being covered, to be covered for longer to help address potential health issues that arise during the postpartum period.”
“My goal as a legislator… is to make sure we keep moving Wisconsin forward and fight for the future of our youth. We, as a state, are unfortunately behind on this issue,” James said. “We have a chance to do better for our moms, our kiddos and our families as a whole.”
The federal government gave states the permanent option to extend coverage to a year postpartum in 2022 in the American Rescue Plan Act.
Gov. Tony Evers has been proposing covering mothers for a year in each of his budget proposals since 2019, but the Republican-led Legislature has rejected it each time. A Republican bill passed the Senate last session with only one opposing vote and also gained the support of a majority of Assembly lawmakers, but it never came to a vote. Assembly Speaker Robin Vos (R-Rochester) has been a staunch opponent of the policy, saying that he doesn’t support expanding “welfare,” and has so far blocked its passage.
There are currently 23 Senate cosponsors and 67 Assembly cosponsors on the bill.
DHS Legislative Director Arielle Exner told lawmakers that from 2020 to 2022, there were 63 pregnancy-related deaths in the state of Wisconsin with one-third of pregnancy-related deaths occurring after that 60-day postpartum period; 76% of those who died had Medicaid at the time of their delivery. In 2023, Medicaid covered 35% of births in Wisconsin and 41% of births nationwide.
“Wisconsin moms are losing health care coverage when they need it the most,” Exner said.
Exner said the agency projects that an additional 5,020 women would have coverage per month under the bill, and that according to a fiscal estimate by the Department of Health Services, the policy would cost $18.5 million in all funds with $7.3 million in general purpose revenue.
If Wisconsin accepted full Medicaid expansion, which would expand Medicaid coverage to nearly all adults with incomes up to 138% of the federal poverty level, the cost for the postpartum coverage would be reduced to $15.1 million in all funds with $5.2 million in general purpose revenue — a total lower cost to Wisconsin.
DHS chief medical officer Jasmine Zapata, who is also co-chair of the Wisconsin Maternal Mortality Review Team and a newborn nursery hospitalist, called attention to the fact that the numbers and statistics are representative of people’s lives. She noted that the team reviews medical records, police records, hospital records, family interviews and more when looking at the deaths.
“The way they were found deceased in their homes after a suicide or overdose… striking stories and heartbreaking stories… their children were there when they were found, brain matter splattered on the floor after a gunshot wound to the head, these are serious situations that are happening,” Zapata said. “For every statistic that we see, we have to remember that there are real lives and real stories behind them.”
Zapata said that providing access to health care is one of the biggest recommendations that the review committee has.
Arkansas is the only other state besides Wisconsin that has not implemented the extension, a fact that was brought up repeatedly during the hearing. That state has also recently been working on maternal health legislation, though a recent bill still excludes the 12-month Medicaid coverage.
“Are they going to beat us and we [will] become the last in the union that does not have this coverage?” bill coauthor Rep. Patrick Snyder (R-Weston) asked. “It is my sincere hope that Wisconsin does not become the last… If we can’t get something like this done, then I don’t know what I’m doing in the Legislature.”
“Can you believe it?” Snyder commented after a question. “Arkansas.”
Jackie Powell, an OB-GYN who is completing her training in maternal fetal medicine, represented the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists at the hearing. She said she often cares for the highest risk patients, who may have chronic medical conditions.
“During pregnancy, we have the opportunity to gain control of these conditions, but for these people who lose their insurance and lose their health care postpartum, we are essentially erasing all progress that we have made throughout their pregnancy,” Powell said.
Powell said that through her work she sometimes diagnoses a major medical condition, including heart failure, cancer and kidney failure, during pregnancy that “alters someone’s life course.”
“Many of these patients need life-saving surgery and intervention postpartum to save their lives. Oftentimes, we need to deliver patients very preterm so that they can receive this care that they need,” Powell said.
“Imagine being told that you need to have major surgery for a life-threatening medical condition within the first few weeks after delivering your baby, and possibly preterm baby, and then losing your insurance. Imagine the complications that you could still experience without the appropriate follow-up care when in the last year, you underwent all of this. Imagine walking into the neonatal intensive care unit to see your baby that you delivered prematurely in a hospital where you can no longer be treated,” Powell said. “This is a failure of our medical system.”
Former Rep. Donna Rozar, who was the lead author on the bill last session and is a nurse, also testified on the bill.
“I could not get, even, a public hearing in the state Assembly, which made me really mad, and so I’m hoping that this year, some things will be different,” Rozar told lawmakers.
Rozar said that she has heard objections to the bill that people could seek coverage through the Affordable Care Act rather than Medicaid once the coverage is lost after 60 days.
“If you have a two-month-old, the last thing you want to do is change insurance programs. At 60 [days], you’re caring for a two-month-old and shouldn’t have to worry about health care coverage,” Rozar said.
There are 37 groups — including American Civil Liberties Union of Wisconsin Inc, Medical College of Wisconsin, American Heart Association, Pro-Life Wisconsin — registered in support of the bill, according to the Wisconsin Lobbying website. No one is registered in opposition.
“I think we’re all on board with this bill,” Sen. Rachael Cabral-Guevara (R-Appleton) commented to the room at one point.
Rep. Joel Kitchens (R-Sturgeon Bay) speaks about the cell phone ban bill. Screenshot via WisEye.
Republican lawmakers made the case Tuesday for a state law that would require school districts to implement a policy banning cell phones and other devices from classrooms as a way to improve students’ focus and performance.
The bill — AB 2 — would require school districts to adopt a policy that “generally prohibits pupils from using wireless communication devices during instructional time.” The policies would need to include certain exceptions in emergencies, cases involving student’s health care, individualized education program (IEP) or 504 plan and for educational purposes. Under the bill, the policies would need to be adopted by July 2026.
Wireless communication devices are defined as a “portable wireless device that is capable of providing voice, messaging or other data communication between two or more parties” and explicitly includes cell phones, tablet computers, laptop computers and gaming devices.
Rep. Joel Kitchens (R-Sturgeon Bay) and Sen. Rachael Cabral-Guevara (R-Appleton) said the policy would be beneficial to students and though many schools already have some, the statewide policy is needed to put enforcement power behind school districts.
“Phones can be a distraction for all of us, but it’s even worse for students,” Kitchens said during a Tuesday hearing in the Assembly Science, Technology, and AI committee. “The interruptions and the pressures of social media are detrimental to children’s mental health as well as to their education.”
According to DPI’s 2024-25 State Digital Learning survey approximately 90% of districts already have some sort of restrictive cell phone policy in place. About 320 out of the 421 public districts in Wisconsin participated in the survey.
“The problem is enforcement without a strong unified approach to the problem. Most teachers eventually throw up their hands… By applying the power of state law behind these restrictions, we’re giving support to our schools,” Kitchens said. “This is not something we are doing to the school districts, [it’s] something we’re doing with them.”
Kitchens said that the law will not “usurp” local control as each district will be able to determine its own policy. He said an amendment to the bill was drafted to clarify that schools can also ban devices throughout the entire day, including lunch.
“We deliberately drafted the bill to be as open as possible,” Kitchens said.
Kitchens noted that much resistance to the policies comes from concerns parents have about being able to reach their children during the day.
“If they’re only banned during class time, they can still reach them between classes. Schools will write their own policy on how they can be reached in case of emergency,” Kitchens said.
According to the Education Commission of the States, several states across the country, including Ohio, California, Florida, have similar statewide policies.
“The results of cell phone bans in schools have been universally positive in the U.S and across the world,” Kitchens said. “In Orlando, schools report that students are more engaged with less bullying and early reports show a dramatic improvement in test scores.”
Democrats on the committee were skeptical about the need for a state law addressing the issue, given that many school districts already have policies in place restricting cell phone use for students.
Rep. Ben DeSmidt (D-Kenosha) said the bill could create confusion and complication for school districts that already have policies in place.
“If we’re just going to muddy the waters with this, and the problem is already being dealt with by school boards… Why don’t we trust those local electeds? Why are we challenging their authority?” DeSmidt asked the bill authors.
Kitchens said that the intention isn’t to create confusion, but to provide enforcement mechanisms and provide cover to school districts when dealing with parents.
DPI Assistant State Superintendent Josh Robinson and Policy Initiatives Advisor Sara Knueve testified at the hearing and made some recommendations for how to make it more effective.
Robinson said the bill gets to the “heart of” the idea of engagement. He said technology “is here to stay” and educators are responsible for ensuring students have the “digital learning skills necessary to compete and thrive in society.” On the other hand, he said DPI understands that there is a need to “mitigate the negative impact” devices can have on students’ mental health and learning.
Knueve noted that cell phone policies in schools vary greatly.
“In general, middle and high schools tend to have some form of restriction, while elementary schools usually enforce a ‘no phones during the day’ policy. To manage devices, some schools use strategies like “phone hotels” or caddies for storage,” Knueve said.
Robinson called the goal of limiting technology disruptions during classroom time “wise,” but had a few recommendations for how to change the proposed legislation. Instead of starting with an outright ban of all devices, the agency suggested setting a statewide policy goal of restricting non-district-issued electronic devices and leaving the local implementation of the policy up to each district.
One of the specific suggestions was to require each school board to develop and adopt a policy that limits or prohibits pupils’ use of electronic communication devices during instructional time and also articulates specific times that the district cannot prohibit use of devices.
DPI also recommends that the bill update or repeal a current state statute, so there is no conflict. Wisconsin Statute 118.258 already states that each school board may, but isn’t required to, adopt policies prohibiting students from using electronic communication devices on premises owned, rented or under the control of a public school.
Finally, DPI said the bill should be changed to make a clear distinction between non-district-issued wireless communication devices and district-issued wireless communication devices.
An empty high school classroom. (Dan Forer | Getty Images)
State superintendent candidate Brittany Kinser outraised her opponents — incumbent state Superintendent Jill Underly and Sauk Prairie Superintendent Jeff Wright — almost three times over with major contributions coming from conservatives and school choice proponents, according to recent campaign finance filings.
The primary for the state superintendent election is Feb. 18., and the top two vote getters will advance to the general election on April 1.
Republican mega-donors Elizabeth and Richard Uihlein, the billionaire owners of the Uline shipping supply company, Beloit billionaire Diane Hendricks and Bill Berrien, a potential GOP gubernatorial candidate and CEO of New Berlin-based Pindel Global Precision each contributed $20,000 to the campaign.
J.C. Huizenga, a Michigan businessman who founded National Heritage Academies, a for-profit education management organization that operates more than 100 charter schools in nine states, including Wisconsin, also contributed $20,000.
Kinser also received $10,000 from Agustin Ramirez, founder of St. Augustine Preparatory Academy, a private K4-12 school that participates in the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program.
The campaign received $5,000 each from Fred Young Jr., a conservative donor who once successfully sued to get rid of limits on how much people can donate in total to multiple candidates running for office, and Scott Mayer, a Republican businessman who considered running for the U.S. Senate in 2024.
The Milwaukee Republican Party contributed $2,500, Cory Nettles, former Secretary for the Wisconsin Department of Commerce under Gov. Jim Doyle gave $2,500 and former Assembly Speaker Scott Jensen gave $1,000.
Kinser reported spending $163,545, leaving her with $152,770.
According to Kinser’s late contribution report, her campaign has received $207,000 since Feb. 3. This includes $200,000 from the Republican Party of Wisconsin.
Meanwhile, Underly reported raising $81,773 in the pre-primary period.
The majority of that came from the Democratic Party of Wisconsin, which endorsed Underly in November. The party contributed a total of $50,000. The Washburn County Democratic Party also contributed $400 to the campaign.
The AFT-Wisconsin Committee on Political Education, which has also endorsed Underly, contributed $5,000 in the pre-primary period.
Underly has spent $37,974, and according to the report, has $79,124 left.
According to her late contributions report, the Democratic Party of Wisconsin has since contributed another $50,000 to the campaign.
Wright reported raising $38,269 during the pre-primary period and has spent about $16,233. He has $101,918 left according to the report.
His largest contribution during the period came from Dan Gavinsky, a general manager of Lake Delton business Original Wisconsin Ducks and Dells Boat Tours. He gave $2,000 to the campaign.
State Superintendent Jill Underly with Madison La Follette High School Principal Mathew Thompson and Madison Public School District Superintendent Joe Gothard in the hallway at La Follette | Photo by Ruth Conniff
Incumbent State Superintendent Jill Underly says that Wisconsin has made some “incredible progress” in the last four years when it comes to education, but there is still more work to be done that she wants to see through in a second term leading the Department of Public Instruction (DPI).
Underly faces two challengers — education consultant Brittany Kinser, a self-described moderate and school choice proponent, and Sauk Prairie Schools Superintendent Jeff Wright, a Democrat — in the race for the nonpartisan office. The primary for the state superintendent election is Feb. 18., and the top two vote getters will advance to the general election.
“This position is about being the No. 1 advocate for public education, and I feel like I’m doing that,” Underly said in an interview with the Wisconsin Examiner.
Underly, a Democrat, ran for her first term in 2021 and defeated her opponent with nearly 58% of the vote. She said entering office during the COVID-19 pandemic was “unprecedented” and presented a bit of a “learning curve,” but she said she feels like DPI has “gotten our arms around what are the most important issues that the state of Wisconsin citizens want us to work on.”
Underly said some of her work has included calls for increased investment in education throughout the budget process, and pointed to securing investments and starting certain initiatives for career and technical education, school mental health, teacher recruitment and retention efforts. She also said that she has worked hard to help elect people in the Legislature who will be “pro-public school advocates” and will help pass initiatives in the future.
Underly said 2025 is “equally unprecedented” compared to last year and her experience makes her the right person to lead DPI.
“You need somebody in this role who can [offer] stability, who has the relationships, who can be consistent in this time of chaos and we need someone who’s going to stand up for public schools — for all kids, for teachers and families — and someone who has already proven that she can do it,” Underly said.
Underly said her work on literacy is one of her proudest accomplishments in her first term.
The agency was instrumental in negotiating 2023 Wisconsin Act 20, which sought to move the state towards a “science of reading” based approach and banned “three-cueing” — a way of teaching reading that relies on context, structure and letters to identify words.
“I think what it proved is that we really do want the same thing. When we put politics aside, we can get some really good stuff done on behalf of kids,” Underly said. “The flip side of that is politics still is involved. I mean, we’re still waiting on that $50 million so that we can reimburse school districts for curriculum and hire some reading coaches, but I’m really proud of that.”
Lawmakers had dedicated the money to supporting literacy changes in the last budget, but it is being withheld by Republican lawmakers.
While Underly is proud of her accomplishments, Underly’s opponents in the race have been critical of her leadership.
Recent changes to the way DPI measures the state’s standardized reading and math test scores is at the center of criticisms from her challengers, who said the changes “lowered standards” and that the decision to make the change wasn’t transparent or well communicated. The changes included new terms to describe student achievement and new cut scores, which are the minimum scores needed to qualify for certain achievement labels.
Underly said it’s “absolutely false” that DPI lowered standards and that “it wouldn’t be an issue” if the election weren’t happening.
“The critics are wrong, and I think, by Brittany saying that this is the reason she entered the race, it just gives me this feeling that she just doesn’t understand what this job is about,” Underly said.
“We didn’t lower standards. We raised standards in math and science. We added standards in career and tech ed. We added a literacy score for all kids. We were very transparent. This is something that DPI has done periodically since testing began in state law,” Underly added. “We had to change the scoring system to match the test, and you do that any time you change a test.”
Underly said she also thinks that the focus on testing is a distraction from other consequential challenges that school districts are facing. If student achievement is a major priority for the state, Underly said, it should look towards investing in mental health, literacy and math, teachers, school meals and early childhood education, including full-day 4-year-old kindergarten.
“Where you see low test scores is in communities that have high poverty. You don’t see low test scores in the schools that have the best facilities or the most veteran teachers or strong and robust school nutrition and mental health programs,” Underly said. “It’s just a way to misdirect or to take the eye off of what really matters, and also then disguise the fact that our Legislature has underfunded schools and undermined public schools, specifically, for the past 15 years.”
Increased investment in public education
A little before polls close in Wisconsin next Tuesday, Gov. Tony Evers will deliver his budget address at the State Capitol and unveil his complete state budget proposal. As a part of the process, state agencies submitted requests to Evers late last year. Underly and DPI submitted one that would dedicate an additional $4 billion — about the same amount as the current budget surplus — towards K-12 education.
The sweeping proposal includes increasing funding for mental health supports, special education costs, literacy and math education, teachers and staff pay, free school breakfast and lunch and early childhood education, including full-day 4-year-old kindergarten. Underly said she proposed it because “it’s what our schools need.”
“They need, probably, more than that, but that’s what they need right now,” Underly said.
Underly noted school districts haven’t been receiving inflationary increases in funding from the state Legislature over the last 15 years. She also noted that last year a record number of school districts went to referendum to ask taxpayers to raise their property taxes to help cover operational and building costs.
There was a “fiscal cliff because the COVID dollars were temporary, one-time, and they couldn’t make ends meet and we had record high inflation,” Underly said. “[Schools] still have to pay staff. They still have to put gas in their buses, and they have to pay utilities and all these other things to keep their operations going, but they haven’t been able to get any increase really that’s been sustainable from our state Legislature.”
Underly said investing could help address an array of issues.
For example, Underly said teacher retention could be helped with more resources and by reestablishing the “respect and rapport that teachers deserve.” Recent DPI data found that four out of every 10 first-year teachers either leave the state or the profession altogether after just six years. She said the agency has been doing some work to help, including securing a federal grant aimed at supporting special education teachers, but that more investment would be beneficial.
Underly said enough people are being prepared for the job and by getting “more revenue in our schools, they have a feeling we can get more staff, either to lower class sizes, which will help with working conditions, and they can also pay their staff more.”
Instead of adequately addressing the financial challenges, Underly said Republicans have been blaming schools “so that people will not send their kids to public school, and they can take that money and they can put it in private vouchers.”
Limit school vouchers
Wisconsin’s school voucher programs, which use state money to subsidize families’ tuition at private schools, have been growing since the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program was created in 1990. The caps on Wisconsin’s school voucher program, which limits the number of students who can participate, are slated to be lifted in the 2026-27 school year and could have a big effect on the future of education in Wisconsin.
Underly said the state needs to ensure the program doesn’t expand any further. She noted that the programs aren’t held to the same accountability, testing, reporting or licensing requirements as the state’s public schools.
“If you have somebody in the seat who is indifferent to vouchers, or is going to be supportive of vouchers, it’s really — that’s the end of public education in Wisconsin, and that’s what the federal government wants. They want to privatize public schools,” Underly said. “They want to take the money that they no longer have to spend in the Department of Ed and just give it to parents so that they could put it in a voucher.”
“If you have somebody in the seat who is indifferent to vouchers, or is going to be supportive of vouchers, it's really — that's the end of public education in Wisconsin, and that's what the federal government wants. They want to privatize public schools,”
– State Superintendent Jill Underly
Endorsed by Democratic Party and AFT-Wisconsin
Underly’s approach to advocating for public schools is part of what has won her the endorsement of the Democratic Party of Wisconsin and American Federation of Teachers-Wisconsin, a union of professionals working in the University of Wisconsin System, the Wisconsin Technical College System, public schools and state agencies.
Jon Shelton, AFT-Wisconsin vice president for higher education and a UW-Green Bay professor, said that Underly’s incumbent status and accomplishments in office set her apart in the endorsement process. The organization, which has a constitutional process for endorsements, interviewed Underly and Wright.
“[Underly] has always shown a commitment to ensuring that the voices of educators have a seat at the table and in the decision-making processes, both with the Department of Public Instruction, but also modeling that for local school districts,” Shelton said.
In addition to overseeing the state’s 421 public school districts, the state superintendent also has a seat on the University of Wisconsin Board of Regents. Shelton said Underly’s outspokenness for educators was an asset in her position there as well. He pointed out that she was the only regent to vote against a plan to fire 35 tenured faculty members at UW-Milwaukee and to give a speech about the negative consequences of the decision.
Shelton also called Underly’s budget proposal “visionary.” He said that K-12 education and higher education, while separate systems in Wisconsin, are connected since younger students eventually become college students and the higher education system is responsible for preparing their future education, which is why it’s important to see both supported by the state.
Shelton said the proposal is important because there is a budget surplus in Wisconsin and educators shouldn’t allow “our expectations to be lowered.” He noted that under new legislative maps, 14 Democrats flipped seats in the state Legislature and the impact could continue in the future.
“In 2026, Democrats could have control of either one or both houses of the Legislature. This idea that we have to basically just adhere to the low expectations of Republican priorities, it’s not the reality anymore,” Shelton said. “So it’s really important that we have people who are in a position like Dr. Underly, who have that platform to be able to vocally and forcefully advocate for these priorities, so that they’re on the agenda in 2026.”
Shelton said having an advocate willing to engage in certain battles is more important than having a candidate that prioritizes working across the aisle due to the actions being taken at the federal level right now.
“Our nation, our state, is under threat from authoritarian Republicans. Right now, the Trump administration is intentionally trying to sow chaos and intentionally trying to set working people against each other. This is why you have this, this executive order, which is meant to prevent even teaching about things like race and racism. This is not like the West Wing… where you have Republicans and Democrats having good faith differences of opinion. This is a party at the national level that is connected to [Assembly Speaker] Robin Vos and the Republicans at the state level, who, frankly, don’t want certain parts of our education system to exist,” Shelton said.
“We’ve tried to find common ground with Republicans, and they just keep cutting our budgets and keep coming at us for more, and frankly, our administrators continue to accommodate this,” Shelton continued. “We’re not going to let our students and the people of the state have the public higher education system, that’s been so good for such a long time, just taken from us, and so we’re going to be the ones on the front lines of fighting it, just like we’re going to be the ones on the front line of fighting authoritarianism from the national level.”
The Wisconsin Democratic Party endorsed Underly for a second term at the end of November. Party Chair Ben Wikler called her a “steadfast advocate” for students, parents and schools in a statement and said she is a “proven leader” who is “championing our kids in the Department of Public Instruction.”
The political environment and working with the Legislature
During her term in office, Underly and the agency have regularly come into contention with the Republican-led Legislature on a variety of issues. Just last week, representatives from the agency testified against several Republican bills, including one to reverse test score changes and limit how schools can spend their money.
Despite the disagreements, Underly said that she’s been able to work with lawmakers during her term. She said the literacy law is one example.
However, Wright cited the communication challenges that the agency has had with lawmakers, school districts and others. He said he would try to minimize partisanship, so that more conversations can be had between the agency and lawmakers.
Underly said communication with lawmakers is an issue that the agency has been working on, and brushed back some of Wright’s critique.
“It’s entirely comical that the male candidate in this race thinks that he’s going to have better luck with the Legislature…,” Underly said. “It’s really insulting that this, you know, this male candidate, thinks he can come in and undermine my leadership and call me a bad communicator.”
Underly said that when she speaks with lawmakers individually and when people on her team speak with them it’s clear that they agree on a lot, but that politics and polarization can get in the way. She noted that most lawmakers want healthy kids, high quality public schools and communities in rural and urban areas.
Underly said in a second term she would continue to work on improving the relationships and is hopeful that new faces in the Legislatures will help.
“We need people in the Legislature who will fight for public schools, too. That’s really what it comes down to,” Underly said. “I think we have to understand that it doesn’t matter who’s in the seat, if you’re a public school advocate, it’s always gonna be a struggle.”
In discussing the politicization of education, Underly called attention to the recent actions being taken by the federal government at the instruction of President Donald Trump. She said the actions are “chaotic” and “cruel.”
“The things that they’re axing and cutting and slashing are programs that are meant to help kids,” Underly said. She pointed to Head Start programs and the freeze on payments that have been affecting child care centers across the country, including in Wisconsin. “We look at the programs that they’re cutting like these that are helping the most vulnerable kids so that they can be successful, healthy adults.”
The administration is also considering eliminating the Department of Education, and Underly warned that people need to be prepared.
“If he says that’s what he’s going to do, we have to believe them… I don’t think people realize all the different things the Department of Education administers,” Underly said. She noted many programs work to ensure certain people have equal access to education, including kids and families in poverty, students with disabilities, English language learners, Native American students, kids in rural areas and girls.
“There’s so many protections in place… I think of the funding that our schools get, our state gets money from the Department of Ed. I don’t know if the state Legislature would be willing to fill those gaps,” Underly said. “There’s a lot to be concerned about.”
Trump has also signed executive orders that attempt to eliminate diversity, equity and inclusion in government, the private sector and schools. He has also eliminated a policy that stopped Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) from going to “sensitive areas” — a decision that opens schools up to immigration raids.
Underly said her “North Star” is focused on “creating safe, welcoming environments where every child feels valued and respected, where every child feels they belong so they can thrive.” She said DPI trusts schools and educators to work closely with families and communities to support all students, though the agency is also providing guidance.
“I’m going to always stand up for kids, especially your most vulnerable kids, and just remind people to stay focused on what matters,” Underly said. “We’re going to follow the law, and we gave them the guidance that will help them.”
The primary election is Tuesday, Feb. 18, and the general election is on Tuesday, April 1.
Education consultant Brittany Kinser says the recent changes to the way Wisconsin reading and math scores are calculated motivated her to enter the race for state schools superintendent.
Kinser is running against incumbent Superintendent Jill Underly, a Democrat, and Sauk Prairie Schools Superintendent Jeff Wright, a Democrat, in the race for the nonpartisan office. The primary for the state superintendent election is Feb. 18 with early voting underway. The top two vote getters will advance to the general election.
Kinser was debating as late as December about whether to enter the race, she said, when a Milwaukee school leader, whom she declined to name, helped her make a decision.
“[He] said, ‘I heard, you’re not going to run. … Who’s going to be the voice for our kids?’” Kinser said in an interview with the Wisconsin Examiner. “And I was like, ‘Oh my gosh.’”
Kinser, prior to entering the race, called herself a “Blue Dog Democrat” according to WisPolitics, however she hasn’t embraced the label since. She recently called herself a “moderate” on 1130 WISN, saying she has voted for Republicans and Democrats before and attended the Republican National Convention and the Democratic National Convention. Her campaign manager is Amy Loudenbeck, a former Republican state lawmaker and former School Choice Wisconsin leader.
Kinser said the decision to change to how test scores are measured was “unacceptable.” Those changes included new terms to describe student achievement and changes to cut scores, which are the minimum scores needed to qualify for certain achievement labels.
“When I heard that they lowered the standards, my response was like, that’s not good for kids. That might make adults feel OK … but that’s not what’s best for kids,” Kinser said. “Kids know if they can’t read, all colleges and their employers will know that they can’t read well enough when they graduate, and so when that happened, I knew I needed to do something. I [can’t] just sit on the sidelines and complain about it.”
While opponents have said the changes “lowered” the state’s standards, DPI and Underly have repeatedly defended the new scores, saying educators helped develop them and the changes were needed to better align the state’s standardized tests with its curriculum standards.
Kinser has said she supports reversing the changes, and is running to “restore high standards” in Wisconsin.
Literacy is one of Kinser’s top priorities and she has said that more needs to be done to ensure students are able to read, pointing to recent results on the Nation’s Report Card.
“It doesn’t have to be three out of 10 [who aren’t proficient in reading]. It can be 95% of our children. It’s possible,” Kinser said.
When it comes to supporting literacy efforts, Kinser said that the state needs to ensure that teachers have “evidence-based curriculum” and are getting support, including through coaching and professional development.
Kinser named Louisiana and Mississippi as examples of states that Wisconsin could take notes from — both states that have seen improvements in reading scores on national assessments.
“They’re doing that in Louisiana, and they have a portfolio of choices for schools. They’re focusing on the kids… we need to focus on making sure our teachers have the support they need, the curriculum as an evidence-based curriculum, so that our kids are getting the instruction and then there is transparency around results,” Kinser said.
Wisconsin has been taking steps to change reading, including by passing a law that was negotiated in part by DPI with Underly at the helm. The law sought to push Wisconsin schools towards a “science of reading” approach to teaching literacy, and dedicated $50 million to support the efforts, though the majority of the money is still being withheld by the state Legislature.
Kinser said that the law was a “great first step,” and said she would want to build on that. She said there needs to be accountability to ensure that schools are adopting new curriculum and not using “three-cueing” — a way of teaching reading that relies on context, structure and letters to identify words — as it was banned under the new law.
“We can continue to build on that, but we also can make sure that we are supporting the schools and implementing it, and also celebrating the schools and making data really clear to see where we’re at, because it really should be about how the students are learning,” Kinser said.
Kinser’s school choice background & view on its role in Wisconsin education
Kinser, if elected, would take the position with a different background compared to her opponents. As first reported by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Kinser has never had a Wisconsin teaching license and her principal’s license lapsed last year.
Kinser said at a WisPolitics forum last week that she is qualified for the job even with her lack of license, and pointed to her other experiences as an educator.
The majority of Kinser’s education experiences in Wisconsin have not been at traditional public schools. Currently, Kinser serves as CEO of Kinser Consulting, LLC and she recently helped start a literacy initiative in Wisconsin.
Prior to this, Kinser served as the CEO and President of the City Forward Collective, a Milwaukee-based nonprofit advocacy group that works to ensure “every child has the opportunity to attend a high-quality school” with a mission statement that says it seeks to support Milwaukee public, charter and private voucher schools.
According to Wisconsin’s lobbying website, Kinser was registered from January 2023 until January 2024 as a lobbyist for the organization, which spent over 538 hours and $148,000 lobbying in 2023-2024.
During 2023, the organization spent the majority of its time lobbying in support of SB 330, now 2023 Wisconsin Act 11, which increased per pupil funding for choice programs, and its companion bill AB 305. The group spent a total 236 hours in 2023 lobbying for the bills.
Last session, the group also registered in support of 2023 AB 688 and AB 900, a pair of bills that would have implemented a decoupling policy in Wisconsin. The policy would separate the state’s voucher programs from public school districts and fund them using state general purpose revenue.
Kinser said she continues to support the policy of “decoupling,” which didn’t pass the Legislature last session.
Kinser has also served as principal and executive director of Rocketship schools in Milwaukee, part of an entrepreneurial network of charter schools that started in the Silicon Valley and has been at the center of public debate about privatization of public schools. Kinser has also served as a special education teacher in Chicago.
Kinser has claimed the title of the “only pro-school choice” candidate in the race, and she said her experiences as an educator shaped her views on the school choice program in Wisconsin.
“Parents should have choices for their children,” Kinser said. She noted that parents in Wisconsin “overwhelmingly choose their neighborhood schools in the state” and called open enrollment, which is a policy that allows students to attend a public school outside of their residential school district, the largest school choice program in Wisconsin.
“What I see happening right now is everyone wants to focus on vouchers, but that’s just… a scholarship for children to go to a private school. That’s just one small part,” Kinser said.
Asked about whether she wants to see changes in funding for voucher schools, Kinser noted that students who receive vouchers to attend private schools in Milwaukee “do not get as much money as the students that are going to MPS.”
As a leader of the City Forward Collective, Kinser celebrated the historic increases in funding for Wisconsin’s voucher programs in the last state budget as a win for “parent power” in an opinion piece in 2023.
“We want to make sure all of our kids are getting a great education, and so the funding for elementary school children that receive private vouchers is much lower than if they were going to a traditional public school, so I would be an advocate for kids getting more money, yes, and making sure that’s fair.”
Public school funding
As state superintendent, Kinser would be responsible for overseeing 421 public school districts across the state, and funding for those schools has become an increasing concern for many in recent years, especially as more school districts have turned to voters to ask them to raise their property taxes to help cover education costs.
Kinser pointed to a controversial partial veto by Gov. Tony Evers in the last budget that extended a $325 increase in its school revenue limits each year for the next four centuries into the future. She said, given this increase in what school districts are allowed to raise from local taxpayers and spend on each pupil (which does not come with any increase in state aid), she is more concerned about ensuring that there is transparency about where money is being allocated and “making sure that it’s getting into the classroom.
“My priority is in the classroom to our teachers, and we are getting more money every year,” Kinser said.
Kinser said that she does want to see more investment in special education, though she didn’t say how much of an increase there should be. The state of Wisconsin currently covers only about 33% of public schools’ special education costs, leaving school districts to cut programs and find other ways to come up with money to cover this federally mandated expense.
“We need to figure out what is possible for funding for special education. We can’t put a number out there that’s not going to happen,” Kinser said.
Kinser said that ensuring a “good relationship” between DPI, the Legislature and Evers’ office would be necessary to figure this out. She said she doesn’t think the whole state surplus, which was most recently estimated to be $4.3 billion, will go towards education, even if that’s her first priority.
She said that she already has a “strong rapport” with Evers and the Legislature, and will continue to strengthen those relationships as well as others.
“Kids need an advocate, and their families and our educators, and part of that is being able to have relationships, building relationships with both sides of the aisle, and… being able to have relationships with everyone,” Kinser said.
Kinser said she wants to see additional investment in rural education, including transportation.
Navigating politics and education
Kinser said that she doesn’t think that politics belongs in Wisconsin schools.
“When I interviewed to be a principal or a special ed teacher… no one ever asked me if I was a Republican or Democrat, I would have been appalled and thought, ‘Oh my gosh, this school doesn’t have their priorities in order, like, why are they asking me this?’ I gotta work with all the kids, no matter who their parents are.”
The DPI, however, will likely have to navigate politically charged issues in the coming years. One issue is diversity, equity and inclusion, which has become a highly discussed topic again as the new administration of President Donald Trump has sought to eliminate DEI in government, the private sector and schools.
Kinser said she thinks every student should feel safe and welcome in the classroom, but that cultural issues, including diversity, equity and inclusion, are something that should be handled by individual districts.
“Wisconsin is a local control state, and I think it is really important that parents are working with their school districts and school board to decide on those issues, on the culture issues,” Kinser said. “I don’t think you can have someone from Madison telling all different school districts what to do with each of their cultures.”
The Trump administration is also considering attempting to eliminate the U.S. Department of Education. Kinser said that she doesn’t know whether that will happen but would want to ensure Wisconsin continues to receive its federal funding.
“My big thing is making sure that the money that we get for… that we’ve been getting really — Title I and special education — still flows to our state so that we can use that money,” Kinser said. “I think the funding is the biggest issue that everyone I’ve talked to here is most concerned about, so making sure that that money still comes into our state.”
The primary election is Tuesday, Feb. 18, and the general election is on Tuesday, April 1.
A teacher and students in a classroom. (Klaus Vedfelt | Getty Images)
In its first hearing of the legislative session, the Assembly Education Committee took testimony Thursday on several Republican bills, including one that would reverse changes to state testing standards and others that implement new state requirements on local school districts.
State Superintendent Jill Underly criticized several of the bills ahead of the hearing in a statement for not providing “real solutions” to the problems that school districts are facing across the state.
“[Republicans are] too busy playing political games, using our schools and children as pawns to push their own ideological agenda,” Underly said in a statement. “Rather than empowering local districts, they are intent on ignoring local control and imposing their own control over classrooms, dictating every move and actively trying to undermine public trust in our teachers and the entire education system.”
Reversing test score changes
The first bill — AB 1 — would reverse the changes to the Forward Exam test scores implemented by DPI last year.
Under the bill, Wisconsin would be required to return educational assessments to score ranges and qualitative terms that DPI used on school report cards for the 2019-2020 school year. It also would require DPI to align the Forward exam score ranges and pupil performance categories to those set by the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP).
Each year Wisconsin students take standardized tests, including the Forward Exam for third graders through eighth graders and the ACT and PreACT Secure for high school students, that help schools, teachers and families determine educational progress.
Last year, DPI approved changes that included new terms to describe student achievement — “developing,” “approaching,” “meeting” and “advanced.” Previously, the terms were “below basic,” “basic,” “proficient” and “advanced.”
New cut scores were also implemented — switching the state from a 3-digit number to a 4-digit number score for the math and English/language arts (ELA) test and changing the test scores needed to qualify to be placed in each performance level.
Sen. John Jagler (R-Watertown) said at the hearing that the recent changes to the test scores “broke the connection to previous years to allow us to see how our kids are performing over time.”
“As we move out of COVID, it is more important than ever that we’re able to see how our educational system is advancing or not advancing,” Jagler said. “Moving away from the national standards set by NAEP only compounded the problem.”
Jagler said he was “disturbed” to see recent NAEP results that found that 31% of fourth grade students were at or above proficient in reading and 8% were advanced.
The Forward Exam results with the new cut scores found that public school student proficiency rates in ELA were 48%.
“We simply can’t improve our numbers by cooking the books which it appears we’ve done here,” Jagler said.
Lawmakers said there needs to be more oversight of the process for test score review, especially as more money is being requested for education in Wisconsin. Underly has proposed spending an additional $4 billion.
“Later on in this session, there will be a request for billions of dollars to be invested in our schools. Should we, the Legislature, be able to determine where we are with other states that are making improvements?” Wittke commented.
Representatives from DPI defended the test score changes and said reverting to the old standards would not be an effective way of measuring test results any longer.
Deputy State Superintendent Tom McCarthy, noting that Wisconsin has a seven-year process for reviewing standards, said Wisconsin hasn’t lowered its educational standards “one iota.”
“If you ask a classroom teacher, what we are expecting them… to teach kids has continued to get more and more rigorous over the past decade,” McCarthy said.
When it comes to NAEP, McCarthy said that it “does not have standards like we do,” adding of the NAEP standard rubric, that it “sometimes relates and it sometimes does not relate.”
DPI Director of the Office of Educational Accountability Viji Somasundaram noted that NAEP addresses the “proficiency” measure on its website.
“It should be noted that the NAEP Proficient achievement level does not represent grade level proficiency as determined by other assessment standards (e.g., state or district assessments),” the website states.
Somasundaram also said that while state assessments are administered to every student in Wisconsin (in 2023-24 there was a 95.4% participation rate for public school students) the NAEP is only administered to a few thousand students. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, the NAEP just tests a representative sample in a state, so not every student in a school or school in a district participates. She said it is a “valuable tool” that can “provide comparison information across the states” and trend information over several years but it doesn’t provide grade level assessment.
Somasundaram explained the process for coming to the new state standards, saying it included input from 88 participants who met over the course of four days. She said they used a method called “bookmark” standard setting, which is used across the country for developing cut scores. DPI helped organize the session but isn’t involved in the process, she said.
“We have one of the most stable assessment systems and it is a practice that we have been following to bring educators together after we have a new assessment to establish cut points,” Somasundaram said.
Some have complained that because participants were required to sign nondisclosure agreements it was a sign of a “secret” process, however, McCarthy said the NDAs were required since participants were looking at “live” test questions, which are considered “proprietary” information.
“Reverting the cut course or having these conversations and accusing people of dumbing down or lowering standards is a convenient political narrative, but it’s not actually real,” McCarthy said. “It’s not what’s happening in schools.”
Rep. Cindi Duchow (R-Town of Delafield) accused DPI of trying to “muddy the waters” when it comes to the scores and focused specifically on the results in Milwaukee. The recent NAEP test results found concerning results for Milwaukee public schools, where only 9% of fourth-grade students tested proficient or above in reading. Other large cities had 26% of students at that level
“We got the national reading scores last week. MPS is the worst in the country. You should all be embarrassed,” Duchow said, “and if this was a private sector and not a government bureaucracy, you would all be fired.”
“You’ve got nothing but word salads going on,” she added.
In response, McCarthy said that the challenges in Milwaukee Public Schools go beyond the agency and have existed since 1988 when the Legislature created the Milwaukee school voucher program.
“I would contend for you that since that point in time things have not actually gotten any better, it’s actually gotten worse,” McCarthy said. “If you want to sit down and have a conversation about what we can do to support Milwaukee and figure out how to drive their results, we’re on board, but the Department of Public Instruction does not have a lever to push that says ‘make Milwaukee better.’”
According to the Wisconsin lobbying website, the test score bill is supported by the Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty, the City Forward Collective, Badger Institute, Metropolitan Milwaukee Association of Commerce, School Choice Wisconsin Action, Wisconsin Charter Action and Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce. The League of Women Voters of Wisconsin is registered in opposition.
Gov. Tony Evers’ spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment.
Dictating how districts allocate funds
The committee also discussed a bill that would impose new mandates on the way school districts allocate money.
The bill — AB 6 — would require school boards in Wisconsin to spend a minimum of 70% of operating money on direct classroom expenditures and would limit annual compensation increases for school administrators to the average annual percentage increase in total compensation that is provided to teachers in the school district.
The bill defines “direct classroom expenditures” as money spent on “salaries and benefits of teachers and teacher aides, instructional supplies, tuition, athletic programs and cocurricular activities.”
Currently in Wisconsin, local school boards, which are elected by community members, are responsible for overseeing school spending.
Bill coauthor Rep. Benjamin Franklin (R-De Pere) said the bill would “provide fairness for our teachers and support staff and prioritize our students by making simple reforms to how schools use their resources.” He noted that, according to National Center for Education Statistics, positions devoted to school administration grew by 94.6% nationally between 2000 and 2022 while teaching positions have shrunk. He also noted the recent results on the NAEP test.
“In the business world if I invest money in a particular area and it yields negative or undesirable results, I would look to reallocating my resources to achieve the desired outcome,” Franklin said. “Government is no different. As state legislators, we have the responsibility to be wise stewards of citizens’ tax dollars and to make sure that we continue to invest back in our classrooms and not in the front office.”
Rep. William Penterman (R-Hustisford) asked how the author came to the 70% number.
Franklin said that most school districts spend on average 73% in the classroom across the state, though he couldn’t name the source of the 73% average. He said 70% is an “achievable” number, and that the bill is a way to ensure districts that are “underperforming” keep up with other districts.
If school districts don’t meet the requirement, DPI would be required to cut the district’s state aid payments by the difference between what the school board spent on direct classroom expenditures and the minimum that it should have spent on direct classroom expenditures. The district would also be prohibited from levying additional property taxes to compensate for the reduction.
Under the bill, if the total reduction in state aid and other state payments does not cover a school board’s excess expenditures, DPI must order the school board to reduce the property tax obligations of its taxpayers, including providing refunds to taxpayers who have already paid their annual taxes, by an amount that represents the amount of excess expenditures that have not been recovered through the state aid reductions.
Franklin highlighted that Milwaukee Public Schools recently came under fire for attempting to increase four administrators’ salaries to $200,000 a year, though the district eventually decided against the raises due to the district’s current finances. The finances of the district have been under scrutiny over the last year due to the passage of one of the largest operating referendums in state history and the subsequent news that the district was late in delivering required financial information to DPI.
Underly said in her statement that the bill “threatens local control, burdens schools with unnecessary penalties and risks worsening the already fragile financial and administrative challenges districts face.”
“Instead of top-down mandates, local communities should retain control over how their schools are run and the Legislature should instead focus on fully funding our public schools so they can meet their local priorities and student needs,” Underly said.
During the hearing, DPI representatives presented more in-depth testimony about why the bill would be ineffective.
Kimber Vercauteran with DPI noted that the state already limits school districts spending through revenue caps. She said that the agency is also supportive of local control, calling it “the most important aspect of our Wisconsin state law.”
“This bill because it requires DPI to intervene, calculate, monitor and penalize spending at the district level lies in direct conflict with school boards, which are empowered with the supervision and management of schools,” Vercauteran said. “Boards are still best positioned to ensure that bonds are expended in accord with the needs of the community.”
Vercauteran also said that the definition included in the bill may not cover all of the costs actually incurred.
For example, she said, athletic activities usually require facilities. She said that the remaining 30% also may not cover the costs of other things including school safety, libraries and librarians, nutrition services, transportation or utilities as the bill is written.
Vercauteran said there are also logistical problems with the enforcement mechanism included in the bill. She said that DPI doesn’t receive school district reports until after the end of a school year.
“We would not be able to determine whether the district meets that 70% benchmark until well into the following year, and if this bill wants us to enact those aid reductions in that following year, school districts have little to no notification that they’re all of a sudden going to have an aid reduction,” Vercauteran said.
Mandating two weeks for school materials inspections
Wisconsin Republicans are also resurrecting a bill that would set a deadline for a school district to respond to a resident’s written request to inspect a textbook, curriculum, or instructional material.
The bill — AB 5 — would require school districts to comply with requests within 14 days.
This is the third session in which lawmakers have introduced a bill to accomplish this. In the 2021-23 session, the bill passed the Legislature and Evers vetoed it. Last session, the bill passed the Assembly and never received a vote in the Senate.
Nicholas Zabloudil, who works for bill author Rep. Barbara Dittrich (R-Oconomowoc) — who was absent from the hearing due to illness — said the bill “is vital in restoring the relationship between parents and school districts.”
“We’ve seen an outcry from parents around our state and frankly around the country regarding the lack of transparency in public schools,” Zabloudil said. He noted that in some cases parents have made records requests and have encountered delays in receiving responses.
DPI testified against the bill, saying it is duplicative, unnecessary and would put a burden on school employees.
DPI Education Policy Advisor Laura Adams said that the agency fully believes in transparency for families and community members, but noted that there are already a variety of ways for people to gain access and to understand the types of instructional materials being used in schools
Adams said that open records laws “are already a vehicle for families and community members to be able to request instructional materials and to see the instructional materials that are being used.”
Other laws in Wisconsin include one that requires a list of textbooks be filed with the school board clerk every year on an annual basis. Another state statute requires school boards to provide the complete human growth and development curriculum and all instructional materials for inspection to parents who request it.
Jeff Wright and Brittany Kinser participated in a WisPolitics forum on Thursday. Screenshot via WisEye.
State schools superintendent Jill Underly, who is running for her second term in office, didn’t attend a forum hosted by WisPolitics Thursday, where her opponents used the opportunity to answer questions about issues including literacy initiatives, cell phones in the classroom, Department of Public Instruction operations and school funding.
Underly told CBS58 Thursday morning that she wasn’t attending the forum because she was “double booked” and plans to participate in debates after the primary.
The primary for the nonpartisan race is set for Feb. 18. The two candidates with the most votes will advance to the April 1 general election.
Brittany Kinser, a former charter school principal and former executive director of the City Forward Collective, a nonprofit that advocates for “ensuring every child has the opportunity to attend a high-quality school” and seeks to support Milwaukee public, charter, and private voucher schools, entered the race for state superintendent in January on a platform that emphasizes improving reading and math education in Wisconsin.
Kinser’s campaign manager Amy Loudenbeck said in a statement that the “education establishment is running scared because Brittany Kinser is a reform-minded outsider who has what it takes to fix the broken education system in Wisconsin.”
“Brittany‘s opponents have nothing to offer Wisconsin voters besides more of the same and will not create the change we need for our kids,” Loudenbeck said.
After the forum, her qualification became a point of discussion due to a recent Milwaukee Journal Sentinel report that highlighted that Kinser has never had a Wisconsin teacher’s license and that her administrator’s license expired last year.
Kinser called the licensing issue a “distraction.”
“I am qualified for this job,” Kinser said. “I’ve been in education for 25 years.”
Sauk Prairie Schools Superintendent Jeff Wright told reporters that he thinks a state superintendent should have an active teaching license to be effective. He noted that he has his teaching, principal and superintendent licenses.
During the forum, Kinser and Wright talked about the role of the state’s voucher programs in the scope of the education landscape. Kinser, an outspoken advocate for school choice, said she was supportive of school vouchers.
“There are children and families that use the scholarship to go to school. We’re talking about children and families,” Kinser said. “I’m pro-school choice, yes.”
Wright said there needs to be more accountability and transparency when it comes to voucher schools in Wisconsin.
“Wisconsin has chosen to have a statewide voucher program. What it hasn’t done very well is teach how it’s paid for,” Wright said. “If we’re going to have a program like this in the state, I think the taxpayers deserve the transparency of knowing how much it’s costing.”
Wright said that he wants to see more consistent accountability measures.
“There are many reasons why I’m anti-voucher, but the state superintendent doesn’t determine whether or not there is a voucher system,” Wright added.
Kinser, in response, said that she is “the only school choice candidate.” and said that she wanted there “transparency across all of the schools for all of our children.”
“I think it’s easy to pick on one school but there are hundreds of schools,” Kinser said.
Sen. Julian Bradley (R-New Berlin) says that legislation requiring sheriffs to cooperate with ICE is meant to “keep communities safe” and that the message to sheriffs is “do not put your personal politics above the safety of the citizens who elected you.” (Photo by Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner)
Republican state lawmakers said Tuesday they would introduce a billto force local law enforcement to verify the citizenship status of people in custody for a felony offense and to notify Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) if citizenship cannot be verified. Counties that do not comply would be at risk of losing state money.
Lawmakers said that Wisconsin needs to assist President Donald Trump and the federal government with its work deporting “illegal immigrants” from the United States. Since inauguration day, federal agents have arrested more than 8,000 people, including some people who had no criminal history.
State Sen. Julian Bradley (R-New Berlin) said at a press conference that the legislation is meant to “keep communities safe” and that the message to sheriffs is “do not put your personal politics above the safety of the citizens who elected you.”
Under the bill, noncompliance by a sheriff would result in a 15% reduction in the county’s shared revenue payments from the state in the next year. Counties across Wisconsin rely on those payments to fund public safety, emergency medical services, transportation and other services. Sheriffs would have to certify compliance each year with the Wisconsin Department of Revenue.
The bill would also require sheriffs to comply with detainers and administrative warrants received from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security for individuals held in the county jail for a criminal offense. Sheriffs would also need to seek reimbursement from the federal government for any costs incurred while holding people.
“We don’t want Wisconsin on the hook for this,” Bradley said.
The only thing this proposal accomplishes is to bankrupt Wisconsin law enforcement both morally and fiscally.
– Milwaukee County Supervisors
The bill would also require sheriffs to keep a record of people who were verified as unlawfully residing in the U.S. and submit the information to the Legislature in a biannual report.
Lawmakers said that sheriffs would continue to have discretion over whether to report people who aren’t detained for a felony offense.
Bradley said that only “far left extremists in this country believe that someone here illegally that commits a felony should be allowed to stay.” He noted that the Laken Riley Act, which expands the mandatory detention requirements of immigrants charged and arrested on petty and other crimes, passed Congress with the help of 46 House and 12 Senate Democrats. He said the issue should be one with bipartisan support and called on his Democratic colleagues to sign on.
The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel first reported the legislation after obtaining a copy of the draft bill.
Gov. Tony Evers has already committed to vetoing the legislation should it make it to his desk.
In a statement released to the Journal Sentinel, Evers’ spokesperson Britt Cudaback called the bill an “unserious proposal” that is “trying to micromanage local law enforcement decisions by threatening to gut state aid by 15% for our local communities — that’s a non-starter.”
“We shouldn’t be threatening law enforcement with deep budget cuts, we should be working together with local law enforcement to improve public safety, reduce crime, and keep dangerous drugs and violent criminals off of our streets,” Cudaback said.
Assembly Majority Leaders Tyler August (R-Walworth) said it’s “unbelievable” Evers would threaten a veto of the legislation.
“It’s unbelievably unfortunate, but not unexpected that the governor would threaten to veto a bill that he hasn’t even seen yet,” August said. “[It] seems to be his M.O. that he governs by veto.”
Currently, seven Wisconsin counties have agreements with ICE to hold in jail immigrants without legal status to reside in the U.S. At one point, that number was eight, but Lafayette County ended its participation in ICE’s 287(g) program.
August said lawmakers talked with county officials, including those in Waukesha, while drafting the bill.
“A lot of the sheriffs already do this by practice because they know that it’s what’s right for their communities,” August said.
Dane, Milwaukee counties considered noncooperative
In a cosponsorship memo, lawmakers point to a June 2024 ICE report that lists Dane and Milwaukee counties as “noncooperative institutions.”
Dane County until recently participated in the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program (SCAAP), in which it provided the names of immigrants lacking legal status to the federal government and in return were reimbursed for the costs of their incarceration.
Dane County Sheriff Kalvin Barrett recently ended the county’s participation in the program. He told Channel 3000 that it’s a “different time” and that the “the previous administration is completely different than our current administration, and we have to be able to continue to represent the values of our community.”
Milwaukee County Supervisors Caroline Gómez-Tom, Juan Miguel Martínez, Anne O’Connor, Steven Shea, Sky Z. Capriolo and Justin Bielinski denounced the legislation in a statement, calling it a “dangerous” proposal that would make sheriffs “a tool of the Trump administration’s bigoted obsession with scapegoating immigrants.”
The supervisors said that mandating that sheriffs honor ‘administrative warrants’ not approved by a judge would “bog down law enforcement with false alarms — preventing them from focusing on real public safety concerns like reckless driving, drug overdoses, and rising crime.”
They also warned that the bill could force Wisconsin residents to carry documents at all times to prove they have “the right to live in their homes, go to work and pick their children up from school,” and that “anyone detained by a Wisconsin sheriff who cannot immediately prove their legal status would be at risk of being handed over to federal authorities.”
“The only thing this proposal accomplishes is to bankrupt Wisconsin law enforcement both morally and fiscally,” the supervisors said, adding that they encourage the Milwaukee County Sheriff’s office to “remain focused on actual public safety instead of enabling the worst policies of Trump extremists.”
ACLU of Wisconsin condemned the legislation, saying it “sends the wrong message.” The group noted that it could mean that any one who invokes their Fifth Amendment right to remain silent would have to be reported to ICE along with anyone who cooperates but fails to have access to the specific documents listed in the bill.
“It sends the message that local law enforcement should take on the additional tasks and risks of immigration status investigations,” Executive Director Melinda Brennan said in a statement. “It will encourage xenophobic sheriffs to investigate the status of not just persons accused of serious crimes but of anyone who enters their custody.”
Republican lawmakers accused Democrats of being extremist. Democratic lawmakers announced a proposal last week that would block state and local government officials from cooperating with federal deportation efforts without a judicial warrant. It would apply to detentions in a public building or facility, school, place of worship, place where child care services are provided, or place where medical or other health care services are provided.
August said Democrats’ proposal “basically would turn the entire state into a sanctuary state.”
Sen. Dora Drake speaks at the 2025 Black History Month kickoff. Screenshot via WisEye.
The Wisconsin Legislative Black Caucus kicked off its celebration of Black History Month at the Capitol Tuesday by recognizing the work that many have done to advance Black Wisconsinites and encouraging community advocacy.
Lawmakers noted that the celebration comes at a moment when diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives are being targeted by the federal government and their fellow state lawmakers.
Rep. Kalan Haywood (D-Milwaukee) said that in 2025 it is “clear that being Black is being attacked. They started with being woke and went to CRT (critical race theory) and went to DEI, but at the end of the day it’s an attack on being Black.”
President Donald Trump issued a proclamation declaring February Black History Month, but he also signed an executive order last month to end DEI efforts — a move that led the Wisconsin Department of Military Affairs to remove webpages — and the U.S. Defense Department declared “identity months dead.” Republican lawmakers in Wisconsin have also been taking actions to identify and attempt to limit or eliminate DEI initiatives.
Haywood encouraged people to “step up” and become involved in the efforts to move the state forward. The caucus announced that it would have its annual “Black Advocacy Day,” which is a time for community members to meet with Wisconsin lawmakers and learn about advocating for issues important to them, on Feb. 27.
“Right now is not the time to sit on the sidelines and watch what’s happening,” Haywood said. “It is time to get in the game. … As bold and as aggressive and blunt as they are about the attacks, we gotta be as bold and aggressive about protecting the past and the future so that we can move forward.”
Part of the caucus’ recognition of the month includes a resolution to officially proclaim February Black History Month. The resolution acknowledges that enslaved Africans were first brought to Virginia over 400 years ago and acknowledges the history of Black History Month, which has its roots in Carter G. Woodson’s “Negro History Week” founded in 1926.
“Both enslaved and free people of African descent have participated in every aspect of America’s effort to secure, protect, and advance the cause of freedom and civil rights, and have stories that are an inspiration to all citizens, that reflect the triumph of the human spirit, and that offer the hopes of everyday people to rise above both prejudice and circumstance and to build lives of dignity,” the resolution draft states.
The resolution recognizes 14 Black Americans, including several Wisconsinites. They include Paul Higginbotham, the first African-American judge to serve on the Wisconsin Court of Appeals; Marcia Anderson, a retired senior officer of the United States Army Reserve from Beloit, Wisconsin, who was the first Black woman to become a major general; Shakita LaGrant-McClain, the executive director of the Milwaukee County Department of Health and Human Services, and Samuel Coleman, the assistant superintendent of instruction for the Oshkosh Area School District.
Sen. Dora Drake (D-Milwaukee) said the month is “a time where we are celebrating the advancements, the struggles and the victories that African Americans have achieved, not just in Wisconsin, but nationwide.”
Even as lawmakers celebrate the accomplishments of Black Americans across history, they emphasized that more work has to be done.
“We have a list of programs that focus on housing, reentry criminal justice initiatives, health and so much more, but what’s very important … is that we are all called — whether we are fighting for justice, standing on the value that we stand on, investing and caring for our children and their education, or making sure that workers have rights and are paid a fair wage,” Drake said. “The time is now to do the job, and the time is now for us to work collectively and to push for justice.”
A majority of Wisconsin lawmakers support a bill to provide mothers on Medicaid who have just given birth with a year of coverage, but whether the bill becomes law hinges on persuading the Republican Assembly leader to let it through.
Pregnant patients in Wisconsin are currently eligible for Medicaid coverage for childbirth if they have an annual income of up to 306% of the federal poverty level. In Wisconsin, people are typically only eligible for Medicaid coverage if they make up to 100% of the federal poverty level.
Medicaid covers about 41% of births in the U.S. and 35% of births in Wisconsin, according to data compiled by KFF, an independent health policy research and news nonprofit. A newborn whose mother is a Medicaid recipient receives a year of coverage. But mothers whose income is above 100% of the poverty level risk losing their coverage after 60 days if they don’t otherwise qualify for Medicaid.
Federal Poverty Guidelines
Based on household size
1 person: $15,650
2 people: $21,150
3 people: $26,650
4 people: $32,150
For 300% of the poverty guideline, multiply income by 3
For the second time in two sessions, a bipartisan group of lawmakers are advocating for a bill to extend the mother’s postpartum coverage period to a year.
“I want to support the families,” said Rep. Patrick Snyder (R-Weston), a coauthor. “It’s just the right thing to do. It’s not political. It shouldn’t be.”
Gov. Tony Evers has been proposing covering mothers for a year in each of his budget proposals since 2019, but Republicans have removed the provision each time. In 2021, lawmakers passed a law to extend coverage to 90 days and the state applied for a federal waiver, but the federal government has never responded.
The federal government gave states the option to extend coverage to a year postpartum in 2022 in the American Rescue Plan Act, and since then, states have gradually opted in.
In Wisconsin, the proposal gathered significant momentum in 2023 with a bill that passed the Senate with only one opposing vote. It also gained the support of a majority of Assembly lawmakers, but it never came to a vote.
When Wisconsin considered extending coverage in 2023, Wisconsin was one of 12 states that hadn’t implemented the extension. Now, it’s one of two.
“It’s just us and Arkansas,” Snyder said. “Are you kidding? The only states that don’t do this.”
Despite widespread support, the bill will face a challenge in becoming law this session due to opposition from Assembly Speaker Robin Vos (R-Rochester). During a press conference in early January, he said it was “unlikely” that the proposal would become law this session.
“Our caucus has taken a position that expanding welfare is not a wise idea for anyone involved,” Vos said.
Snyder said he’s heard “rumors” that Vos may assign the bill to the Assembly State Affairs Committee. “I hope he doesn’t because a lot of times that’s where bills go to die,” he said.
Snyder, who chairs the Assembly Children and Family Committee, said his experience serving there has shown him the importance of the legislation.
“I just see the impact of families that are disrupted with something like this,” Snyder said. When mothers die as the result of a preventable issue, he noted that it results in “trauma” for the child and families.
A 2024 report from the Wisconsin Maternal Mortality Review Team found that from 2019 to 2020 there was a 30% increase in deaths of mothers within one year of the end of pregnancy, regardless of cause. In 2020, there were a total of 49 deaths.
According to the CDC, over 80% of U.S. deaths during pregnancy, delivery, or up to one year after pregnancy in 2020 were preventable.
Snyder said Wisconsin’s continued holdout means “either we don’t understand the whole gravity of it or we’re just stubborn.”
Snyder told the Examiner that bipartisan support for the measure continues this session with the majority of Senators and around 65 Assembly representatives signing on to the bill as of Wednesday afternoon.
Co-authors on the legislation alongside Snyder explained a number of ways a year of coverage would benefit Wisconsinites.
Rep. Jessie Rodriguez (R-Oak Creek) called the legislation a “no-brainer,” noting the number of medical and other issues that can arise for mothers after giving birth.
“Moms are most vulnerable after giving birth to a child. There's just a lot of issues that occur right after not to mention sleep deprivation and just being exhausted, tired,” Rodriguez said.
Rodriguez noted that the legislation would ensure that mothers covered under Medicaid when they give birth are able to see doctors throughout the first year after birth and allow issues to be addressed early on.
Sen. Jesse James (R-Thorp) said his experience as a husband, father, grandfather, law enforcement officer and state legislator has shown him firsthand the importance of taking care of moms.
“In my opinion, there should not be a price tag on it. It shouldn't matter how much we invest because healthy mamas bring healthy babies, which bring healthy families to Wisconsin,” James said. “Our moms go through the wear and tear of pregnancy, carrying the baby for nine months, through all the body changes… Once that mom is done giving birth, the care just doesn't end there.”
In considering the actual cost to the state, however, James said he thought it would be worth it.
A fiscal estimate by the state Department of Health Services of the 2023 bill found that the cost of the program would be about $21.4 million in all funds, including $8.4 million in state general purpose revenue. The estimate found that Medicaid would enroll an additional 5,290 people a month.
“That's a very small investment," he said, suggesting that in return, mothers would get better health care and get it sooner, while also saving the system money in the long run. “Then that's a success. We're making them healthier.”
Sen. LaTonya Johnson (D-Milwaukee) spoke about the legislation at a roundtable hosted by Protect Our Care, a health care advocacy group, in Milwaukee on Wednesday — just after the Trump administration paused federal spending and Medicaid portals froze in states across the country. Postpartum expansion became a point of “optimism” during the conversation, which included U.S. Rep. Gwen Moore and patients who spoke about their varied experiences with Medicaid and fears about potentially losing Medicaid coverage.
“When my daughter was born, I had a job. I was working. It didn't provide medical benefits. Not only did I give birth to a premature child, but two days after, I had to go back to work,” Johnson said. “What I know personally is that relying on Medicaid, it's considered a privilege that you have to fight too hard for.”
Participants at a roundtable in Milwaukee discuss their concerns about Medicaid on Wednesday, Jan. 29, 2025. (Photo by Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner)
Securing coverage could have a significant impact for Black mothers and children, Johnson noted.
Wisconsin has sharp racial disparities in maternal health. One DHS report found that from 2016 to 2023 Black women were at the highest risk for severe maternal morbidity — unexpected outcomes of labor and delivery that result in significant short- or long-term consequences to a woman’s health. Another study found that between 2006 and 2010 the maternal death rate for Black women in Wisconsin was five times that of white women — outpacing the national disparity during that period.
“The only way to improve the odds is to make sure that we have the coverage that we need, to follow not only that baby for 12 months, but also that mom,” Johnson said.
Johnson told the roundtable group that she thinks the bill is a priority for lawmakers, though there is a long way to go on it.
Snyder said he plans to have another conversation with Vos soon, and other lawmakers say they’ll continue to work to persuade the speaker to come around.
James said he is ready to provide his supportive colleagues with talking points and that he hopes to speak with Vos in the near future.
“I'm just hoping that he's willing to have a conversation,” James said. “I have no issue in hearing him out… they tried to do that 60 to 90 day waiver, and the federal government says they're not going to take anything less than one year, so I think as we progress through we just — we need to make things happen. We need to take care of our families.”
Vos has told Wisconsin Watch that he wants to see the 90-day waiver resubmitted to the Trump administration.
The proposed bill’s cosponsors said they would potentially be open to compromise, but that a year of coverage would be the easier and more impactful option.
“If we could get his support in bringing it down to 90 days, that would be great, but we've already done. In order to do the 90 days, we have to ask for a waiver and the state never got a response back on that,” Rodriguez said. It'd be easier, she said, to pass legislation for the full year already authorized by the federal government.
“Most of the mortality occurs between five and nine months,” Snyder said. “Between five and nine months, there is anything from cardiac arrests, preeclampsia and even suicide, so 90 days isn't going to always help.”
Snyder said that he is hoping that Vos might change his mind.
“Hopefully enough advocates will come to him and say ‘It's not really expanding welfare, it's extending from two months,” Snyder said.
Rodriguez acknowledged that Vos’ “philosophical beliefs” are part of his opposition to the legislation.
But if Vos doesn’t support the legislation, “Hopefully we can find a place where he can allow this to move forward,” Rodriguez said, “maybe not support it but at least allow this bill to get to the floor.”
Leaders of the Wisconsin Technical College System (WTCS) laid out the system’s requests for the 2025-27 state budget to support college operations and students’ education during a Thursday legislative briefing.
Education funding will likely be a major point of debate in the upcoming budget process, with public K-12 schools, the UW System and the technical colleges all requesting increases. The technical college system is made up of 16 colleges across the state serving about 287,000 students each year who pursue associate degrees, technical diplomas or short-term certificates.
The technical college system’s budget for 2024-25 totaled about $1.3 billion, with $592.9 million — or 44% — coming from state aid. About 17% of the remainder comes from tuition and fees and 39% comes from property taxes.
“We are very lean overall in terms of our overall funding picture… we have to be because funding is always limited resources,” said system President Layla Merrifield, who started in the position in September 2024.
The system’s increase would add up to just under $60 million in general purpose revenue, according to a Department of Administration summary.
According to the system, about 70% of the funding would be distributed based on a formula and 30% would be distributed based on outcomes.
WTCS policy advisor Megan Stritchko said the request is about 4% of the current budget and is meant to help expand capacity for the technical colleges to meet employer demand across a wide variety of industries. The funding would then be able to be used by each college to meet its “unique needs,” Stritchko said.
“The colleges are hearing from really all the employers in their district just looking for skilled labor, and so this is to help with capacity to meet that demand,” Stritchko said. “It’s also to help with expanding the pipeline of talent so trying to bring more folks into the technical college system — get them trained up, get them a credential and get them out into the workforce, and then supporting those students while they’re within the colleges and helping ensure that they’re successful.”
Stritchko noted that technical colleges have been facing rising costs, including because of rapidly advancing technology.
The system is requesting $700,000 in general purpose funds for positions in the Technical College System office and for information technology and security to maintain the system’s operations and enable continuous improvement in outcomes. Merrifield said the office helps coordinate the work of the system.
“We are currently funded at the same level we were funded at 20 years ago,” Merrifield said. “Everything that we do is database decision making. We really try to take in all of this great data from our colleges and then turn it into something useful, and give it back to them so that they know how they can improve relative to their fellow colleges. All of that requires resources.”
Part of the request includes $3 million across the biennium to provide grants to colleges for teaching and learning materials that are in the public domain or have been released under an intellectual property license that permits their free use. The system has said the investment would help to reduce the cost of education as students across the system can access those resources, making it more affordable and accessible.
“These textbooks need to be maintained and they need to be updated regularly, just like when you had books, when you’re in school, there are version one, version two, version three and they all need to be updated,” WTCS policy advisor Brandon Trujillo said, adding that the system has identified nursing and automotive as some programs where students would benefit from available materials.
The system is also seeking $10 million across the biennium to prepare students and educators for the adoption of artificial intelligence in the classroom and the workforce.
The system is also requesting $10.8 million in each year of the biennium to go towards Wisconsin Grants, administered by the Wisconsin Higher Educational Aids Board. The program provides grants to undergraduate Wisconsin residents enrolled at least half-time in degree or certificate programs.
According to the system, for the first time in over 10 years there has been a waitlist for the grants, with about 3,200 students by the end of fiscal year 2023-24. It is projected that the waitlist will grow significantly in FY 2024-25 due to changes in the federal formula for determining a student’s financial need.
“We’re seeing student need increase across our system and it’s going to continue to increase,” Trujillo said.
While Wisconsin’s state agencies have submitted their budget requests, Gov. Tony Evers will deliver his budget address and release his complete budget proposal next month. The budget will be in the hands of state lawmakers.
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