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On a dry, rocky patch of his family’s farm in Door County, Wisconsin, Dave Klevesahl grows wildflowers. But he has a vision for how to squeeze more value out of the plot: lease it to a company that wants to build a community solar array.

Unfortunately for Klevesahl, that is unlikely to happen under current state law. In Wisconsin, only utilities are allowed to develop such shared solar installations, which let households and businesses that can’t put panels on their own property access renewable energy via subscriptions.

Farmers, solar advocates and legislators from both parties are trying to remove these restrictions through Senate Bill 559, which would allow the limited development of community solar by entities other than utilities.

Wisconsin lawmakers considered similar proposals in the 2021-22 and 2023-24 legislative sessions, with support from trade groups representing real estate agents, farmers, grocers, and retailers. But those bipartisan efforts failed in the face of opposition from the state’s powerful utilities and labor unions.

Community solar supporters are hoping for a different outcome this legislative session, which ends in March. But while the new bill, introduced Oct. 24, includes changes meant to placate utilities, the companies still firmly oppose it.

“I don’t really understand why anybody wouldn’t want community solar,” said Klevesahl, whose wife’s family has been farming their land for generations. In addition to leasing his land for an installation, he would like to subscribe to community solar, which typically saves participants money on their energy bills. 

Some Wisconsin utilities do offer their own community solar programs. But they are too small to meet the demand for community solar, advocates say.

Utilities push back on shared solar 

Around 20 states and Washington, D.C., have community solar programs that allow non-utility ownership of arrays. The majority of those states, including Wisconsin’s neighbor Illinois, have deregulated energy markets, in which the utilities that distribute electricity do not generate it.

In states with ​“vertically integrated” energy markets, like Wisconsin, utilities serve as regulated monopolies, both generating and distributing power. That means legislation is necessary to specify that other companies are also allowed to generate and sell power from community solar. Some vertically integrated states, including Minnesota, have passed such laws.

But monopoly utilities in those jurisdictions have consistently opposed community solar developed by third parties. Minnesota utility Xcel Energy, for example, supported terminating the state’s community solar program during an unsuccessful effort by some lawmakers last summer to end it.

The Wisconsin utilities We Energies and Madison Gas and Electric, according to their spokespeople, are concerned that customers who don’t subscribe to community solar will end up subsidizing costs for those who do. The utilities argue that because community solar subscribers have lower energy bills, they contribute less money for grid maintenance and construction, meaning that other customers must pay more to make up the difference. Clean-energy advocates, for their part, say this ​“cost shift” argument ignores research showing that the systemwide benefits of distributed energy like community solar can outweigh the expense.

The Wisconsin bill would also require utilities to buy power from community solar arrays that don’t have enough subscribers.

“This bill is being marketed as a ​‘fair’ solution to advance renewables. It’s the opposite,” said We Energies spokesperson Brendan Conway. ​“It would force our customers to pay higher electricity costs by having them subsidize developers who want profit from a no-risk solar project. Under this bill, the developers avoid any risk. The costs of their projects will shift to and be paid for by all of our ​‘non-subscribing’ customers.”

The power generated by community solar ultimately goes onto the utility’s grid, reducing the amount of electricity the utility needs to provide. But Conway said it’s not the most efficient way to meet overall demand.

“These projects would not be something we would plan for or need, so our customers would be paying for unneeded energy that benefits a very few,” he said. ​“Also, these credits are guaranteed by our other customers even if solar costs drop or grid needs change.”

Advocates in Wisconsin hope they can address such concerns and convince utilities to support community solar owned by third parties.

Beata Wierzba, government affairs director of the clean-power advocacy organization Renew Wisconsin, said her group and others ​“had an opportunity to talk with the utilities over the course of several months, trying to negotiate some language they could live with.”

“There were some exchanges where utilities gave us a dozen things that were problematic for them, and the coalition addressed them by making changes to the draft” of the bill, Wierzba said.

The spokespeople for We Energies and Madison Gas and Electric did not respond to questions about such conversations.

A small-scale start 

To assuage utilities’ concerns, the bill allows third-party companies to build community solar only for the next decade. The legislation also sets a statewide cap for community solar of 1.75 gigawatts, with limits for each of the five major investor-owned utilities’ territories proportionate to each utility’s total number of customers.

Community solar arrays would be limited to 5 megawatts, with exceptions for rooftops, brownfields and other industrial sites, where 20 megawatts can be built.

No subscriber would be allowed to buy more than 40% of the output from a single community solar array, and 60% of the subscriptions must be for 40 kilowatts of capacity or less, the bill says. This is meant to prevent one large customer — like a big-box store or factory — from buying the majority of the power and excluding others from taking advantage of the limited community solar capacity.

Customers who subscribe to community solar would still have to pay at least $20 a month to their utility for service. The bill also contains what Wierzba called an ​“off-ramp”: After four years, the Public Service Commission of Wisconsin would study how the program is working and submit a report to the Legislature, which could pass a new law to address any problems.

“The bill is almost like a small pilot project — it’s not like you’re opening the door and letting everyone come in,” said Wierzba. ​“You have a limit on how it can function, how many people can sign up.”

Broad support for community solar

In Wisconsin, as in other states, developers hoping to build utility-scale solar farms on agricultural land face serious pushback. The Trump administration canceled federal incentives for solar arrays on farms this summer, with U.S. Department of Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins announcing, ​“USDA will no longer fund taxpayer dollars for solar panels on productive farmland.”

But Wisconsin farmers have argued that community solar can actually help keep agricultural land in production by providing an extra source of revenue. The Wisconsin Farm Bureau Federation has yet to weigh in on this year’s bill, but it supported previously proposed community solar legislation.

The bill calls for state regulators to come up with rules for community solar developers that would likely require dual use — meaning that crops or pollinator habitats are planted under and around the panels or that animals graze on the land. These increasingly common practices are known as agrivoltaics.

The bill would let local zoning bodies — rather than the state’s Public Service Commission — decide whether to permit a community solar installation.

Utility-scale solar farms, by contrast, are permitted at the state level, which can leave ​“locals feeling like they are not in control of their future,” said Matt Hargarten, vice president of government and public affairs for the Coalition for Community Solar Access. ​“This offers an alternative that is really welcome. If a town doesn’t want this to be there, it won’t be there.”

A 5-megawatt array typically covers 20 to 30 acres of land, whereas utility-scale solar farms are often hundreds of megawatts and span thousands of acres.

“You don’t need to upgrade the transmission systems with these small solar farms because a 30-acre solar farm can backfeed into a substation that’s already there,” noted Klevesahl, a retired electrical engineer. ​“And then you’re using the power locally, and it’s clean power. Bottom line is, I just think it’s the right thing to do.” 

A version of this article was first published by Canary Media.

Wisconsin lawmakers look to break utility grip on community solar is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

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The Waukesha County Sheriff Department. An audit of the department's use of data from the Flock surveillance camera system shows inconsistent reporting the reasons on the reasons investigators access the information, a problem common among police agencies. (Photo by Isiah Holmes/Wisconsin Examiner)

Like other Wisconsin law enforcement agencies, the Waukesha County Sheriff’s Department (WCSD) uses Flock cameras for many reasons, though department personnel don’t always clearly document what those reasons are. Audit data reveals that staff most frequently entered “investigation” in order to access Flock’s network, while other documented uses are raising concerns among privacy advocates. 

Flock cameras perpetually photograph and, using AI-powered license plate reader technology, identify vehicles traversing roadways. Flock’s system can be used to view a vehicle’s journey, even weeks after capturing an image, or flag specific vehicles for law enforcement which have been placed on “Be On The Lookout” (BOLO) lists.

As of March 2025, the company Flock Safety was valued at $7.5 billion, with over 5,000 law enforcement agencies using its cameras nationwide. At least  221 of those agencies are in Wisconsin, including the city of Waukesha’s police department as well as  the county sheriff . The Wisconsin Examiner obtained Flock audit data from the Waukesha County Sheriff’s Department through open records requests, covering Flock searches from January 2024 to July 2025, and used computer programming to analyze the data.

Over that period of time, more than 6,700 Flock searches were conducted by WCSD using only “investigation”, as well as abbreviations or misspellings of the word. The searches, as they appeared in the audit data, offered no other context to suggest why specifically Flock’s network had been searched. Lt. Nicholas Wenzel, a sheriff’s department spokesperson, wrote in an email statement that “investigation” has a broad usage when Flock is involved. 

“A deputy/detective using Flock for an investigation is using it for a wide range of public safety situations,” Wenzel explained. “Flock assists in locating missing persons during Amber or Silver Alert by identifying their vehicles and has proven effective in recovering stolen cars. Investigators use Flock to track suspect vehicles in serious crimes such as homicides, assaults, robberies, and shootings, as well as in property crimes like burglaries, catalytic converter thefts, and package thefts. The system also supports traffic-related investigations, including hit-and-run cases, and enables agencies to share information across jurisdictions to track offenders who travel between communities.”

Widespread use of vague search terms 

Dave Maass, director of investigations at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, says that terms like “investigation” are too vague to determine whether or not Flock was used appropriately.  At least some responsibility falls on Flock Safety itself, Maass argues. “They’re setting up a system where it’s impossible for somebody to audit it,” he told the Wisconsin Examiner. “And I think that’s the big problem, is that there’s no baseline requirement that you have to have a case related to this…They say you have to have a law enforcement purpose. But if you just put the word ‘investigation’ there, how do you know? Like, how do you know that this is not somebody stalking their ex-partner? How do you know whether this is somebody looking up information about celebrities? How do you know whether it’s racist or not? And you just don’t, because nobody is checking any of these things.”

The audit also stored other vague search terms used by WCSD such as “f”, “cooch”, “freddy”, “ts”, “nathan”, and “hunt” which Lt. Wenzel would not define.“The search terms are associated with investigations, some of which remain active,” he wrote in an email statement. “To preserve the integrity of these ongoing investigations, no further description or clarification of the terms can be provided at this time.” 

In August, Wisconsin Examiner published a similar Flock analysis that also found agencies statewide entering only the word “investigation,” with no other descriptor, in order to access Flock. At nearly 20,000 searches (not including misspellings and abbreviations), the term “investigation” was in fact the most often used term in that analysis, which relied on audit data obtained from the Wauwatosa Police Department. 

While data from the Waukesha County Sheriff’s Department appeared in that first Flock story, that analysis focused on broad trends which appeared among at least 221 unique agencies using Flock in Wisconsin. This more recent analysis focuses specifically on the Waukesha County Sheriff Department’s use of the camera network. 

The August report found that the Waukesha County Sheriff’s Department appeared among the top 10 Wisconsin law enforcement agencies that used Flock the most. The report also found that some agencies also only entered “.” — a period — in the Flock system field to indicate the reason for using the system. The West Allis Police Department led Wisconsin in this particular search term, followed by the Waukesha Police Department and the Columbia County Sheriff’s Office. 

In response to an inquiry from the Wisconsin Examiner, a Waukesha Police Department spokesperson  said that an officer who’d conducted nearly 400 Flock searches using only “.” as the reason had been provided extra training, and that the officer’s behavior had been corrected after the Wisconsin Examiner reached out. The West Allis Police Department,  on the other hand, did not suggest that its officers were using the Flock network improperly. 

Use of vague search terms is chronic across Flock’s network, Maass has found. He recalled  one nationwide audit that covered 11.4 million Flock searches over a six-month period. Of those some 22,743 “just dots” appeared as reasons for Flock searches. Searches using only the word “investigation” made up about 14.5% of all searches, he said. 

“So yeah, that’s a problem,” Maass told the Wisconsin Examiner. Reviewing a copy of Waukesha County Sheriff’s Department audit data, Maass saw the same vague search terms that have been reported by the Examiner. Although some terms can be reasonably guessed — such as “repo” perhaps meaning repossession, or ICAC, which usually stands for Internet Crimes Against Children — others aren’t so easy. 

“‘Hunt’ can mean anything,” said Maass, referring to a term which appeared 24 times within the Waukesha Sheriff’s data. Maass points to the search term “f”, which the Wisconsin Examiner’s analysis found WCSD used to search Flock 806 times. 

Maass highlights that each search touches hundreds or even thousands of individual Flock networks nationwide. “If I’m one of these agencies that gets hit by this system, how am I to know if this is a legitimate search or not?” Maass said. “Now, maybe somebody at Waukesha is going through their own system, and like questioning every officer about every case. Maybe they’re doing that. Probably not.” 

Wenzel of the Waukesha County Sheriff’s Department said that although some searches appear vague,  deputies and detectives are required by department policy to document their use of Flock in reports. Although a case number category does appear in the audit data, this column was rendered blank, making it impossible for Wisconsin Examiner to determine how often Flock searches had case numbers, or whether those case numbers corresponded with specific investigations the sheriff’s department had on file. 

“The Sheriff’s Office understands the concerns surrounding emerging technology and takes very seriously its responsibility to protect the privacy and civil rights of the community,” Wenzel said in a statement. “The use of Flock license plate recognition technology is guided by clear safeguards to ensure it is only used for legitimate law enforcement purposes.” 

The department’s policy, Wenzel explained, “prohibits any use outside of legitimate criminal investigations.” He said that deputies undergo initial and ongoing training to use the camera network. “All system activity is logged and subject to review,” said Wenzel.

Maass says the department can’t back-check the searches conducted by other agencies using the Waukesha Flock network, however. “Because when we’re talking about millions of searches coming through their system, you know, every few months…like hundreds of thousands at least every month…how are they actually quality controlling any of these?” Maass told the Wisconsin Examiner. “They’re just not.”

Wenzel said that “the technology is not used for general surveillance, traffic enforcement, or monitoring individuals not connected to an investigation.” The Wisconsin Examiner’s analysis, however, detected 43 searches logged as “surveillance” and 30 searches logged as “traffic offense.” The audit data also contained at least 357 searches logged as “suspicious” or variations of the word, as well as another 14 logged as “suspicious driving behavior,” 52 searches for “road rage” and 36 logged as “identify driver”.

There were also 62 searches related to evictions, which privacy advocates contend  go beyond the public safety roles that the cameras were originally pitched to serve.

“Evictions can be unpredictable and potentially dangerous situations,” said Wenzel. “The removal of individuals from a residence often creates heightened emotions, uncertainty, and sometimes resistance. For this reason, safety is the top priority for both the residents being evicted and the deputies carrying out the court order. Flock is utilized to determine if the former tenants have left the area or could possibly be in the area when the court order is being carried out.” 

Jon McCray Jones, policy analyst for the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Wisconsin, said in a statement that the Waukesha Sheriff’s use of Flock has extended “far beyond the public safety justifications for which these tools were originally sold.” McCray Jones told the Wisconsin Examiner, “These systems were introduced to the public as a means to reduce violent crime and aid in solving serious investigations. However, when they are used for non-criminal purposes, such as evictions, they cross a dangerous line.”  

Waukesha’s uses for evictions were particularly concerning for McCray Jones. “What’s happening here is surveillance technology, operated by taxpayer-funded public servants, being weaponized at the behest of private landlords and corporations,” he said. “That is exactly the kind of mission creep communities are most worried about when it comes to police surveillance. If Flock cameras can be repurposed to target tenants today, what stops law enforcement tomorrow from using facial recognition to track people who fall behind on rent, or phone location data to monitor whether workers are ‘really sick’ when they call off? We’ve seen documented cases where law enforcement misused surveillance systems to track down romantic interests. Once the floodgate is opened, the slide into abuse is fast and quiet.” 

Wenzel said that access to the Flock network is limited to personnel who are properly trained and authorized to use the software, and the department’s policy is regularly reviewed by those personnel. 

“Searches are limited to legitimate law enforcement purposes per department policy,” he wrote in an email statement. The department has conducted its own Flock audits, Wenzel explained, and no sheriff department staff have ever been disciplined or re-trained due to Flock-related issues. Although the Waukesha County Sheriff’s Department is part of the federal 287(g) program, in which local law enforcement agencies participate in federal immigration enforcement, Wenzel said that Flock is not used as part of the program, and the Wisconsin Examiner didn’t find any clear examples of immigration-related uses by the sheriff’s department. 

McCray Jones considers the Waukesha Sheriff’s use of Flock to be an example of why “surveillance technology in the hands of law enforcement must be tightly limited, narrowly defined, and rigorously transparent.” He stressed that every use “must be clearly logged and justified — not with vague categories like ‘investigation’ or ‘repo’, but with meaningful explanations the public can actually understand and evaluate. Without strict guardrails, audits like this reveal how quickly tools justified in the name of ‘safety’ turn into instruments of convenience or even private gain.” 

With the growth of surveillance technologies and the civil liberties implications they raise, McCray Jones said that the public “deserves clear proof that it is being used only to reduce crime — particularly violent crime — and not to serve the interests of landlords or corporations. Accountability and transparency aren’t optional add-ons; they are the bare minimum to prevent abuse.”

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In the Wisconsin Senate’s last floor session of 2025, lawmakers debated and voted on bills that appear destined for Democratic Gov. Tony Evers’ veto pen. 

One of the bills, which passed the Republican-led Assembly in September and is on its way to Evers’ desk, would prohibit public funds from being used to provide health care to undocumented immigrants. Sen. Van Wanggaard, R-Racine, the bill’s Senate author, argued it would protect Wisconsin taxpayers, citing Democratic states like Illinois where enrollment and costs of a health care program for noncitizens far exceeded initial estimates. 

But several Senate Democrats lambasted the proposal as a “heartless” attempt by GOP lawmakers to gain political points with their base with 2026 elections around the corner. Sen. Tim Carpenter, D-Milwaukee, hinted at its likely future in the governor’s office. 

“It’s going to be vetoed,” Carpenter said. 

Plenty of bills in the nearly eight years of Wisconsin’s split government have passed through the Republican-controlled Assembly and Senate before receiving a veto from the governor. Evers vetoed a record 126 bills during the 2021-22 legislative session ahead of his reelection campaign and 72 bills during the 2023-24 session. The governor has vetoed 15 bills so far in 2025, not including partial vetoes in the state budget, according to a Wisconsin Watch review of veto messages. The number is certain to rise, though whether it will approach the record is far from clear.

A few Senate Democrats seeking higher office in 2026 said some recent legislation that is unlikely to make it past Evers, from a repeal of the creative veto that raises school revenue limits for the next 400 years to a bill exempting certain procedures from the definition of abortion, looks like political messaging opportunities to ding Democrats. They anticipate more of those proposals to come up next year. 

“For the last eight years we’ve had divided government, but we’ve had a heavily gerrymandered Legislature,” said Sen. Kelda Roys, D-Madison, who is among at least seven candidates running for governor in 2026 and voted against those bills on the floor. “For Republicans in the Legislature, there has been no cost and everything to gain from pursuing the most radical and extreme proposals in their party.” 

Evers is not seeking a third term as governor in 2026 and is entering the final year of his current term, which no longer makes him vulnerable to political fallout from vetoing bills. But legislative Democrats, particularly in the Senate where the party hopes to win the majority in 2026, can be forced into difficult decisions in their chambers where Republicans control which bills get votes on the Senate and Assembly floors. 

“It was all this political gamesmanship of trying to get points towards their own base and/or put me or others, not just me, into a position to have to make that tough vote,” said Sen. Jeff Smith, D-Brunswick, of the bill banning public dollars spent on health care for undocumented immigrants. Smith, who is seeking reelection in his western Wisconsin district next year, holds the main Senate seat Republicans are targeting in 2026. He voted against the bill.

Smith said the immigration bill saw “a lot of discussion” in the Senate Democratic Caucus ahead of the floor session on Nov. 18, particularly on where Smith would vote given the attention on his seat. The bill passed the chamber on a vote of 21-12 with Democratic support from Sen. Sarah Keyeski, D-Lodi; Sen. Brad Pfaff, D-Onalaska; and Sen. Jamie Wall, D-Green Bay, who are not up for reelection next year but represent more conservative parts of the state. 

“Many people thought the easy vote would be to just vote with the Republicans because it’s not going to be signed,” Smith said. “But I’ve still got to go back and explain it to my voters.” 

A spokesperson for Majority Leader Sen. Devin LeMahieu, R-Oostburg, did not respond to questions from Wisconsin Watch about how Senate Republicans consider what bills advance to the Senate floor. Neither did a spokesperson for Assembly Speaker Robin Vos, R-Rochester.

In a social media post after the Senate session, Senate President Mary Felzkowski, R-Tomahawk, listed “all the things WI Senate Democrats voted against,” which included “prohibiting illegal aliens from getting taxpayer-funded healthcare.” 

Scott Kelly, Wanggaard’s chief of staff, said a potential veto or putting Democrats on the record on certain issues largely doesn’t influence the legislation their office pursues.

“Our job is to pass bills that we think are good ideas that should be law,” Kelly said. “Whether other people support or veto them is not my issue. The fact that Democrats think this is a political ‘gotcha,’ well, that just shows they know it’s an idea that the public supports.”

Not all of the bills on the Senate floor on Nov. 18 seemed aimed at election messaging. The chamber unanimously approved a bill to extend tax credits for businesses that hire a third party to build workforce housing or establish a child care program. In October, senators voted 32-1 to pass a bipartisan bill requiring insurance companies to cover cancer screenings for women with dense breast tissue who are at an increased risk of breast cancer. The Republican-authored bill has yet to move in the Assembly despite bipartisan support from lawmakers there as well.

Assembly Democrats last week criticized Vos and Assembly Majority Leader Rep. Tyler August, R-Walworth, for blocking a vote on Senate Bill 23, a bipartisan bill to expand postpartum Medicaid coverage to new Wisconsin moms. Assembly Minority Leader Rep. Greta Neubauer, D-Racine, in a press conference at the Capitol called the move “pathetic.”

But health care is a top issue for Democratic voters and less so for Republicans, according to the Marquette University Law School Poll conducted in October. Illegal immigration and border security are the top issue for Republican voters in Wisconsin. About 75% of GOP voters said they were “very concerned” about the issue heading into 2026, though only 16% of Democrats and 31% of immigrants said the same.  

Barry Burden, director of the Elections Research Center and political science professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said political messaging votes can have impacts on elections, especially in what will be some of the close Senate races in 2026.

“It’s kind of a messaging opportunity, not really a policymaking opportunity. It’s also maybe a way for Republicans to let off some steam,” Burden said. “They have divisions within their own caucuses. They have disagreements between the Republicans in the Assembly, Republicans in the Senate. They can never seem to get on the same page with a lot of these things, and there are often a few members who are holding up bills. So, when they can find agreement and push something through in both chambers and get near unanimous support from their caucuses, that’s a victory in itself and maybe helps build some morale or solidarity within the party.”

Here’s why Wisconsin Republican lawmakers pass bills they know Gov. Tony Evers will veto is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

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Group Health Cooperative of South Central Wisconsin's East Side Madison clinic. (Photo by Erik Gunn/Wisconsin Examiner)

Directors of a Madison health care system will consider Thursday whether to change course in the organization’s response to a union organizing campaign.

Supporters of the union campaign at Group Health Cooperative of South Central Wisconsin put five motions before the board of directors at an in-person meeting in October — including one to voluntarily recognize the union, SEIU Wisconsin.

A statement from the co-op management Wednesday did not address whether the board will directly act on any of the motions when it meets.

“The motions are advisory to the Board of Directors concerning its instructions to management about the unionization efforts of our direct care employees,” Group Health stated. “All the Motions will be considered by the Board at the November 20th meeting. The results of those discussions will be communicated to our membership in a future statement.”

Group Health’s response to the union drive, which became public about a year ago, has produced a rift between the co-op’s management and some of its members, who have criticized the organization’s response as a betrayal of its progressive heritage.

“To me it was horrifying to learn that we had people leaving because the conditions were not tolerable,” said Ruth Brill, a Group Health member since 1979 who has supported the union organizing campaign.

According to union supporters, the five motions offered at an Oct. 11 in-person mass meeting to discuss the union organizing campaign passed unanimously. About 170 Group Health members attended that meeting, and union allies said it was the largest turnout in memory for an in-person meeting of co-op members.

Three of the five motions call on the board, the co-op management, or both:

• To report to members how much money Group Health has spent in 2024 and 2025 to pay the law firm Husch Blackwell, which has represented the co-op in connection with the union campaign.
• To voluntarily recognize SEIU Wisconsin as the representative for the professions and departments that the union first sought to represent when workers petitioned the National Labor Relations Board for a union election on Dec. 12, 2024. That motion also demands that Group Health “observe strict neutrality regarding the unionization of any of its workers.”
• To compile a report “of all meeting minutes, emails, and other communications involving Board members, administrators, and/or supervisory employees regarding union activity, from January 2024 to the present.”

The third motion also demands a report on all legal or consulting fees that Group Health has spent related to the union drive, including itemized details.

The fourth motion demands that the board and administration “faithfully follow the democratically expressed will” of the co-op members, charging that the membership has “been denied an opportunity to duly and fully exercise its role” in leading the co-op.

The fifth motion calls for a meeting by mid-January “on the democratization of GHC governance.”

“GHC says members are the most important part of our cooperative and yet the board is not listening to what the members have very clearly stated what they would like to happen,” said Dr. Nisha Rajagopalan, a family practice physician and among the union campaign’s leaders.

“If we are a cooperative that is for our members and our patients, those people showed up in the room and they voted and said exactly what they wanted, and we would like to hear the board uphold that,” said Katie Cloud, a certified medical assistant who has also been active in the union campaign.

Paul Terranova, a Group Health member for 25 years, organized a presentation to the co-op board earlier this year to make the case for unionization in the context of a nonprofit co-op. He later helped organize a slate of candidates for the board in opposition to four incumbent board members. All four of the rival candidates were elected in June.

Terranova said that board members have not communicated directly with Group Health members about the union campaign. Board discussions about the matter have been conducted in closed sessions.

The board’s consideration of the motions is “a really pivotal moment for GHC,” Terranova said, “and how they handle this is going to say a lot about whether this is still a cooperative or if it’s become just a corporate board with cooperative window dressing.”

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This story was originally published by ProPublica.

The most powerful Republican in Wisconsin stepped up to a lectern that was affixed with a sign reading, “Pro-Women Pro-Babies Pro-Life Rally.”

“One of the reasons that I ran for office was to protect the lives of unborn children,” Assembly Speaker Robin Vos told the cheering crowd gathered in the ornate rotunda of the state Capitol. They were there on a June day in 2019 to watch him sign four anti-abortion bills and to demand that the state’s Democratic governor sign them. (The governor did not.)

“Legislative Republicans are committed to protecting the preborn because we know life is the most basic human right,” Vos promised. “We will continue to do everything we can to protect the unborn, to protect innocent lives.”

Now, however, Vos has parted with some in the national anti-abortion movement in its push for a particular measure to protect life: the life of new mothers.

Many anti-abortion Republicans have supported new state laws and policies to extend Medicaid coverage to women for a year after giving birth, up from 60 days. The promise of free health care for a longer span can help convince women in financial crises to proceed with their pregnancies, rather than choose abortion, proponents say. And many health experts have identified the year after childbirth as a precarious time for mothers who can suffer from a host of complications, both physical and mental.

Legislation to extend government-provided health care coverage for up to one year for low-income new moms has been passed in 48 other states — red, blue and purple. Not in Arkansas, where enough officials have balked. And not in Wisconsin, where the limit remains two months. And that’s only because of Vos.

The Wisconsin Senate passed legislation earlier this year that would increase Medicaid postpartum coverage to 12 months. In the state Assembly, 30 Republicans have co-sponsored the legislation, and there is more than enough bipartisan support to pass the bill in that chamber.

But Vos, who has been speaker for nearly 13 years and whose campaign funding decisions are considered key to victory in elections, controls the Assembly. And, according to insiders at the state Capitol, he hasn’t allowed a vote on the Senate bill or the Assembly version, burying it deep in a committee that barely meets: Regulatory Licensing Reform.

Vos’ resistance has put him and some of his anti-abortion colleagues in the odd position of having to reconcile their support for growing families with the failure of the Assembly to pass a bill aimed at helping new moms stay healthy.

“If we can’t get something like this done, then I don’t know what I’m doing in the Legislature,” Republican Rep. Patrick Snyder, the bill’s author and an ardent abortion foe, said in February in a Senate hearing.

Reached by phone, Vos declined to discuss the issue with ProPublica and referred questions to his spokesperson, who then did not respond to calls or emails. Explaining his opposition, Vos once said, “We already have enough welfare in Wisconsin.” And in vowing to never expand Medicaid, he has said the state should reserve the program only for “those who truly need it.”

His stance on extending benefits for new mothers has troubled health care professionals, social workers and some of his constituents. They have argued and pleaded with him and, in some cases, cast doubt on his principles. ProPublica requested public comments to his office from January 2024 to June 2025 and found that the overwhelming majority of the roughly 200 messages objected to his stance.

“I know this is supported by many of your Republican colleagues. As the ‘party of the family’ your opposition is abhorrent. Get with it,” one Wisconsin resident told the speaker via a contact form on Vos’ website.

Another person who reached out to Vos chastised him for providing “lame excuses,” writing: “The women of Wisconsin deserve better from a party that CLAIMS to be ‘pro-life’ but in practice, could care less about women and children. We deserve better than you.”

 ‘A commonsense bill’

Donna Rozar is among the Wisconsin Republicans who staunchly oppose abortion but also support Medicaid for new mothers.

While serving as a state representative in 2023, she sponsored legislation to extend the coverage up to one year. Her effort mirrored what was happening in other states following the end of Roe v. Wade and the constitutional right to an abortion. Activists on both sides of the abortion issue recognized that there could be a rise in high-risk births and sought to protect mothers.

“I saw this as a pro-life bill to help mothers have coverage for up to a year, in order to let them know that they would have the help they needed if there were any postpartum complications with their pregnancy,” said Rozar, a retired registered nurse. “I thought it was a commonsense bill.”

Vos, she said, would not allow the bill to proceed to a vote even though it had 66 co-sponsors in the 99-person chamber. “The speaker of the state Assembly in Wisconsin is a very powerful individual and sets the agenda,” she said.

Rozar recalled having numerous “frustrating” conversations with Vos as she tried to persuade him to advance the legislation. “He was just so opposed to entitlement programs and any additional expenditures of Medicaid dollars that he just stuck to that principle. Vehemently.”

Vos has argued as well that through other options, including the Affordable Care Act, Wisconsinites have been able to find coverage. While some new mothers qualify for no-cost premiums under certain ACA plans, not all do. Even with no-cost premiums, ACA plans typically require a deductible or co-payments. And next year, when enhanced premium tax credits are due to expire, few people will be eligible for $0 net premiums unless Congress acts to change that.

Rozar lost her race for reelection in August 2024 after redistricting but returned to the state Capitol in February for a Senate hearing to continue advocating for the extension. She was joined by a variety of medical experts who explained the extreme and life-threatening risks women can face in the first year after giving birth.

They warned that without extended Medicaid coverage, women who need treatment and medication for postpartum depression, drug addiction, hypertension, diabetes, blood clots, heart conditions or other ailments may be unable to get them.

One legislative analysis found that on average each month, 700 women fell off the Medicaid rolls in Wisconsin two months after giving birth or experiencing a miscarriage because they no longer met the income eligibility rules.

Justine Brown-Schabel, a community health worker in Dane County, told senators of a new mother diagnosed with gestational diabetes who lost Medicaid coverage.

“She was no longer able to afford her diabetes medication,’’ Brown-Schabel said. “Not only did this affect her health but the health of her infant, as she was unable to properly feed her child due to a diminishing milk supply.”

She described another new mother, one who had severe postpartum depression, poor appetite, significant weight loss, insomnia and mental exhaustion. Sixty days of Medicaid coverage, Brown-Schabel said, “are simply not enough” in a situation like that.

Currently, new moms with household incomes up to 306% of the poverty line (or $64,719 a year for a single mom and baby) can stay on Medicaid for 60 days after birth. But the mother must be below the poverty line ($21,150 for that mom and baby) to continue with coverage beyond that. The new legislation would extend the current protections to a year.

Bipartisan unity on the legislation is so great that Pro-Life Wisconsin and the lobbying arm of the abortion provider Planned Parenthood, which offers some postpartum services, both registered in support of it before the Senate.

“It’s something that we can do and something that’s achievable given the bipartisan support for it,” Matt Sande, a lobbyist for Pro-Life Wisconsin, said in an interview. “It’s not going to break the bank.”

Once fully implemented, the extended coverage would cost the state $9.4 million a year, according to the state Legislative Fiscal Bureau. The state ended fiscal year 2025 with a budget surplus of $4.6 billion.

With the Assembly bill buried by Vos, Democratic Rep. Robyn Vining tried in July to force the issue with a bit of a legislative end run. She rose during floor debate on the state budget and proposed adding the Medicaid extension to the mammoth spending bill.

All of the Republicans who had signed on to the Medicaid bill, except one absent member, voted to table the proposal, sinking the amendment. They included Snyder, the bill’s sponsor, who in an email to ProPublica labeled the Democrats’ move to raise the issue during floor debate “a stunt.”

“Democrats were simply more concerned with playing political games to garner talking points of who voted against what, than they were in supporting the budget negotiated by their Governor,” he said.

Said Vining of the Republicans who tabled the amendment: “They’re taking marching orders from the speaker instead of representing their constituents.”

Well-funded opposition

Vos’ opposition echoes that of influential conservative groups, including the Foundation for Government Accountability, a Florida think tank that promotes “work over welfare.” Its affiliated lobbying arm openly opposed the Medicaid extension for new moms when it first surfaced in Wisconsin in 2021, though it has not registered opposition since then. Reached recently, a spokesperson for the foundation declined to comment.

Over the past decade, the foundation has received more than $11 million from a charitable fund run by billionaire Richard Uihlein, founder of the Wisconsin-based shipping supplies company Uline. In recent years, Uihlein and his wife, Liz, also have been prolific political donors nationally and in the Midwest, with Vos among the beneficiaries.

Since 2020, Liz Uihlein has given over $6 million to Wisconsin’s Republican Assembly Campaign Committee, which is considered a key instrument of Vos’ power. And in February 2024, she donated $500,000 to Vos’ personal political campaign at a time when he was immersed in a tough intraparty skirmish.

One concern cited by extension opponents such as the Foundation for Government Accountability is that Medicaid coverage for new moms could be used for health issues not directly related to giving birth. Questions over how expansive the coverage would be spilled into debate in Arkansas in a Senate committee in April of this year.

“Can you explain what that coverage is? Is it just like full Medicaid for any problem that they have, or is it somehow specific to the pregnancy and complications?” asked GOP Sen. John Payton.

A state health official told him new mothers could receive a full range of benefits.

“Like, if they needed a knee replacement, I mean, it’d cover it?” Payton said.

“Yes,” came the reply.

The bill failed in a voice vote.

In Wisconsin, no lawmaker voiced any such concern during the February Senate hearing, which was marked by only positive feedback. In fact, one lawmaker and some medical experts in attendance openly snickered at the thought that Arkansas — a state that ranks low in public health measurements — might pass legislation before Wisconsin, leaving it the lone holdout.

Ultimately, the Wisconsin Senate approved the legislation 32-1 in April, sending it along to the Assembly to languish and leaving Wisconsin still in the company of Arkansas on the issue.

Despite the setbacks and Vos’ firm opposition, Sande of Pro-Life Wisconsin and other anti-abortion activists are not giving up. He thinks Vos can be persuaded and the bill could move out of its purgatory this winter.

“I’m telling you that we’re hopeful,” Sande said.

Rozar is, too, even though she is well aware of Vos’ unwavering stance. “He might have egg on his face if he let it go,” she said.

ProPublica is a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative newsroom. Sign up for The Big Story newsletter to receive stories like this one in your inbox.

He vowed to ‘protect the unborn.’ Now he’s blocking a bill to expand Medicaid for Wisconsin’s new moms. is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

Wisconsin Supreme Court candidate Brad Schimel speaks with reporters after an event Feb. 26. (Henry Redman | Wisconsin Examiner)

Former state Attorney General and conservative state Supreme Court candidate Brad Schimel has been appointed as the interim U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Wisconsin. 

Schimel, who was also previously a Waukesha County Circuit Court judge and the Waukesha County district attorney, will now be the highest ranking federal prosecutor in the district that covers the eastern part of the state, including Milwaukee. 

Usually, U.S. attorneys are first recommended for the office by the two U.S. senators in a state and then nominated by the president before being confirmed by the Senate. In Wisconsin, Sens. Tammy Baldwin and Ron Johnson operate a joint commission responsible for finding candidates. 

Schimel told the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel that the commission was unable to reach a consensus for the job — which has been empty since February when former U.S. attorney Gregory Haanstad, a Biden appointee, left the role as part of the normal transition when a new party enters the White House. 

In a statement, Baldwin accused Trump of “blowing up Wisconsin’s bipartisan judicial nominating process” and “ignoring Wisconsinites of all stripes” by choosing Schimel, whom voters rejected twice, in his races for state attorney general and Supreme Court.

Once the commission failed to find a candidate, Schimel said he reached out to U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi, whom he knows from their time as state attorneys general. 

Interim U.S. Attorneys are allowed to hold that role for 120 days, though the Trump administration has tried in other states to extend that period. 

Schimel will now take over the office as it manages increased federal immigration enforcement happening in the state and heads into the highly political trial of Milwaukee County Judge Hannah Dugan, who federal prosecutors have alleged obstructed the work of federal agents attempting to apprehend a migrant in the county courthouse. Dugan’s trial is set for Dec. 15, Schimel told the Journal-Sentinel the prosecution team on the case will remain the same. 

Schimel ran for the state Supreme Court earlier this year in what became the most expensive judicial election in U.S. history — largely due to the involvement of Elon Musk, who was at the time a part of the Trump administration through his DOGE office. 

Schimel lost by more than 10 percentage points to Justice Susan Crawford. In his campaign, he touted his prosecutorial experience but was unable to separate himself from criticism that he was too closely tied to Trump and Musk.

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A Kwik Trip station in Mount Horeb, Wisconsin, was among the locations chosen for new charging stations in the first round of Wisconsin's build-out for its charging station network under the National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure program (NEVI), part of the bipartisan infrastructure law enacted during President Joe Biden's term in office. (Photo by Erik Gunn/Wisconsin Examiner)

A program to expand electric vehicle charging stations in Wisconsin is getting  a $14 million jolt with plans to build 26 more stations across the state.

Gov. Tony Evers and the Wisconsin Department of Transportation announced the expansion plan Monday.

The announcement recharges the state’s electrical vehicle charging network project, supported by the National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure program. NEVI, part of the 2021 bipartisan infrastructure law signed by  then-President Joe Biden, provides grants to states to build more charging stations.

“Transportation is evolving, and departments of transportation and states have to adapt with that evolution,” said John DesRivieres, WisDOT’s communications director. “As the market and the number of folks who are driving electric vehicles grows, EV infrastructure is needed.”

NEVI funding paused after President Donald Trump took office, and Wisconsin was one of 15 states along with the District of Columbia to sue the Trump administration in May for cutting off money for the program. A federal judge blocked the administration in June from defunding NEVI, and the Wisconsin DOT subsequently restarted its program.

The $14 million in federal funds for Wisconsin’s new round of charging stations will go to projects in communities throughout the state, from Superior in the northwest to East Troy in the southeast. They include 11 locations at Kwik Trip service stations, six locations at hotels or resorts, six locations at other service station brands and a handful of other businesses.

“My administration and I have prioritized ensuring our state’s infrastructure meets the needs of the 21st Century since Day One because expanding our clean energy and electric vehicle infrastructure helps create jobs and bolster our economy, and it’s good for our planet, too,” Evers said. “Thanks to our actions to get the Trump Administration to release this critical funding that they were illegally withholding, we are thrilled to see the NEVI program continue to support these goals and further move us toward the clean energy future Wisconsinites deserve.”

The transportation department chose projects based on their location, their potential for future development, and the business site’s hours. Extended hours were given preference to accommodate longer refueling times, according to WisDOT.

Wisconsin’s plan calls for charging stations along 15 major interstate, U.S. and state highway corridors that cross the state. A WisDOT EV charging station dashboard shows the locations for all planned chargers in the state.

With the round of grants announced Monday, Wisconsin has invested a total of $36.4 million in federal funds for 78 projects.

The first round, announced in May 2024, invested $22.4 million to build 52 stations. Of those, 11 are operational, 16 have been authorized for construction and the rest are in pre-construction phases.

A federal tax credit for electric vehicles that was included in the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act abruptly ended, effective Sept. 30, under the Republican tax-cut and spending mega-bill enacted in July.

“There are already 37,000 EVs on the road today, and we saw that number spike as people raced to purchase EVs before the federal tax credit expired,” said Alex Beld, communications director for Renew Wisconsin, a nonprofit that promotes policies and programs to expand solar, wind and hydropower along with building electrification, energy storage and electric vehicles.

“By expanding our network of charging stations, we hope to see that number continue to climb,” Beld said. “Through this transition away from gas-powered vehicles, we can reduce emissions and support our state’s economy.”

An analysis by SRI International published in 2023 for the Wisconsin Economic Development Corp. concluded that “there is a tremendous opportunity for Wisconsin to develop a globally competitive cluster centered on the manufacturing of EVs and EV-related equipment, which in turn can help revitalize Wisconsin’s automotive manufacturing industry and drive statewide economic development.”

Beld said that jobs related to clean energy grew four times faster than the rest of Wisconsin’s economy in 2024.

“If this funding had been clawed back permanently, I think we would have still seen progress,” Beld said. “It would have certainly been slower and would have likely cost the state jobs.”

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