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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.

Ryan Strnad, who promoted recycling when he announced earlier this summer that he would seek the Democratic nomination to run for governor, ended his campaign Tuesday. (Photo by Isiah Holmes/Wisconsin Examiner)

Democratic hopeful Ryan Strnad, an American Family Field beer vendor from Mukwonago, announced Tuesday he is ending his campaign for governor. 

“I want to thank every person who supported this campaign,” Strnad said in a statement. “I ran to give working class families a voice and to deliver results for communities that have long been overlooked.”

Strnad launched his campaign for the Democratic nomination in August, acknowledging  he was polarizing and a longshot for the position. He told the Examiner at the start of his campaign that his mother thought he should “run for something smaller.”

He launched his campaign saying that he would seek to improve conditions for workers by repealing Act 10 and getting rid of “right to work” — the law that lets workers who are represented by unions decline to pay union dues without giving up their right to the union’s representation. He said he supported police and allowing access to abortion in Wisconsin. 

Strnad said he is endorsing Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley in the crowded race and encouraged his supporters to support him as well. He said Crowley “is the candidate who can hit the ground running, fight for families, and begin delivering those results for Wisconsin starting on day one.”

Other Democratic hopefuls include Lt. Gov. Sarah Rodriguez, state Sen. Kelda Roys (D-Madison), state Rep. Francesca Hong (D-Madison) and former Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation CEO Missy Hughes.

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Democrats and pro-democracy organizations held a rally Oct. 16 to call for the creation of an independent redistricting commission. On Tuesday, the Wisconsin Supreme Court issued an order for two judicial panels to hear arguments against Wisconsin's current U.S. House maps. (Photo by Henry Redman/Wisconsin Examiner)

The Wisconsin Supreme Court on Tuesday ordered a pair of three-judge panels to hear arguments in two lawsuits challenging the state’s congressional maps. 

The challenges to the maps come as fights play out all over the country over the dividing lines of congressional districts ahead of next year’s midterm elections. After Texas legislators worked to draw Democratic seats out of existence at the behest of President Donald Trump and a number of other Republican-led states followed suit, California voters elected to temporarily undo their state’s independent redistricting commission and allow Democratic leaders to wipe out Republican-leaning seats. 

Similar efforts have followed to varying degrees of success in states including Arkansas, Indiana and Virginia. 

Wisconsin’s political maps have been at the center of its divided government for more than a decade, with the Supreme Court undoing the partisan gerrymander in the state Legislature two years ago. 

Since then, the focus has turned to Wisconsin’s congressional maps, where Republicans control six of the state’s eight districts. More than once, the Supreme Court has declined to hear cases that request the Court directly take up challenges to the congressional maps. 

A lobbying effort in the state is also ongoing to establish an independent, nonpartisan process for creating the state’s legislative and congressional maps. 

On Tuesday, the Court ruled that the challenges to the maps must follow a 2011 law, passed by the GOP-controlled Legislature and signed by Republican Gov. Scott Walker, which requires that challenges to the state’s congressional districts be heard by a panel of three circuit court judges. 

Republicans had argued that law shouldn’t apply in this case. In a 5-2 decision, in which the court’s four liberal justices were joined by conservative Justice Brian Hagedorn, the Court ruled the law applies and the panels should be created.

In the majority decision, the Court’s liberals also appointed the panels — of which all the members were appointed by Gov. Tony Evers or endorsed liberal Justice Susan Crawford in this spring’s election. 

Hagedorn dissented on the appointment of the panels, arguing the panel members should’ve been appointed randomly. 

“Given the nature of this case and the statute’s implicit call for geographic diversity and neutrality, a randomly-selected panel and venue would be a better way to fulfill the statutory mandate,” Hagedorn wrote. “To be clear, I am not suggesting the judicial panel will fail to do its job with integrity and impartiality. But this approach is an odd choice in the face of a statute so clearly designed to deter litigants from selecting their preferred venue and judge.” 

Justices Annette Ziegler and Rebecca Bradley dissented from the decision, arguing the majority chose the judges on the panel to further the goals of the Democratic party. 

In several previous lawsuits over political maps, Bradley and Ziegler have issued rulings that benefited the Republican party or further entrenched the partisan gerrymander that has allowed the Republican party to retain control of the Legislature for 15 years. 

“Hand picking circuit court judges to perform political maneuvering is unimaginable,” Ziegler wrote. “Yet, my colleagues persist and appear to do this, all in furtherance of delivering partisan, political advantage to the Democratic Party.” 

On Tuesday, Crawford and Justice Janet Protasiewicz also issued orders denying requests from Republican members of Congress and GOP voters that they recuse themselves from the redistricting cases. Since the two justices’ elections in recent years, the state’s Republicans have regularly accused the pair of making statements on the campaign trail that show pre-judgment of cases involving the state’s political maps. 

“The Congressmen’s recusal theories are overbroad, impracticable, and rife with unintended consequences,” Crawford wrote. “Individuals and organizations have the right to contribute to judicial campaigns and to express their beliefs about the effect judicial elections will have on issues of importance to them. Demanding that a justice recuse from a case because third parties who made campaign contributions have expressed their views on high-profile issues improperly implies that the judge had endorsed or adopted such views. This insinuation is inappropriate, particularly where the judge has expressly disclaimed such an endorsement, and undermines judicial impartiality. Further, it would chill protected speech and undermine this court’s central role of deciding cases of statewide importance.”

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WisconsinEye's coverage includes livestreams of committee hearings, floor sessions and press conferences. Rep. Alex Dallman speaks at a press conference in June that was livestreamed by WisconsinEye. (Photo by Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner)

WisconsinEye — the independent, nonprofit service that provides coverage of Wisconsin state government similar to C-Span — is set to halt its coverage on Dec. 15 without sufficient funding and is turning to lawmakers as well as donors for help.

The service’s coverage includes livestreams of committee hearings, floor sessions and press conferences. It also has an extensive video archive of more than 30,000 hours of state government proceedings, candidate interviews and other programming. 

“We operate on a shoestring budget, but we exceed our contractual agreement with the Legislature,” WisconsinEye President Jon Henkes said, noting that they are required to cover all floor sessions as well as a certain percentage of committee hearings. “For 18 years, we have far exceeded those expectations and requirements, so we’re doing a remarkable job.”

All of that could stop — live coverage eliminated and the video archive at risk of going offline — if the organization doesn’t raise $887,000, enough to cover its 2026 annual budget, it warns in a popup message on its website. In a November press release, the organization warned of this possibility.

“It’s clear to us that the current funding model is not working. We can continue to knock on doors. We continue to connect with potential donors,” Henkes said. “The fact is by the end of December, we will run out of money — and that is the reason why we sounded the alarm a week ago — if we cannot bridge this gap in the short term.”

Since starting in 2007, WisconsinEye has operated independently with the majority of its funding coming from charitable, nonprofit donations. Henkes said that the organization, similar to other nonprofits, has faced a tough fundraising environment since the COVID-19 pandemic. 

He said there has been “a very palpable donor skittishness” due to economic uncertainty and an increase in competitiveness as nonprofits that were more dormant during the pandemic have reemerged.

“We’re such a small nonprofit, relatively young in the world of philanthropy, we’re never first in line. We’re lucky to be third in line at times,” Henkes said.

“We are not grounded and deeply rooted in a local community meeting basic human needs,” he continued. “We’re not feeding the homeless, we’re not providing shelter, we’re not disaster relief… then we’re also faced with a recent trend, which is record-breaking political fundraising, so donors who are interested in the inputs and outcomes of government are more inclined to give to candidates, campaigns and causes, but yet they put WisconsinEye into that same general bucket of politics, and we’ve got to fight our way through that fog, because that’s not us. We don’t advocate. We’re the neutral ground.”

Henkes said WisconsinEye is continuing to make inquiries and raising $250,000 could get the organization through the first quarter of 2026.

As first reported by WisPolitics, the organization is also looking to the Legislature for assistance. 

The state has provided grant funding on a few occasions, including during the pandemic. In the 2025-27 state budget, Wisconsin lawmakers and Gov. Tony Evers extended WisconsinEye’s opportunity to access $10 million in state funds to build a permanent endowment fund until June 2026. 

The state had initially set aside the money in the previous budget, which required WisconsinEye to raise the entire $10 million in order to get the state-funded match. The organization wasn’t able to access the state’s portion because it didn’t meet the full amount.

In the new budget, the organization is able to collect the state portion on a dollar-by-dollar basis that matches WisconsinEye’s own fundraising.

Currently, $250,000 is available with no match requirement. That will cover expenses through Dec. 15.

The organization can receive the other $9.75 million if it raises an equal amount from private sources. Henkes said that those match dollars would not help with current operating costs, however.

“We could raise a half million dollars and the state would match that, but those dollars, by law, then would have to go into an endowment account — could not be spent for operating current budget needs, and could only be used as the income off of that investment is generated,” Henkes said. “Really, in a sense, we are competing against ourselves.” 

However, even still, Henkes says the organization has made “well qualified, well cultivated” donation requests totaling more than $9 million. None of those requests have led to donations.

“We’re trying to raise money for the operating budget. At the same time, we’ve got this wonderful opportunity to raise $10 million to create a $20 million endowment, which would solve the funding need once and for all,” Henkes said. “The priority right now is meeting month-to-month obligations and keeping the lights on, and not losing staff and having to rebuild if we do lose staff, so the pressure is on us right now.”

The organization is turning to Wisconsin lawmakers for some help with addressing its funding gaps by eliminating the match requirement or finding a way to release some of the state funding to support its operating budget.

In a letter to lawmakers, WisconsinEye identified three alternative routes they could take:

• Provide annual funding of $1 million dollars per year to fund and maintain WisconsinEye’s live and produced content; 
• Provide $1 million per year for each of the next three years, carrying WisconsinEye through the 2027-28 budget cycle; 
•  Provide $1 million for 2026 and have the next Legislature consider the 2027-28 WisconsinEye Budget Request. 

Under the third option, the 2027-28 session would not be broadcast until funds are appropriated.

Henkes said he and the rest of WisconsinEye’s management are hopeful that lawmakers will be open to helping. He said there are many champions and supporters of WisconsinEye in the Legislature, including Assembly Speaker Robin Vos (R-Rochester), Senate Majority Leader Devin LeMahieu (R-Oostburg), Assembly Minority Leader Greta Neubauer (D-Racine) and Senate Minority Leader Dianne Hesselbein (D-Middleton). He also noted that bipartisan effort led lawmakers and Gov. Tony Evers during the budget process to extend the availability of the $10 million. 

“This is not like we’re asking for new money. This money has already been earmarked for WisconsinEye. We’re simply asking for release of those funds, or part of those funds, in a way different from the endowment,” Henkes said. “The best case scenario would be if the Legislature would release a minimum of one year, so $1 million, essentially to carry us forward, and we can focus 100% over the next several months through June, to really hammer down and see if we can’t raise some endowment dollars. We think that’s a very viable option, and we’re hopeful.” 

Henkes said WisconsinEye provides accountability for the state government — providing a view of how decisions are made that affect every citizen and community. He said that is the message the fundraising team is taking to potential donors. 

“There’s this current cry out there right now — and a legitimate cry — to save our democracy, and that is a painting that is being colored by different voices,” Henkes said. “Some of those voices are saying we need election integrity. Those who are eligible to vote should have every opportunity, and we need to guard against those who don’t. We need to guard against gerrymandered legislative districts. We need to tone down the partisan rhetoric and all this negative campaign stuff.” 

WisconsinEye is able to meet those demands, he argued. 

“At the heart of all that is WisconsinEye and providing transparency and access to what really happens,” Henkes said. “What we are is a network where truth takes its rightful place. If you really want to know what happened, without partisan spin, without sensational headlines, then you come to WisconsinEye.”

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• Eve Galanter created the Wisconsin Civics Games as a way to get high school students civically engaged.
  
• The quiz-show style contest first held in 2019 has been coordinated by the Wisconsin Newspaper Association, and has grown annually. 
  
• The competition has gotten to be such a large endeavor that WNA leaders asked the Universities of Wisconsin to take the reins. 
  
• The contest fits with the university system’s strategic plan, and Galanter is excited to see how the games expand in the coming years. 

It’s been nearly a decade since Eve Galanter, a retired teacher and reporter in Madison, read the news story that led her to start a statewide competition to get high schoolers excited about government. 

Galanter, now 84, had just read a Wisconsin State Journal article headlined “All three school board incumbents running unopposed.”

“I looked at that and I thought, ‘Are they really doing such a fabulous job, or is no one interested? Does no one have any idea what might be involved in being on a school board or a city council or a village or town board?”

Running unopposed is a modern norm in some Wisconsin public offices. Across the state’s 10 most populous counties, less than a quarter of races for county board supervisor were contested in 2020, according to an analysis by the Wisconsin Policy Forum.

Studies show a growing number of people in the United States and across the world can’t answer basic questions about how the government works. U.S. schools cut back on civics education decades ago. In Wisconsin, students can graduate high school without taking a single course on the subject, though they must pass a civics test.

For two years Galanter mulled ways to get more Wisconsinites interested in running for local office. She settled on a quiz game where high school students across the state would test their knowledge of democracy and rights for the chance to win college scholarships.  

“If people understood how government worked, then surely they would be more interested in public service as a future occupation,” said Galanter, who served on the Madison City Council, ran former U.S. Sen. Herb Kohl’s Madison office and used to open all her public presentations with the same line: “I’m from the government, and I’m here to help.”

In 2018, she pitched her idea to the Wisconsin Newspaper Association, a membership organization of the state’s papers, figuring their publications could get the word out across the state.

The association agreed, and the Wisconsin Civics Games were born. Soon staff were making plans for regional playoffs and a state final at the Capitol where members of the winning team would each receive $2,000 in scholarships. 

Since then, teams from 76 high schools have competed, and interest continues to grow. This year’s regional playoffs, held in April, drew 205 students — twice as many as the first year. 

The competition has grown so much, in fact, that it’s too big for the five staff members of the Wisconsin Newspaper Association to handle. They’re now handing the reins to the Universities of Wisconsin, which has sponsored the event since its inception.

“It needs to continue to grow, but … it’s a really big project,” said Beth Bennett, executive director of the association. “We just needed to find a home for it where somebody could take it to the next level.” 

The games will be overseen by the university system’s Wisconsin Institute for Citizenship and Civil Dialogue, which will soon become the Office of Civic Engagement, said Universities of Wisconsin President Jay Rothman. Separately, that office will host civic education workshops for teachers across the state over the next three years, funded by a $1.1 million grant through the U.S. Department of Education’s American History & Civics Seminars program.

“This is consistent with our strategic plan focusing on freedom of expression, civil dialogue and really having students learn more about civics, which is important to our state and our nation,” Rothman said of taking the lead on the games. “So we are really excited about this opportunity.”

‘A republic, if you can keep it’

In preparation for the first Wisconsin Civics Games, Galanter pulled out a legal pad and began jotting questions. “What are the five freedoms identified in the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution?” “In 1982, Wisconsin was the first state to outlaw what type of discrimination?”

By the time she was done, she had over 100. 

Then she called school principals across the state to urge them to field teams. She contacted presidents of University of Wisconsin campuses to ask them to host playoffs. 

When students began registering, she looked up their local legislators to encourage them to congratulate the constituents and send them a Wisconsin Blue Book. She even wrote to Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor to ask her to speak at the finals.

“Her scheduler said that she was busy for the next several years,” Galanter said with a laugh, but the Justice agreed to send a letter congratulating the contestants.

“I strongly believe that the future of our nation depends upon your ability to practice democratic principles as thoughtful, informed citizens and public servants,” Sotomayor wrote. 

Sotomayor went on to recount the story of Benjamin Franklin leaving the Constitutional Convention in 1787, where he had just helped draft the new U.S. Constitution. 

“Benjamin Franklin was asked what sort of government he and his fellow framers had created. Dr. Franklin famously replied, ‘A republic, if you can keep it.’ By working to expand your civic knowledge in preparation for this tournament, you have begun the important undertaking of keeping our republic strong and vibrant,” Sotomayor wrote.

Galanter knew the games were a success when she overheard a comment from a participant at one of the regional playoffs that first year.

“One of the students said, ‘I’m going to go home and tell my parents about this,’” Galanter recalled. “I just thought that was the most wonderful thing: that they were so excited and wanted to share this opportunity.” 

The need for civics education persists today, though studies suggest Americans may be getting more knowledgeable. Each year, the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania asks Americans about the Constitution and the government. In 2022, just 47% could name all three branches of the U.S. government and a full 25% couldn’t name one. Three years later, 70% of Americans could name all three, and just 13% couldn’t name one.

New home, same games

Galanter recently filled a box with the materials and questions she’d prepared for past games and sent it off to Rothman.

“I am so excited that the Universities of Wisconsin will be taking the games to yet a higher level,” Galanter told Wisconsin Watch. She hopes the fact that the universities already have connections with high schools statewide will mean more students will hear about “the opportunities to undertake keeping our republic strong and vibrant.”

The behind-the-scenes shuffling won’t change things for contestants. Teams interested in the 2026 games can register for free through March 1 to compete and receive study materials. Regional playoffs will be held online April 8-9, and the finals, which are open to the public, will be held on May 1. For more information, visit wnanews.com/wisconsin-civics-games.

But while no changes are planned for the 2026 games, at least one could be coming in the future. When the games returned in 2022 after a two-year hiatus during the COVID-19 pandemic, the regional playoffs moved online. Rothman hopes they might eventually return to UW campuses. 

“I’m sure, as things go along, we will look for ways to continue to improve and upgrade the competition, but it’s a terrific competition today,” said Rothman, who attended the finals in May. 

“You see the engagement of those high school students, and you talk to them and you find out what their future plans are and the amount of work that they have put in, along with their faculty advisors,” Rothman said. 

“You can see it in those students’ eyes: They’re going to be active and engaged in their communities going forward, and that’s good for all of us.”

How a Madison woman’s question sparked a growing statewide civics contest 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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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.

President Donald Trump meets with New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani n the Oval Office on Nov. 21, 2025. (Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump and New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani turned around their heated criticism in remarks to the press after an Oval Office meeting Friday.

After months of attacking each other, Trump and Mamdani pledged to address the high cost of living for New Yorkers. The White House has tried to steer messaging toward affordability in recent weeks as Trump’s approval ratings on the economy have sunk. 

“Some of his ideas really are the same ideas I have,” Trump said. “You know the new word is affordability. Another word is just groceries. It’s sort of an old-fashioned word, but it’s very accurate. They’re coming down.”

Food prices have risen considerably in recent years. Groceries overall cost 3.1% more than they did a year ago, according to the government’s latest Consumer Price Index.

Mamdani campaigned on lowering the cost of living, including property tax reform, making buses free and floating the idea of city-run grocery stories.

The mayor-elect described the meeting as “a productive meeting focused on a place of shared admiration and love, which is New York City, and the need to deliver affordability to New Yorkers.”

“We spoke about rent, we spoke about groceries, we spoke about utilities, we spoke about the different ways in which people are being pushed out, and I appreciated the time with the president,” Mamdani said.

The pair fielded questions on housing costs, crime, whether either of them would retract their recent barbs and whether Trump would backtrack his threats to cut federal money to New York City.

“Well, I think if we didn’t get along, whether it’s cut off or just make it a little bit difficult, or not give as much, we want to see,” Trump said.

“We had a meeting today that actually surprised me. He wants to see no crime. He wants to see housing being built. He wants to see rents coming down. All things that I agree with. Now, we may disagree how we get there,” Trump added.

In response to a question about GOP Rep. Elise Stefanik, a Trump ally, calling Mamdani a “jihadist” as she eyes the New York gubernatorial seat, Trump said “she’s out there campaigning, and you say things sometimes in a campaign.”

“I met with a man who is a very rational person. I met with a man who wants to see, really wants to see, New York be great again,” Trump continued, adding “I’ll be cheering for him.”

Mamdani will be the city’s first Muslim mayor, as well as the youngest ever elected.

Mamdani sought meeting

Mamdani said he sought the meeting with Trump.

“My team reached out to the White House to set up this meeting because I will work with anyone to make life more affordable for the 8 and a half million people who call this city home,” Mamdani said in a press conference Thursday.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters Thursday the meeting “speaks to the fact that President Trump is willing to meet with anyone.”

“It speaks volumes that tomorrow we have a communist coming to the White House.”

Trump and congressional Republicans have repeatedly referred to the 34-year-old Mamdani as a “communist.” Mamdani, who ran on the Democratic ticket, identifies as a Democratic Socialist, an organization that claims roughly 85,000 members nationally. The ideology as a movement received a boost after the 2016 presidential run of U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, an independent who represents Vermont and caucuses with Democrats.

Mamdani beat out former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo this month by a 50.4% to 41% margin, according to the New York Times election coverage. Republican candidate Curtis Sliwa took just over 7% of the vote. Cuomo, who ran as an independent, resigned from office in 2021 after multiple women accused him of sexual harassment.

Trump endorsed Cuomo, seemingly reluctantly, on the eve of the election, in a post on his social media platform Truth Social.

“Whether you personally like Andrew Cuomo or not, you really have no choice,” he wrote. “You must vote for him, and hope he does a fantastic job. He is capable of it, Mamdani is not!”

Threat to pull funding

As Mamdani’s campaign gained momentum, Trump threatened to cut off billions in federal funding to New York City, Trump’s own home city.

Trump repeated the threat on election eve, writing on Truth Social that if Mamdani won, New York City would be a “total economic and social disaster” and that NYC should not expect any federal dollars “other than the very minimum as required.”

In Mamdani’s victory speech, he referred to Trump as a “despot.”

In July, Trump threatened to arrest Mamdani if the incoming mayor does not comply with the administration’s mass deportation campaign, including sending an influx of Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers to New York City.

 

Hemp plant at a farm in Minnesota. (Photo by Baylor Spears)

When Jacob Diener first heard that the status of hemp could be reviewed, he wasn’t too concerned. With his company, A Good Plug, the 32-year-old expected to continue producing small batch hemp products like gummies, brownies, and cheesecakes. 

“It seems around this time it happens every year that they want to re-assess the Farm Bill,” Diener told the Wisconsin Examiner. But 2025 was different and Diener, like others across the industry, was caught off guard when what amounted to a prohibition on his livelihood was discreetly attached to a deal to end the longest government shutdown in U.S. history. “It’s just weird and scary,” he said. 

Hemp businesses were allowed to flourish after the passage of the 2018 Farm Bill, which legalized the production and distribution of hemp products with no more than 0.3% THC on a dry weight basis. But under new rules that were included in the stopgap spending bill ending the federal government shutdown last week, products must contain no more than 0.4 milligrams of THC per container. 

Steve Hampton, owner of the Eau Claire-based company Steve’s Hemp, says that standard is biologically impossible to meet. “[The] hemp plant struggles to grow to meet that guideline before it’s even harvested,” Hampton told the Wisconsin Examiner. “So, we’re seeing upwards to 99% of the industry get wiped out from this.” 

THC is the primary psychoactive compound in the cannabis plant. Although hemp and the psychoactive variety commonly known as marijuana are the same plant species, they have different chemical compositions. Many cannabis varieties are cultivated with high levels of THC for markets in states where the plant has been legalized medical or recreational. 

Hemp, with far lower concentrations of THC, is mostly used for rope, paper and industrial products. It is also offered in states that do not have legal cannabis markets as an alternative — a source for  products containing delta-9 THC, THCa, THCp and other derivatives. 

The law reopening the government, however, effectively bans those products and gives the industry until next November to adapt or fizzle out. Erin Kelly, owner of the Wauwatosa-based hemp goods store Kelly’s Greens, told TMJ4 that even CBD products contain trace amounts of THC which make them effective medicine, and that the new rules would render that medicine ineffective. Wisconsin’s hemp industry is estimated to be valued at $700 million and accounts for at least 3,500 jobs, according to the Wisconsin State Journal. 

“Everybody’s frantic, you know, we’re all worried,” Hampton told the Examiner. Without an amendment to the new rules or legislative intervention, Hampton says the nation’s $28.4 billion hemp industry won’t survive, and that most of his own store’s inventory would be banned. 

More than just a cash crop

When he was a teenager in Fond du Lac, Diener was introduced to cannabis through his grandmother, who used it to manage her pain and chronic illnesses. He began using it to help with his stress and the early signs of Crohn’s disease he was experiencing

After years of working in the restaurant industry, Diener realized he wanted more out of life. “And so I started to get permission from my chef to start making candy in the kitchen behind the scenes, just learning the basics, but with the intentions that I wanted to make infused candy, gummy worms, stuff like that,” he said. “Stuff that I didn’t see on the market at the time.”

Hampton also became involved in hemp after experiencing the medicinal value of the plant. “I was a college student at the time,” he said, “and was looking for some relief with some back pain, some sore muscles from the gym. And my dad had actually bought me some CBD oil to test out for my birthday. And it was from a local farm up here in northern Wisconsin. That helped me a ton with what I needed it for.” 

Hampton realized that there were not many such products marketed to younger people like him. He grew his business online before opening a storefront during Small Business Week in 2021. Today Hampton, 29, owns and operates his business alongside his wife and five employees. People of all ages come into his store. “In-store, we have a lot of customers who come in just looking for relief,” he said. Many of the customers are seeking a remedy for anxiety, as well as “a large handful of customers that have chronic pain,” he said. 

Steve’s Hemp carries flowers, vapes, gummies, candies, topical ointments and other products. Diener, who specializes in culinary cannabis products, makes everything from Nerds-covered gummies (a popular product he calls “Stoney Bites”) to other sweets. Diener describes his customers as “such a community of oddballs and people who have unique personalities. And that’s what I’ve always hoped for, and that’s kind of what I come from and who I am a person. People authentic to themselves.” 

The cost of  prohibition

Before the federal ban on THC-derived hemp products was added to the bill to reopen the government, Republican lawmakers in Wisconsin were already working on bills to restrict or prohibit the industry in the state. Representatives Lindee Brill (R-Sheboygan Falls), Jim Piwowarczyk (R-Hubertus) and others introduced what they called “a common-sense corrective bill” to close the “loophole” that allowed what they called “dangerous, psychoactive THC-laced products to proliferate in Wisconsin.” 

The lawmakers pointed to health advisory warnings issued by federal agencies about the use of delta-9 THC, and issues with unregulated markets across the country. In Wisconsin, hemp products from CBD to delta-9, HHH, THCa, and others can either be found at dispensaries where employees are often knowledgeable about their products, or at gas stations and smoke shops where customers don’t receive information and guidance. Wisconsin lawmakers have raised an alarm about emergency room visits and poison center calls linked to delta-8 THC and similar compounds, as well as concerns that children could easily purchase the products. 

Hemp business owners say they often applaud common sense regulation. They also support fully legalizing cannabis in Wisconsin —  ending prohibition. To address concerns about health consequences and children’s access to cannabis, “what would really help that is regulation, not prohibition,” Hampton said.

Everything from clear packaging guidelines to age restrictions, lab testing and education about where the product comes from and what it does could be part of a legal regulatory structure, Hampton argued. Rather than allowing any gas station to carry hemp products, Hampton would like to see licensed facilities staffed by people who care about what they’re doing. “Our main goal with this business was to educate our customers, and know what’s in our product, and recommend what would work best for our customer,” he said. 

One 2024 study analyzing national poison data systems found that between 2021 and 2022, reports of exposure to delta-8 THC increased by 79%. The study also found that poison center calls for delta-8 were significantly lower in places where either delta-THC was banned, or where cannabis use was already legalized. “Consistent regulation of delta-THC across all states should be adopted,” the study recommended. Other poison center data shows that since 2022, exposures to delta-8 THC have plummeted, a trend which has continued into 2025. 

Prohibition also creates economic stagnation,  advocates contend. Tim Frey, of Ignite Dispensary and Cigar calls it “Wisconsin’s half a billion dollar loss.”

Frey lobbied against state Republican bills to restrict hemp, and he argues that hundreds of millions are essentially handed over to Michigan and Illinois every year when Wisconsinites make the sometimes difficult decision to travel across state lines to obtain cannabis. 

“Now that Minnesota is opening up, with the largest border, we’re probably going to be losing approximately up to $200 million,” Frey told Wisconsin Examiner. “And then if they came up with a small tax on hemp-derived stuff, that’s easily $100 million there, if not more, give or take. So it’s going to be around half a billion dollars that Wisconsin could use to give to law enforcement, get fentanyl off our streets, reduce property taxes, invest in roads” and other uses. 

Hampton fears that now customers will go to the black market or risk being pulled over after driving to a neighboring state. “I just don’t understand why they thought that prohibition would be the right answer,” he said. 

As some Wisconsin legislators are working to enact a new prohibition on hemp products, others are trying to legalize medicinal THC cannabis in the state. Earlier this year, two-thirds of registered voters polled by Marquette Law School said that cannabis should be legalized in Wisconsin. Meanwhile, Republican lawmakers have introduced what would be one of the country’s most restrictive medicinal cannabis programs. 

Frey is cautious of the medical-cannabis-only approach, however, “because it’s very hard to qualify with some ailments,” he told the Wisconsin Examiner. He added that if Wisconsin passed a restrictive medical cannabis program, then it would open the door for the state’s indigenous tribal communities, as sovereign nations, to open their own recreational programs. “So then we would be a recreational state without the control, or the revenue,” he said.  

Diener said that when conservative lawmakers talk about cannabis, they sound at least 10 years behind the times. “I think that right now there’s such extreme viewpoints on it that are outdated, and really just don’t line up with today’s market or today’s values with the plant,” he said.

Frey believes that it’s past time Wisconsin had a serious discussion about legalization. “Limit the licenses,” he declared. “Control this, tax it, get licenses out there to responsible people that are going to do things the right way —  that card people, that do truth-in labeling, that care about the quality of their products.”

In addition to strict regulation, Diener said parents can protect their children from hemp products instead of the government banning them. “You have the responsibility just the same as if you have a gun in the home to keep your things in a safe space that your children cannot access,” Diener said. “You wouldn’t have your alcohol bottle sitting just, like, within reach or in a cupboard that your kids know they can access. Even growing up as a teen, when my mom knew that I was starting to go to parties and stuff, she would start to hide her alcohol.” 

After the federal hemp laws were changed, Piwowarczyk, in a television interview, said unsympathetically of hemp business owners that “you guys took a gamble when you decided to open up your hemp business.” 

Hampton counters that lawmakers like Piwowarczyk should “open their eyes, and look around, and actually meet with the constituents of their districts” who are the consumers driving the industry. 

Uneasy months ahead

For now, hemp distributors and their allies have until next November to adjust to the new federal restrictions. Frey said Wisconsin could provide some protection for the industry by enacting its own regulations for hemp products, similar to the way states have legalized cannabis industries despite the ongoing federal prohibition. 

There are already state-level legislative responses in the works, he said. One bill, AB 503, would redefine the definition of hemp to prohibit THC-derived products. Another, AB 606, would add hemp to the responsibilities of the agency in the Department of Revenue that regulates alcohol. A bill authored by Senate Democrats, SB 644, would create a regulated framework and age limits for hemp products, though it lacks Republican co-sponsors. Sen. Patrick Testin (R-Stevens Point) is circulating a draft bill for co-sponsorship that also regulates hemp products. 

“That bill is probably the best, most common-sense written bill that I’ve seen,” Frey told the Wisconsin Examiner. While the Democratic bill would be promising, he said, he thinks it won’t gain Republican support. 

“It’s more crucial to protect this industry in Wisconsin than it is to craft the most perfect bill,” said Frey, adding that he thinks the hemp industry will get behind Testin’s bill “full force”. 

At the same time, however, Frey wonders whether the federal regulations will change by next November. He points out that the new law gives the industry a year to adapt instead of imposing a ban immediately. 

Frey thinks that if Wisconsin passes hemp regulations but the federal laws remain the same, then the hemp industry would risk losing its federal task deductions and also lose the ability to conduct interstate commerce. 

If there is no change to save the hemp industry, a cascade of effects will ripple out. Earlier this year, Hampton  opened a new manufacturing facility just down the street from the Steve’s Hemp storefront. In the middle of next year, he will likely have to close that as well, he said. 

Once the new law takes effect, “our hands are pretty much tied,” said Hampton. “My wife and I will have to find new jobs for each other, continue to make ends meet. And then those families that work for us — those employees that work for us — will have to do the same.” Until then, Diener said, “I am going to continue to serve the people who need us the most and work to continue growing this dream and keeping this dream alive.” 

Hampton and his employees “are obsessed and passionate about this industry,” Hampton said. “We started this industry with hopes to run a legal dispensary out of Wisconsin, and hopefully transition into that. Now that plan is crushed. And so we don’t know what we’re going to do. We’re just going to try to keep our hopes up, and try to fight as much as we can to keep [hemp] legal, and if that isn’t possible, get recreational cannabis pushed through the state of Wisconsin.”

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DPI announced this week that initial special education payments would reimburse schools for their special education costs at 35%. A hallway in La Follette High School in Madison. (Wisconsin Examiner photo)

Initial special education reimbursement payments to school districts this year will be about 35% of their costs — about 7 percentage points below the estimated rate approved in the state budget.

When the 2025-27 state budget was passed by the state Legislature and signed by Gov. Tony Evers in July, policymakers boasted that their investments would bring the special education reimbursement rate to a historic 42% in the first year of the budget and 45% in the second year. 

While school districts will still receive more aid for special education costs this year than in previous state budgets, it appears that the state funding set aside probably won’t be enough to reach the rate that was estimated when the budget was signed in July.

The Department of Public Instruction (DPI) announced in a bulletin on Monday that initial special education payments for November through March would reimburse schools 35% of their special education costs. While DPI uses a slightly lower rate to avoid overpayment and this is not the final reimbursement rate, Chris Bucher, DPI director of communications, said in an email that the agency has anticipated the rate falling below the estimate.

Special education reimbursement rates for public school districts can vary from the estimate because it is a sum certain allocation, meaning that payments come from a fixed pot of money.

During the budget process, public education advocates, DPI and Gov. Tony Evers called for that to change to a sum sufficient allocation, meaning that the amount of money provided by the state would be enough to meet the set reimbursement rate. Republican lawmakers rejected the request.

Bucher said having a lower reimbursement rate than what is estimated has been relatively typical with budgets, given that there is a fixed amount of state funding as well as a rising amount of unaided special education costs and a rising number of students with disabilities.

According to a Legislative Fiscal Bureau memo released Thursday, in 2024-25 the state had appropriated about $574 million to special education aid. When the 2023-25 state budget was passed, the appropriation was estimated to bring schools to a 33.3% rate in each year of the budget. In November 2024, DPI estimated a rate of 29.16%, and the final rate for that school year was 30.64%.

Based on cost increases in recent years, DPI projected costs would grow by 4% for its 2025-27 state budget request. It had estimated that aidable costs would be about $1.8 billion in 2025-26 and $1.9 billion in 2026-27. Those estimates were also used as Evers prepared his budget request and as the Legislature prepared the budget. 

According to the new memo, DPI now projects that aidable costs in 2024-25 increased by an estimated 9% — a rate more than twice the original projection when the 2025-27 budget was being drafted.

For the 2025-27 state budget, the DPI requested about $2 billion across the biennium to cover special education costs for school at a rate of 90% by the second year of the budget and to change the funding from “sum certain” to “sum sufficient.”

Gov. Tony Evers also requested the change from sum certain to sum sufficient, though he requested increasing it to a 60% rate by the second year. The Joint Committee on Finance denied those requests instead choosing to provide $207 million in the first year of the budget to cover an estimated 42% of costs and $297 million in the second year to cover costs at an estimated rate of 45%.

Advocates called attention to the reimbursement rate in statements this week, saying the funding system needs an overhaul.

Peggy Wirtz-Olsen, president of the Wisconsin Education Association Council, the state’s largest teachers union, blamed the rate on lawmakers, saying that they “turned their backs on our most vulnerable children, failing to deliver on promised special education funding and leaving our students without the supports they need to succeed in school.” 

“This shortfall will mean even more communities forced into holding school referendums in 2026 just to meet basic needs, causing uncertainty and hardship for students who deserve better from their elected leaders,” Wirtz-Olsen said in a statement. 

Wirtz-Olsen said lawmakers have been “caught lying about the scant resources they are providing.” 

“It’s time for these politicians to fix Wisconsin’s school funding formula and fulfill what the state Constitution requires,” she said. “Taxpayers have had enough of picking up the tab on our property taxes to make up for their refusal to fund schools. If they won’t take action for the students who most need help, educators and families will.” 

Beth Swedeen, executive director of the Wisconsin Board for People with Developmental Disabilities, called on the state to change the way it funds school districts. 

“It’s time to build a budget that is rooted in real costs and can provide budget certainty to schools and parents that the promises made by the legislature will translate into real dollars schools can use,” Swedeen said in a statement. “We should not be in this position cycle after cycle where students with disabilities and schools are undercut by accounting codes.”

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“Frankly, Robin Vos’ move to prevent us from circulating this petition and his refusal to bring this bill to the floor is pathetic," Assembly Minority Greta Neubauer (D-Racine). (Photo by Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner)

The Wisconsin Assembly met for its final floor session of 2025 Wednesday, where Democratic lawmakers sought to pass a bill that would extend Medicaid coverage for new mothers for one year after the birth of a child, though Republicans blocked it. Bills to encourage school district consolidation and make changes to elections laws passed.

Republicans block Democratic efforts to get a vote on postpartum Medicaid bill 

Wisconsin is one of two states in the U.S. that have not taken the federal government’s postpartum Medicaid expansion, and Democratic lawmakers hoped to begin the process of changing that during the floor session. 

The bill, which passed the Senate in April on a 32-1 vote, would allow eligible mothers to keep their Medicaid coverage for a year postpartum. Currently in Wisconsin, mothers only get 60 days of coverage if they don’t otherwise qualify for Medicaid.

Assembly Democrats planned to employ a rarely used Assembly rule to pull the bill out of committee and bring it up for a vote. Under the rule, if 50 lawmakers sign a petition, a bill can be brought to the floor. Democratic lawmakers hoped to have the chance to convince some of the Republican cosponsors of the bill to sign on.

Before that could come to fruition, however, the Assembly clerk notified Assembly Speaker Robin Vos (R-Rochester) of the plan, Assembly Minority Leader Greta Neubauer (D-Racine) told reporters. 

Republicans moved the bill from the Assembly Rules Committee, where it had sat since May, to the Assembly Organization Committee — triggering a rule that says a  withdrawal petition on the bill cannot be circulated for 21 days. 

“This is a great effort by the Speaker to prevent this important bill from getting a vote on the floor,” Neubauer said. 

Neubauer said she didn’t know why the clerk notified the Assembly Republican leaders.

“There had been some conversation with staff about the timeline for [the petition], but I’m not really sure why it happened the way it did,” Neubauer told reporters. She said that Rick Champagne, director of the Wisconsin Legislative Reference Bureau, told the lawmakers that notification should have happened when they turned the petition in with the 50 signatures, not prior to the petition circulating.

All 45 Democratic lawmakers are cosponsors of the bill as are over 20 Republicans, but the bill has been hung up in the Assembly due to opposition from Vos, who has said in the past that he doesn’t support expanding “welfare.” The bill only needs a simple majority of 50 votes to pass the Assembly.

Neubauer read out the names of the Republican cosponsors during the press conference. 

“These are legislators who believe that this bill should become law, so they say, but they have been bullied by their speaker into not pushing for a vote on this bill on the floor,” Neubauer said. “Frankly, Robin Vos’ move to prevent us from circulating this petition and his refusal to bring this bill to the floor is pathetic, and when moms in Wisconsin and their babies are put at risk, their health and well-being is put at risk, because they do not have adequate health care in the year after they have given birth, it will be Robin Vos’ fault.” 

The Republican lawmakers on the bill include Reps. Patrick Snyder (R-Weston), Jessie Rodriguez (R-Oak Creek), Scott Allen (R-Waukesha), Elijah Behnke (R-Town of Chase), Barbara Dittrich (R-Oconomowoc), Bob Donovan (R-Greenfield), Cindi Duchow (R-Delafield), Benjamin Franklin (R-De Pere), Rick Gundrum (R-Slinger), Nate Gustafson (R-Omro), Dean Kaufert (R-Neenah), Joel Kitchens (R-Sturgeon Bay), Rob Kreibich (R-New Richmond), Scott Krug (R-Rome), Tony Kurtz (R-Wonewoc), Dave Maxey (R-New Berlin), Paul Melotik (R-Grafton), Jeff Mursau (R-Crivitz), Adam Neylon (R-Pewaukee), Todd Novak (R-Dodgeville), Kevin Petersen (R-Waupaca), David Steffen (R-Howard), Rob Tusler (R-Harrison), Chuck Wichgers (Muskego), Rob Wittke (R-Caledonia), Rob Summerfield (R-Bloomer), Calvin T. Callahan (R-Tomahawk), Clint Moses (R-Menomonie) and Joy Goeben (R-Hobart). 

Democratic lawmakers also tried to introduce amendments to a bill on the floor that would have extended postpartum Medicaid coverage, but those were also blocked by Republicans.

“It shouldn’t be this hard to get Republicans to do the right thing. Wisconsin women deserve access to quality, affordable health care and that includes postpartum care,” Vining said before she was cut off by Speaker Pro Tempore Kevin Petersen who said she wasn’t on topic.

“This is a disgrace,” Vining yelled out.

School district consolidation 

Democratic and Republican lawmakers split over a package of bills that would encourage school districts to consolidate. Republican lawmakers argue the bills are necessary due to falling enrollment, which they say is the reason for school districts’ financial struggles. 

Rep. Amanda Nedweski (R-Pleasant Prairie) said at a press conference that the bills would address declining enrollment and the cycle of repeatedly going to referendum to raise money from local taxpayers that school districts are in. Schools in Wisconsin have seen a drop of about 53,000 students over a decade, from the 2013-14 to 2022-23 school years.

Of Wisconsin’s 421 school districts, about two-thirds are struggling with declining enrollment with preliminary numbers from the Department of Public Instruction showing that enrollment for public school districts in the 2025-26 school year fell by about 13,600 students. Total enrollment across Wisconsin school districts is about 759,800 this year. 

“Districts with declining enrollment receive less in state aid and to make up for that revenue loss. We’ve seen a growing cycle of constant referendums with varying degrees of success,” Nedweski said. “Wisconsin taxpayers are frustrated with our public school system… They are frustrated with districts continuously asking them to raise their own taxes, frustrated that their generous investments have not produced matching results.”

Democrats blamed Republicans for school districts having to go to referendum, noting that state aid has not kept pace with inflation in nearly two decades. They also said Wisconsinites have not been asking to close schools. Neubauer said Republicans were “proving how disconnected they are from our constituents.”

“Wisconsinites do not want to close school buildings, break up their communities, force their kids to ride on the bus for hours a day, or lose their local sports teams. Wisconsinites want us to fund our public schools,” Neubauer said. “Republicans’ push to close schools misses the mark completely, and Wisconsinites deserve better… Don’t close schools, fund them.”

According to the Department of Public Instruction, Wisconsin is spending the least, proportionally, in state revenue that it has ever spent on schools under the current funding formula. About 32.1% of state general purpose revenue goes to state general aid to schools, while that percentage used to be around 35%.

Rep. Angelina Cruz (R-Racine) noted during floor debate that many school districts lost state aid this year. Data from DPI for the 2025-26 school year shows that of 421 districts, 71% — or 301 districts — will receive less state aid this year compared to the prior year and 26% will receive more.

“For 15 years, Wisconsin has intentionally divested in our public schools while expanding privatization through voucher schemes,” Cruz said at a press conference, adding that Racine Unified School District has felt the loss of revenue acutely.

According to DPI data, about 15% of Racine’s revenue limit — or $43 million — goes to pay for voucher program participants.

“Since 2011, our community has gone to referendum three times —  in 2014, 2020 and 2025 — asking residents to raise their own property taxes to provide what the state has refused to fund,” Cruz said. “Even after those referendum paths, our district has been forced to close and consolidate schools including… the school where I grew up as a teacher. This is not about a lack of community commitment. It is about the state failing its constitutional obligation to provide free and as nearly uniform as practicable schools to children… Let me be clear, if there is money to close public schools, there is money to fund public schools.”

Rep. Joel Kitchens (R-Sturgeon Bay) rejected claims that the choice program is to blame.

“That’s a tiny little percentage of this,” Kitchens said. “It’s happening because of declining birth rates, of people choosing to have less kids, waiting long to have kids. I can’t imagine how anybody can look at our 421 school districts that we have right now and think that in 30 years, that’s going to be sustainable.”

Kitchens also emphasized that the bills are voluntary.

“Let’s trust our communities to work through these things and decide for what’s best for themselves,” Kitchens said. 

Republicans also rejected Democratic lawmakers’ insistence that the state needs to invest more money in its public schools. 

“[Democrats] want us to believe that if we simply spend more on K-12, people will flock to Wisconsin and increase enrollment,” Nedweski said. She compared Wisconsin to New York, which according to the New York Focus spends more per public school student than any other state. “Their outcomes are no better than ours, and they are losing students even faster than Wisconsin. As they elect more communist leaders like [New York City Mayor-elect] Zohran Mamdani, I suspect more New Yorkers will rapidly leave tax-and-spend Democratic Socialist policies. More spending is not a strategy, it’s denial.”

Nedweski said the bills are a “lifeline” for school districts that can use it and will encourage savings and “invest in increasing opportunities for students who may not otherwise have access to things like AP classes, world languages, advanced tech ed and specialized learning services.”

The six bills in the package:

• AB 644 would increase additional state aid to schools that consolidate in 2027, 2028 and 2029 to $2,000 per pupil in the first year. Under current law, school districts receive additional aid when they consolidate. For the first five years after consolidation, a consolidated school district gets $150 per pupil. In the sixth year, the aid drops to 50% of what the school district received in the fifth year and in the seventh year, the aid drops to 25% of the fifth year. It passed 53-44 with Rep. Shae Sortwell (R-Two Rivers) joining Democrats against the bill. 

• AB 645 would provide grants of up to $25,000 to groups of two or more school district boards for the costs of a feasibility study for school district consolidation or whole grade sharing agreements. It passed on a voice vote.
• AB 646 would launch a study of Wisconsin’s school districts, looking at current school district boundaries, potential school district consolidations, existing school district facilities, staffing levels and salary scales, the population of school-age children in each school district, and revenue limits and current overall spending. It passed 54-43 along party lines.

• AB 647 would create a four-year grant program for school districts that enter into a whole-grade sharing agreement, agreeing to educate students at one location. School districts would get up to $500 per pupil enrolled in a single grade. It passed 54-43 along party lines.

• AB 648 would help create new supplemental state aid for consolidated school districts to  address differences in school districts’ levies when they merge. The measure is meant to address concerns of higher property taxes for residents of low-levy districts when a consolidation takes place. It passed 54-43 along party lines.
•  AB 649 provides the funding for the bills, including $2.7 million for grants to schools that enter whole-grade sharing agreements, $3 million to provide state aid to offset levy limit differences and $250,000 for feasibility studies. It passed 54-43 along party lines.

Vote on online sports betting bill delayed

After being fast tracked through the public hearing process, a vote on a bipartisan bill that would legalize online sports betting in Wisconsin was postponed. 

The Wisconsin Constitution requires that gambling in the state must be managed by the state’s federally recognized Native American tribes. Following that requirement, sports betting has been allowed in Wisconsin since 2021, but bets have had to be made in person at tribal casinos. 

AB 601 would expand this to allow for online sports betting anywhere in the state by placing servers running the betting websites and apps to be housed on tribal land; this is known as a “hub and spoke” model. It was introduced in October and received hearings in the Assembly and Senate earlier this month. 

Assembly Majority Leader Tyler August (R-Walworth) said that he still would have had the votes on the bill if it had come up for a vote, but he had conversations with members of his caucus over the weekend that brought new issues to his attention. He would not provide details on what the concerns were, though he said they didn’t deal with issues of constitutionality.

“I’m not going to get into the details of the conversations that I’ve had with members,” August said. “We’re just working through some of that right now, and I’m confident that there’s no rush on this. It’s the right thing for the state, and I’m confident that we’ll get there.”

Neubauer said she planned to support the bill. 

“We know that our tribes in Wisconsin have the right to control gaming in our state, and right now, that’s not happening with online sports betting,” Neubauer said. “I do hope that we pass a bill that puts control of that industry back in their hands.”

The Assembly passed and concurred in a total of over 50 bills. Others include:  

• AB 596 and AB 597, which passed unanimously, would direct $1.9 million to be used for a state grant match program for veterans’ housing. A nonprofit group would need to be participating in the federal program, which currently provides about $82 per day per veteran housed to groups that offer wraparound supportive services to homeless veterans, to be eligible for a state matching funds of $25 per day per veteran. While no one voted against the bills, Democratic lawmakers expressed concerns that the bill would not fill the gaps that currently exist due to the closure of two Veterans Housing and Recovery Program sites earlier this year. 
• AB 602, which would instruct Evers to opt into a federal school choice program, passed 54-44 along party lines. 
• A pair of bills meant to help address students who are disruptive in class passed in 54-43 votes. AB 613 would require principals to provide written notification to parents every time a student is removed from a class and “the quality or quantity of instructional time provided to the pupils in the class is diminished.” AB 614 would add language into state law to say that teachers are allowed to maintain order in the teacher’s classroom, establish and enforce classroom rules, call 911 in an emergency, take immediate action if a pupil’s behavior is dangerous or disruptive and request assistance from school administrators during a disruptive or violent incident.
• AB 207, which would provide information about constitutional amendments to voters including their potential effects, passed on a voice vote.
• AB 312  passed on a voice vote. It would require absentee voting sites to be open for at least 20 hours during the period for voting absentee in-person.
• AB 385 passed in a 55-42 vote with Rep. Lori Palmeri (D-Oshkosh) joining Republicans in favor. The bill would prohibit a political committee, political party or conduit from accepting contributions that are made with a credit card online unless the contributor provides their credit card verification value (CVV) or code and the billing address associated with the card is located in the United States. Republican state lawmakers introduced the bill following efforts by Republicans and the Trump administration to target ActBlue — a Massachusetts-based platform that processes donations to Democratic campaigns.
• AB 617 passed 53-44. Rep. Paul Tittl joined Democrats voting against the bill. It would make a number of changes to elections law, including requiring that alternate absentee ballot sites must be in a building or facility constituting a fixed location and requiring absentee ballots with faulty or missing certifications be returned to voters if they are received seven days before the election. It is similar to a bill introduced last session, but it does not include a provision that would have allowed for Monday processing of absentee ballots. Rep. Scott Krug (R-Rome) said that he is speaking with the Assembly Elections Committee chair about potentially having an informational hearing on Monday processing.

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The agricultural industry is feeling the strain from President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown, and Republican lawmakers are certainly hearing about it back home.

What elected officials will do about farmers’ frustrations is much less clear — an indication that relief could be far away.

“Members are beginning to talk about it, but it doesn’t feel as though a particular solution is coming into focus yet, and clearly the White House is going to be the most important player in these conversations,” said Rep. Dusty Johnson, who sits on the House Agriculture Committee.

Ongoing Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids in agricultural centers, from California to Wisconsin to New York, have increased pressure on members of Congress to provide fixes for farmers who say they are facing labor shortages.

In Wisconsin, for example, a 2023 University of Wisconsin study found that 70% of labor on the state’s dairy farms was done by undocumented workers. Many of those farmers have turned to existing temporary visas — like the H-2A visa, a seasonal agricultural visa — to staff their farms. The Trump administration moved to strip back labor protections for farmers hiring workers on the visa earlier this year, in an effort to streamline H-2A visas.

But those visas are inherently limited for year-round work, like at dairy farms.

The program is also associated with high costs and a slow-moving bureaucracy. Democrats and immigrant advocates said the administration’s move put workers at risk of abuse and exploitation. Approximately 17% of agricultural workers have an H-2A visa.

There are currently several proposed reforms floating around the Capitol.

A bipartisan bill introduced in May by Reps. Dan Newhouse and Zoe Lofgren proposes streamlining the H-2A visa process and providing visas for year-round agricultural employers.

Wisconsin Republican Rep. Derrick Van Orden has proposed legislation that would allow undocumented farmworkers to gain legal employment status, as long as they haven’t committed a crime. Both immigrants and their employers would be required to acknowledge the worker’s status and pay a fine.

“We got to understand, at this point these people are our neighbors. Our kids go to school together, and they’re part of our communities,” Van Orden said. “I don’t want these people having to hide underneath a trailer when immigration shows up.”

Van Orden’s bill has no co-sponsors.

Lawmakers formed a task force in 2023 to consider possible reforms to the H-2A visa program and improve the industry’s reliable labor shortage.

The Republican-majority House Committee on Agriculture has readied a bill that largely follows task force recommendations — which include proposals to streamline administrative paperwork, expedite application review by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services and change the wage system — to overhaul the H-2A program.

Committee chair Rep. Glenn Thompson said the bill is awaiting “technical assistance” from the Department of Labor. That final step had been delayed by shutdown furloughs, he said. The Department of Labor did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

“We’re very close to introducing a very strong, I’ll call it a tripartisan bill, because that includes Republicans, Democrats and individuals from the industry,” Thompson said.

The bill draft is expected to be ready for public review by early January.

Rep. Salud Carbajal, a Democrat on the agriculture committee, however, says he hasn’t heard from his Republican colleagues or the White House on the issue.

“There’s been no communication from my colleagues on the other side and from this administration,” he said.

Republicans say the White House is engaged on the issue. Thompson told NOTUS that he’s been in “frequent discussions” with the White House and the Department of Agriculture about immigrant farmworkers.

Rep. Doug LaMalfa, who also sits on the House Agriculture Committee, said the White House is “in the mood here to engage” on farmworker visas.

“A while back, the president acknowledged in a speech that we got to up the game on having more and simpler processes for having farm workers available. I know we feel that in California with our specialty crops,” LaMalfa said.

Trump in June suggested that farms would get a pass in the deportation crackdown — a statement that senior administration officials seemed to disagree with.

Immigration advocates haven’t been happy with the administration’s visa policy changes thus far.

Alexandra Sossa, the chief executive officer with the Farmworker and Landscaper Advocacy Project, said that her organization is “not in favor” of the H-2A visa program, which it associates with “human labor trafficking and labor exploitation.”

And now, with the ongoing immigration raids, she says, farmworkers who are brought to the country under the visa program fear deportation, and those who are considering coming under the program are apprehensive about doing so.

“We are talking about workers who wake up at 4 a.m. in the morning and start working at 5 a.m. and end working around 9 to 10 p.m., Monday to Sunday. So that’s not easy to find, and it’s a difficult job to do. The consequences on the economy are reflected when you go to the grocery store to buy food,” Sossa said.

Democrats, meanwhile, are calling for larger immigration reform to address the dangerous working conditions that the H-2A program has led to, while also giving a bigger pathway to work.

“When people are exploited, we’ve got to crack down on that,” Rep. Jim McGovern, a Democrat on the House Committee on Agriculture, said about the concerns regarding H-2A visas. “But I just think the climate that’s been created by this administration makes it difficult for some Republicans to even want to talk about the issue.”

“I hear from farmers all the time about concerns that their labor force will disappear, or that they can’t count on workers,” McGovern said.

This story was produced and originally published by Wisconsin Watch and NOTUS, a publication from the nonprofit, nonpartisan Allbritton Journalism Institute.

Farmers are feeling the squeeze from Trump’s mass deportations. Congress isn’t close to a fix. is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

The return of the sandhill crane to Wisconsin is a conservation success, but now the state needs to manage the population and the crop damage the birds can cause. (Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources)

Republicans in the Wisconsin Legislature are trying once again to establish a sandhill crane hunting season in the state and once again the issue has caused a heated debate. 

At a public hearing on a bill to establish a crane hunt Wednesday morning, Democrats and conservation groups complained that the proposal was a solution in search of a problem while hunters repeatedly insisted the only way to manage the crane population is through a hunt. 

The bill is the product of a Joint Legislative Council study committee convened last year — which spent months trying to find a compromise solution that would satisfy farmers concerned about the more than $1.5 million in crop damage the birds cause each year, hunting groups dead set on establishing a hunt and bird conservationists worried a hunt could damage a population that the state spent decades working to reestablish. 

Sandhill cranes were once gone from the Wisconsin environment, but years of careful work have reestablished the birds. However, many of the wetland habitats that originally served as the bird’s nesting sites have been replaced with farmland and the birds like to eat the corn seeds out of those fields. 

The compromise proposal barely eked through the study committee — which was divided along similar lines as Wednesday’s hearing. 

In the version of the bill under consideration now, a number of proposals meant to help farmers with the crop damage problem have been stripped out, including a program that would subsidize part of the cost for pre-treating corn seeds with a chemical that makes them unappetizing to the birds. 

Dave Considine, a retired state representative whose former district includes the Baraboo-based International Crane Foundation, said at the hearing it was a “travesty” that aid for farmers has been left out of the bill. 

“I thought we had a really decent compromise [in the study committee]. Now I come here to testify and we have given farmers no help, nothing,” Considine said. “Matter of fact, most of the science in the committee meeting, spoke of the fact that if anything [a hunt] may increase damage.”

Plus, a number of anti-hunt advocates questioned how holding a hunt in the fall is meant to deter crop damage, which largely happens in the spring before the seeds have sprouted. 

A number of pro-hunt speakers at the hearing pointed to Alabama, Kentucky and Tennessee, as well as the Canadian provinces of Ontario and Quebec, which hold or are preparing to start sandhill crane hunting seasons. 

The difference, conservationists argued, is that the sandhill cranes that migrate through the eastern flyway (the region of North America of which Wisconsin is a part), use Wisconsin as their annual nesting ground. 

“Cranes are long-lived, and slow to breed one or two young annually,” said Ann Lacy, director of North American eastern flyway programs at the International Crane Foundation. “They do not have the same biology as ducks or geese; therefore, they cannot be managed similarly. They have unique biological considerations, especially in Wisconsin. What happens to these birds in Wisconsin has an effect on the Eastern Population as a whole.”

Despite all those concerns, hunting advocates refused to budge, even as several experts testified explaining the scientific reasons why a hunt won’t help the crop damage problem. For example, sandhill cranes mate for life and are extremely territorial but most of the damage in the state every year comes from single birds moving in larger flocks. If one or both members of a mated pair are killed in a hunt, that only opens up the pair’s territory to be taken over by an unruly group of unmated birds. 

“[We’ve] heard several times that hunting is not a tool that will help us against agricultural damage,” Todd Schaller, a member of the Wisconsin Waterfowl Association board said in response to the expert testimony. “I’m going to say, in my pragmatic thinking, that’s false.”

In 2021, Republicans in the Legislature proposed a similar bill to start a crane hunt. When announcing that bill, conservative rock musician Ted Nugent appeared at a press conference in which he called the birds “ribeyes in the sky.” On Wednesday, Tim Andryk of Wisconsin Ducks Unlimited argued people would be less squeamish about having a crane hunt in Wisconsin if they tasted the meat. 

“They’re just amazing when it comes to eating them,” Andryk said. “They’re a delicate, dark red meat … they’re such good eating that people that are opposed to hunting them, once they’ve eaten one, I don’t think they would be opposed to hunting.”

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Senate Chambers in the Wisconsin State Capitol. (Baylor Spears | Wisconsin Examiner)

During its last floor session of the year, the Wisconsin Senate passed bills Tuesday that would eliminate the annual $325 per pupil revenue increase for school districts, define abortion to not include treatment for ectopic pregnancies and other emergency medical conditions and block state and local dollars from being used on health care for people not legally in the country.

Senate Minority Leader Dianne Hesselbein (D-Middleton) said she is “dismayed” and “disgusted” that lawmakers were not taking up bills that focused on affordability. She said she is open to working across the aisle on the issue.

“Republicans do not care about affordability, and they have no plan about affordability either,” Hesselbein said. “There are no bills on this calendar that will lower prescription drug costs, increase access to health care, lower housing costs or make child care more affordable.”

Sen. Sarah Keyeski (D-Lodi) noted a few of the more than 60 bills lawmakers were scheduled to take up and questioned whether they addressed pressing matters. 

“Republicans, who determine the issues and bills we focus on, today are addressing things like exempting tobacco bars from the public smoking ban, delaying the implementation of commercial building code rules,” Keyeski said. “While these may be worthy issues to discuss, I would suggest that it does not meet the threshold of emergent need when families are facing dire economic circumstances. GOP legislators are essentially forcing us to sit idly by and watch Wisconsinites suffer.”

Senate Majority Leader Devin LeMahieu (R-Oostburg) said at a press conference that Democratic lawmakers were just “filibustering” and rejected the claim that Republicans weren’t working to help with affordability in the state.

“We passed a budget which had the second largest tax cut in state history to get money back into people’s pockets for utility bills, for retirees on fixed incomes, for middle class tax cuts. We’re doing everything we can to try to keep things affordable, ending the 400-year veto so taxes don’t go up in the next budget process,” LeMahieu said. “We are very concerned. It seems like Democrats can make these statements, but yet they’re introducing bills that let local governments increase their levies to tax, raise property taxes, and everything else, so it seems a little disingenuous.”

Republicans advance bill to eliminate 400-year veto

The Senate voted to pass a bill that would reverse Gov. Tony Evers’ partial veto that extended school revenue limit increases for 400 years. 

Lawmakers during the 2023-25 state budget gave school districts a $325 increase to schools’ revenue limits for the 2023-24 and 2024-25 school years. When the bill reached Evers’ desk, he exercised his partial veto power, striking two digits and a dash from the years to extend the annual increases through 2425, to lawmakers’ dismay. The Wisconsin Supreme Court ruled in April that the partial veto was within Evers’ powers.

In response, lawmakers introduced SB 389 to eliminate the $325 per pupil school revenue limit increase beginning in the 2027-28 school year. It passed along party lines. 

“We’re very concerned with the ruling of the state Supreme Court, but what we want to do is to clarify that the original intent of the Legislature in the budget was to increase school funding for the next budget period,” Sen. Chris Kapenga (R-Delafield), a coauthor of the bill, said. “He changed the bill in a way that no governor in the history of the state of Wisconsin has changed [a bill], and that’s very concerning for us because the Legislature is where the voice of a people is supposed to take place, and the governor is supposed to look at that and use his veto authority to determine where he stands on that, but he went far beyond what’s ever been done before.”

Democratic lawmakers defended the revenue limit increases, saying it is helping school districts that have struggled without inflationary increases in state funding.

“As fists clench over the 400-year veto, know this, it doesn’t even make up for inflation. What it does is, it provides a minimum increase for what people can expect,” Sen. Chris Larson (D-Milwaukee) said. “Unfortunately, with this vote, it is trying to go back and trying to actually make a horrible budget even worse by saying not only are we giving you zero dollars in general aid increase…, but more than that, we’re also going to bar the local school district from making up for that gap by being able to allow them to vote for an increased property tax.”

Larson said that the law could have been changed during the 2025-27 state budget process and that it is the state’s fault that property taxes are bearing the brunt of the increases.

“Everybody who voted for the budget, in essence, voted for the continuation of the $325 dollars per pupil increase to be passed on to local taxpayers to make up the difference,” Larson said. “If you had wanted to change it, there were two things that you could have done. One, you could have voted to have that ended and substituted with a different per-pupil increase. Second thing is, you could have had the state actually fund those increases using funds from the increasing general aid or using the vast surplus that we have, taking money from the agriculture manufacturing tax credit [or] anywhere else, and you could have actually funded our kids.”

Redefining abortion

The Senate also passed SB 553, which seeks to redefine abortion to exempt treatments for certain medical conditions including the removal of a dead embryo or fetus, an ectopic, anembryonic or molar pregnancy.

Bill coauthor Sen. Romaine Quinn (R-Birchwood) said during a press conference that he wanted to remove confusion from state statute, saying he is “pro-life” and hasn’t wanted to stop women from being able to receive the medical care that they need. 

“Women who need medical attention due to situations of stillbirths, miscarriages, ectopic pregnancies or other related issues, can and should receive the care that they need. That has always been the pro-life position,” Quinn said. “This bill before us today does not ban abortions. It does not restrict abortions, it simply clarifies our laws so that both women and medical providers can do what is necessary in those situations.”

Wisconsin has a web of abortion restrictions in place, including a 20-week ban, but confusion soared in the state after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. An 1849 law interpreted as a near-total abortion ban led health care providers afraid of felony charges to deny care to women who faced miscarriage and life-threatening pregnancy complications.

Recently, Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin, the state’s largest abortion provider, stopped providing abortion care in part due to federal changes.

Sen. Kelda Roys (D-Madison) said the lawmakers were trying to distance themselves from “the horrors that we are seeing in states that have banned and restricted abortion.” The Assembly coauthor, Rep. Joy Goeben (R-Hobart) said in September that she introduced it in part because Republicans are getting “killed” on the abortion issue during elections, although she said she favors a total abortion ban.

“Women being turned away from hospital emergency rooms repeatedly, being left to bleed out in Walmart parking lots. In fact, women are dying because they are denied timely abortion care that could easily have saved their lives, and their children left orphaned,” Roys said. “That’s the reality of what it looks like when you ban and restrict access to abortion in this country.”

Recent polling done by Marquette Law School found that abortion policy has declined as a “most important” issue among voters across all partisan groups in 2025 as compared to 2022, although 50% of respondents still said they were “very concerned” and 23% said they were “somewhat concerned” about the issue. 

Another recent poll found that 78% of voters support protecting health care professionals from criminal charges related to providing abortion care and 72% of voters favor allowing advanced health care providers like nurse practitioners and midwives to provide abortion care.

Roys said she was also concerned that the bill could push physicians to do emergency C-sections rather than terminate pregnancies as a way of addressing health issues. 

“Abortion is a necessary medical procedure that sometimes pregnant people need to save their lives, to preserve their health, to preserve their future fertility, and nothing in this bill is going to change that,” Roys said. “This bill will instead push physicians to force women to have unnecessary C-sections or to induce delivery rather than providing them with abortion. A C-section is much more dangerous. It is much more invasive. It’s major abdominal surgery that takes weeks or months to recover from, and it also impairs a woman’s future ability to be pregnant to have the labor and delivery that she wishes.”

The bill will now go to the Assembly for consideration. 

Restricting health care for immigrants

The Senate concurred 21-12 in AB 308, which would prohibit state, county, village, long-term care district and federal funds from being used to subsidize, reimburse or provide compensation for any health care services for a person not lawfully in the United States. Sens. Sarah Keyeski (D-Lodi), Brad Pfaff (D-Onalaska) and Jamie Wall (D-Green Bay) joined Republicans in favor. 

Bill coauthor Sen. Van Wanggaard (R-Racine) said the bill would ensure that Wisconsin doesn’t begin spending large amounts of money on people who aren’t legally in the country. He noted that other states, including Minnesota and California, have rescinded or paused providing coverage for people not legally in the U.S. 

“[Illinois] did an audit and found that they had spent nearly $900 million on health care benefits for illegal aliens, about a 200% increase, and then in Minnesota, the Legislature, by bipartisan vote, they voted to end the eligibility for illegal immigrants due to questions about their state’s financial well-being, and then, lastly, wonderful, California. Gov. [Gavin] Newsom recently froze enrollment of illegal immigrants into the state’s medical programs, citing California’s $12 billion budget deficit,” Wanggaard said at a press conference. “We’re looking at something that is really a no-brainer.”

Wisconsin already doesn’t allow immigrants without legal authorization to apply for the state’s Medicaid program, BadgerCare.

There are two programs available to those without legal status outlined on the Department of Health Services website: Medicaid Emergency Services, which provides short-term medical coverage for people who have a medical emergency and aren’t eligible for BadgerCare Plus or Wisconsin Medicaid, and BadgerCare Plus Prenatal Plan, which provides health care coverage for pregnant mothers who are not eligible for BadgerCare Plus due to immigration status or being in prison or jail.

Democratic lawmakers accused Republicans of seeking to make a political point and neglecting to address health care costs and accessibility.

“We are not in an affordability crisis because of less than 1% of BadgerCare funds that are used to save lives,” Sen. Dora Drake (D-Milwaukee) said. “This is cruel, it is a mean-spirited bill that is attempting to score cheap political points off of a group that’s already marginalized enough.” 

Advocates have warned that the bill could have a “chilling effect,” discouraging people from seeking care when they need it.

“Why is this sort of thing even coming up for discussion? Are we that heartless? Have we really lost our vision for this country?” Sen. Jeff Smith (D-Brunswick) asked. “These are all messaging to somebody’s base. Terrible people who are coming here to work in our factories, in our fields without the proper papers need to be punished… How heartless are we to make political points? Go ahead and make your god dang political points.”

The Assembly passed the bill in September, so it will now go to Evers for consideration. 

Other bills passed by the Senate Tuesday include:  

• AB 165, which would ban local governments from using tax money to create guaranteed income programs without a work or training requirement. The Assembly passed the bill along party lines in April and the Senate concurred in it 18-15 so it will now go to Evers for consideration. 
• AB 265, which would require judges to sentence people convicted of human trafficking to at least 10 years in prison, or at least 15 years for trafficking a child, was concurred in in an 18-15 party line vote. Democratic lawmakers expressed concerns about young victims of sex trafficking potentially facing mandatory minimums if they are forced to participate in trafficking, while Republicans brushed away those concerns. 
• SB 498 passed 17-16 with Sen. Steve Nass (R-Whitewater) joining Democrats against it. The bill would place specific freedom of speech requirements into state statute, including barring campuses from restricting speakers on campus, and implement new penalties, including a tuition freeze, if a campus violates any parts of the bill.
• SB 394 would make it a Class I felony to damage or graffiti structures, plaques, statues, paintings or other monuments on public property or that is maintained by the state or any county or municipality. It passed 18-15 along party lines.
• SB 11, which would require school districts to provide an opportunity for certain federally chartered youth membership organizations, including the Girl Scouts, to give students information about their organizations. It passed by a voice vote. The Assembly is scheduled to vote on the bill on Wednesday.
• SB 16, which would make the Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association subject to open records and open meeting laws, passed 22-11.

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A Republican proposal to require every Wisconsin municipality to offer early-voting hours has divided groups representing voters and election officials, with voters calling the proposal a net gain for voting access and some clerks calling the requirements onerous, especially for small municipalities.

The bill originally required every municipality to offer at least 20 hours of in-person early voting at the clerk’s office or an alternate site. It was amended Tuesday, based on clerk feedback, to allow for fewer required hours in some smaller municipalities. 

Municipalities that can’t hold their own early-voting hours would be able to offer it in a neighboring municipality or the county clerk’s office under the bill. A separate measure would provide $1.5 million to municipalities extending their early-voting hours — lowered from an originally proposed $10 million — but that would be available only for the 2025-26 fiscal year, while the early-voting requirements appear to be indefinite. The proposal would apply to the April and November elections.

Sen. Rachael Cabral-Guevara, a Republican, previously told Votebeat she wrote the bill after noticing the stark difference in early-voting availability between rural and urban municipalities. Cities such as Milwaukee and Madison offer multiple days for early voting, while some rural municipalities offer just a couple of hours, or do it by appointment only. 

Cabral-Guevara didn’t directly answer a follow-up question from Votebeat on Tuesday about whether the Senate would fund the measure, but said she’s hoping it passes. Rep. Scott Krug, a Republican who wrote the bill with her, told Votebeat he hopes the Senate will pass the measure since he lowered the amount of proposed funding.

“It’s only going to create more opportunities for voting,” said Jay Heck, executive director of Common Cause Wisconsin. “That for us is always the key. It should be funded for more than one year.”

The amended bill would set the minimum early-voting period at 10 hours in municipalities with fewer than 600 voters,15 hours in municipalities with between 600 and 799 voters and 20 hours in towns with 800 or more voters.

But some clerks said any hourly requirement would be too burdensome — and could have the unintended consequence of decreasing voter access. Because Wisconsin’s elections are run at the municipal level, a small number of clerks serving only a few dozen voters would still be required to adhere to the minimum hours.

Omro Town Clerk Dana Woods called this “too drastic of a measure” and said the requirements may lead to “honorable public servants” choosing to leave their jobs.

Most Wisconsin clerks work part time, with some scheduled only a few hours per week. Woods, for example, is scheduled to be in her office just seven hours per week and serves 1,800 registered voters.

Lisa Tollefson, the Rock County clerk, acknowledged that the proposal could increase voting across the state but said it still doesn’t make sense in the smallest municipalities, where voters typically choose to vote on Election Day.

Joe Ruth, government affairs director at the Wisconsin Towns Association, said at a public hearing for the proposal that clerks would likely stop offering early voting by appointment if they have to fulfill the proposed hourly requirement. And if they do so, he added, the voters who can’t come during the set hours would lose their opportunity to vote early in person.

Ruth didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment about whether the amendment alleviated his concerns.

In an Assembly Committee on Campaigns and Elections executive session, the five Republicans on the committee voted in favor and the two Democrats voted against it. It is scheduled for an Assembly floor vote on Wednesday.

Republican Rep. Dave Maxey, who chairs the Assembly elections committee, called the bill a great idea and questioned why people would vote against a funded mandate that would expand voting. He said there would be a mechanism to fund early voting in future years through the budget.

Rep. Lee Snodgrass, a Democrat, told Votebeat that she voted against the bill because it allows a county board to decide whether a municipality can hold early-voting hours at the county clerk’s office. She said county boards shouldn’t have oversight over elections. The latest tweak to the bill now requires consent from both the county board and clerk.

Alexander Shur is a reporter for Votebeat based in Wisconsin. Contact Shur at ashur@votebeat.org.

Votebeat is a nonprofit news organization reporting on voting access and election administration across the U.S. Sign up for Votebeat Wisconsin’s free newsletter here.

Wisconsin election officials skeptical of proposed early-voting mandate for municipalities 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.

State Rep. Matt Morgan, R-Richmond, surveys a map of proposed new congressional districts in Texas, as Democratic lawmakers, who left the state to deny Republicans the opportunity to redraw the state's 38 congressional districts, began returning to the Texas Capitol in Austin on Aug. 20, 2025. REUTERS/Sergio Flores

Texas cannot use its new congressional map for the 2026 election and will instead need to stick with the lines passed in 2021, a three-judge panel ruled Tuesday.

“The public perception of this case is that it’s about politics,” U.S. Judge Jeffrey Brown, a Trump appointee, wrote in the ruling. “To be sure, politics played a role in drawing the 2025 Map. But it was much more than just politics. Substantial evidence shows that Texas racially gerrymandered the 2025 Map.”

Brown ordered that the 2026 congressional election “shall proceed under the map that the Texas Legislature enacted in 2021.” The case will likely be appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, but time is short: Candidates only have until Dec. 8 to file for the upcoming election.

The decision is a major blow for Republicans, in Texas and nationally, who pushed through this unusual mid-decade redistricting at the behest of President Donald Trump. They were hoping the new map would yield control of 30 of the state’s 38 congressional districts — up from the 25 they currently hold — and help protect the narrow GOP majority in the U.S. House.

The map cleared the GOP-controlled Legislature in August and was quickly signed into law by Gov. Greg Abbott. Several advocacy groups sued over the new district lines, saying lawmakers intentionally diluted the voting power of Black and Hispanic Texans and drew racially gerrymandered maps. Over the course of a nine-day hearing in El Paso earlier this month, they aimed to convince the judges that it was in voters’ best interest to shelve the new map until a full trial could be held.

It was not immediately clear if the state still has a legal path to restoring the new map in time for 2026. Unlike most federal lawsuits, which are heard by a single district judge and then appealed to a circuit court, voting rights lawsuits are initially heard by two district judges and one circuit judge, and their ruling can only be appealed directly to the U.S. Supreme Court.

The decision comes 10 days into the monthlong period when candidates can sign up for the March primary. The filing deadline is Dec. 8.

This is just the opening gambit in what promises to be a yearslong legal battle over Texas’ congressional map. A lawsuit over the state’s 2021 redistricting — including its state legislative and education board seats — went to trial earlier this summer and remains pending before the same three-judge panel. The judges have indicated they may want to see how the U.S. Supreme Court rules on a major voting rights case before issuing their full ruling on Texas’ maps.

But for Trump, and many of his Republican supporters in Texas, the short-term goal of having this map for the 2026 election was as important as the long game.

“I’m convinced that if Texas does not take this action, there is an extreme risk that [the] Republican majority will be lost,” Sen. Phil King, R-Weatherford, said on the floor of the state Senate before the new map passed. “If it does, the next two years after the midterm, there will be nothing but inquisitions and impeachments and humiliation for our country.”

This article first appeared on The Texas Tribune, a States Newsroom partner

Lt. Gov. Sara Rodriguez speaks during a Wisconsin Technology Council forum featuring Democratic and Republican hopefuls in the 2026 governor's race Nov. 6, 2025. (Photo by Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner)

The longest ever federal government shutdown that ended last week revolved around a top issue for Lt. Gov. Sara Rodriguez as she campaigns to be Wisconsin’s next governor: health and health care.

A registered nurse by training and former official at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Rodriguez has been deeply involved in health care policy, first in her single term as a member of the Wisconsin Assembly and then, since 2023, as the No. 2 official in the state’s executive branch.

And, she says, it motivated her to declare her intention to succeed Gov. Tony Evers after Evers decided to stand down from the 2026 election.

“One of the reasons why I wanted to run is to make sure that we have somebody in a leadership position that, No. 1, understands health care, and No. 2, really gets how unaffordable and broken it is,” Rodriguez told the Wisconsin Examiner in an interview Monday.

She also sees a shift in the federal government away from established public health principles, forcing states to take the lead on setting public health standards. In the governor’s office, she said, her professional background would equip her to tackle  those issues.

As  a state representative, Rodriguez proposed a bill in the 2021-22 legislative term to accept the expansion of Medicaid — BadgerCare in Wisconsin — through the Affordable Care Act. Expansion would allow the state to enroll people with incomes between 100% and 138% of the federal poverty guidelines in Medicaid, with the federal government paying 90% of the additional cost.

When the ACA took effect, Gov. Scott Walker was in office and refused throughout his two terms as governor to accept the federal support and expand the program.

Evers defeated Walker in 2018 and promised to accept the federal expansion, but in the lame-duck session before he was sworn in, the Republican majority in the Legislature passed a bill that Walker signed, requiring the Legislature’s approval for expansion.

Since then, repeated attempts by Democrats to expand Medicaid, including the bill Rodriguez authored four years ago, have failed with Republican majorities in both houses of the Legislature.

Another form of Medicaid expansion — covering mothers for a year after they give birth — has the support of bipartisan majorities in the Senate and the Assembly, but Assembly Speaker Robin Vos (R-Rochester) has opposed bringing it to the floor. 

“We are one of two states that have not done that — us and Arkansas,” Rodriguez said. “And I think Arkansas may be working on it. So we may be the only one left at the end of the day.”

Rodriguez’s political career started with her Assembly race in 2020, flipping a Republican seat in the Milwaukee suburbs. She followed that with her race for lieutenant governor in 2022 and now her  campaign for the Democratic nomination to run for governor in 2026.

Throughout her political life, she said, she has been supported by 314 Action, a political organizing group seeking to elect more scientists and people in science-related professions, including health care.

During the recent federal government shutdown, Democrats in the U.S. Senate insisted that any resolution to fund the government also extend federal subsidies for health insurance under the ACA. The expiration of those subsidies at the end of this year will cause health insurance premiums to double, on average, participants in the ACA marketplace. 

Ultimately, a handful of Democratic senators voted with the Republicans to advance a GOP-authored spending bill that ended the shutdown without addressing the looming health insurance cost spike.

But the issue won’t go away, Rodriguez said.

“We’re looking at a doubling of premiums,” she said. “A 60-year-old couple are looking $1,500 to $2,000 more a month to be able to pay for their health insurance. That is absolutely unaffordable for most Wisconsinites.”

The problem extends beyond just people who buy their insurance through the federal marketplace, she warned.

“The larger amount of people who are uninsured in the state, the higher our health care costs are going to get, because they’re going to wait, they’re going to delay care, they’re going to be sicker when they get into care, and it’s going to cost hospital systems more in terms of uncompensated care,” Rodriguez said.

“If people will go uninsured, it’s going to raise costs,” she added. “And continuing to talk about it, continuing to let people know how that works, is something that I’m uniquely equipped to do as a nurse, as somebody who’s worked within the health care system. And it’s one of the reasons why I’m running for governor.”

Rodriguez said she has seen the benefits that the ACA has brought in the last decade and a half.

Before it was in place, “people delayed care,” she said. “They came in sicker to my emergency department and it cost a whole lot more dollars to be able to treat them and they were out of work because they had to be treated within a hospital system as opposed to going to their regular doctor and being able to get the care that they needed and be able to take care of their diabetes, to take care of their hypertension. Those are the kind of things that the Affordable Care Act has allowed us to do.”

She said she’s heard from small business owners who were able to start a business because they could get health insurance thanks to the ACA.

“Do we need to fix it? Absolutely. Do we need to get it better? Absolutely,” Rodriguez said. “But to get rid of it is going to have devastating effects on health care in Wisconsin.”

Rodriguez said she also brings the perspective of health and health care to other policy topics.

“The medicine we give you, the procedures that we do — it’s such a tiny fraction of how healthy we are,” she said.

Food, housing and “a good-paying job to put a roof over our heads and to pay for the food we eat and to pay for the medications we’re prescribed” are health issues, too, Rodriguez said. That’s why housing affordability, for example, is part of her platform, she said. 

“Tom Tiffany in the governor’s seat [is] not going to put a priority on lowering costs for Wisconsinites,” she said.

She also predicted that, if elected, Tiffany would sign laws restricting abortion in Wisconsin — “and that is going to be extraordinarily dangerous for people.”

Rodriguez views her science background as a strong selling point. “I think we want somebody who’s going to use data and science to make decisions,” she said.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr., President Donald Trump’s secretary of the federal Department of Health and Human Services, has been “using conspiracy theories as his underlying belief system, and that hurts real people,” Rodriguez said.

She cited surging measles cases in Wisconsin and nationally and the deaths of children in some states after the federal government weakened its support for vaccination.

“That hasn’t happened in a decade, and they’re continuing to feed this anti-science rhetoric that is going to harm our kids here in Wisconsin,” Rodriguez said. “I’ve been clear, I think RFK Jr. should resign. I don’t think he’s qualified for the job that he has and he’s actually a danger to public health across the country.”

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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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A Nov. 14 conference at UW-Madison debated the merits of bringing fusion voting back to Wisconsin (Henry Redman | Wisconsin Examiner)

Dozens of political scientists, election experts and members of the public gathered in a UW-Madison conference room Friday to debate whether returning to a 19th century election process could empower voters and help turn back the United States’ slide toward authoritarianism. 

The event centered around fusion voting, which is the practice of allowing more than one political party to nominate the same candidate on a ballot. Currently used in Connecticut and New York, the fusion voting system means the candidates on the left can appear on the ballot under both the Democratic Party and the smaller Working Families Party while candidates on the right appear for the Republican Party and the Conservative Party. 

In theory this can give the minor parties enough influence to push for policy changes. A minor party that can swing 4% of a vote total can move the needle. 

Throughout the 1800s, fusion voting was the norm across the country — the Republican Party itself was formed in Wisconsin as a fusion party by voters who felt that the major parties at the time, the Democrats and Whigs, weren’t doing enough to end slavery. Eventually, the two major parties worked together to get the practice banned in most of the country.

Often, minor fusion parties are further from the ideological center than the major parties, but a lawsuit is currently pending in Wisconsin from a group called United Wisconsin aiming to create a fusion party that connects moderate voters who don’t feel like they’re represented by the modern Democrats or Republicans. The effort is being helmed by former state Senate Majority Leader Dale Schultz and former Dane County Sheriff Dave Mahoney. The group is represented in the lawsuit by the voting rights focused firm Law Forward. 

Lawsuits to reinstate fusion voting are also pending in New Jersey and Kansas. 

Lilliana Mason, a political science professor at Johns Hopkins University, said during the conference that the two party system and primary election process have polarized the country’s politics and made our’ “sense of winning or losing” more “existential.”

Looming over the discussions, but without being explicitly mentioned very often, was the Trump administration’s anti-democratic actions — including denying the outcome of the 2020 election, supporting the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection and pardoning Wisconsin’s fake electors —  and the threat of authoritarianism. The debate Friday was often an exchange over how fusion voting fits into broader systemic reforms and if it can be used in tandem with proposals including proportional representation, multi-member congressional districts, ranked choice voting, gerrymandering prohibitions, filibuster reform and others. 

“It makes it possible for people who want to organize and who want to create and claim their own political power, to do so in an effective way,” Beau Tremitiere, an attorney from the non-profit Protect Democracy, said. They’re exactly right. “People are deeply dissatisfied with the system. There’s a lot of energy to do something better and fusion makes that easier.”

Fusion advocates said the system allows politics to be more dynamic. People’s political beliefs don’t always fit neatly in a party system that encourages big tents and the necessity of coalition management in those big tents means that parties aren’t encouraged to distance themselves from their most extreme members. 

“Politics is a complex, dynamic system that is always changing,” said Lee Drutman, who studies political reform at the think tank New America. “And the key is, how do you keep it from spiraling out of control? How do you keep it from a self-reinforcing tumult? And if you have a party system problem, which we do, you need a party system solution.”

But several speakers at the conference also laid out the limits and downsides of fusion voting. It’s not a major structural reform. Fusion parties are usually further from the ideological center, so if the goal is a more moderate politics, it’s not clear fusion will deliver that. Members of the Green Party expressed concern that fusion enables a patronage system of political favor trading. 

Overall though, the conference often returned to the idea that the country is in a democracy crisis and experimentation is a good thing in the effort to turn it around. 

“I’m supportive of experimentation,” Derek Muller, a law professor at Notre Dame, said. “It seems to me, we should see more real world experiments.”

Schultz, who was in the Legislature from 1983 to 2015, said he’s trying to establish a fusion party in Wisconsin to get more “humanity” in the state’s politics. 

“Why fusion voting? Why does it matter? Because of agency, the fact that suddenly people get a chance to sit at the table, to be a part of the discussions that matter to them,” he said. “Yes, fusion voting is not the be- and end-all political reform, but it is, in my opinion, an essential part of our future if we’re going to get back to having a healthy democracy.”

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