A measure passed by the U.S. House Ways and Means Committee allows individual taxpayers such as waiters and waitresses to deduct qualifying tips earned throughout the year, a tax break that would end in 2028. (Getty Photos)

WASHINGTON — House Republicans advanced the tax portion of the “one big, beautiful” reconciliation package early Wednesday, a step forward in permanently extending, and in some cases expanding, the 2017 tax law and temporarily handing President Donald Trump a win on campaign promises like no tax on tips.

The House Committee on Ways and Means voted along party lines to pass the measure, 26-19, after nearly 18 hours of debate that went through the night. Republicans rejected numerous amendments offered by Democrats, including protecting tax credits meant to combat climate change enacted under Democrats’ own 2022 budget reconciliation law, the Inflation Reduction Act.

The marathon debate occurred as the House Committee on Energy and Commerce debated overnight and into Wednesday afternoon over deep budget cuts, including some to Medicaid assistance for low-income individuals, to pay for the cost of tax provisions.

As of now, the massive tax package is estimated to add $3.8 trillion to the budget deficit over 10 years, according to the nonpartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.

If any temporary expansions in the bill are eventually made permanent, it would add roughly $5.3 trillion to the deficit over the next decade, according to the CRFB. The official congressional budget score has not yet been released.

Overall the bill is “a very, very big tax cut,” said Howard Gleckman, senior fellow at the Tax Policy Center, part of the left-leaning Brookings Institution and Urban Institute. “Much of the benefit will go to higher income people.”

Tax brackets, business breaks would continue

The bill permanently extends the underlying tax provisions passed in 2017 under the GOP-backed bill titled the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, which is set to expire in 2025.

This means:

• Individual taxpayers would remain in the same tax brackets that were lowered in 2017, and they would continue to see the doubled standard deduction — two of the most costly measures. Additionally, taxpayers will receive a boost up to $2,000 on the standard deduction through 2028.
• Individual brackets would remain at 10%, 12%, 22%, 24%, 32%, 35% and 37%, though the proposal would change how inflation adjustments are calculated, meaning income would be taxed less over time, except for those in the 37% bracket.
• The $2,000 child tax credit, per child, would remain permanent but temporarily increase to $2,500 through 2028. The refundable portion of the credit — meaning how much money taxpayers can get back — would be increased to $1,400, but the amount remains subject to income thresholds, meaning lower income households would receive less of a refund.
• The child tax credit would now only be accessible if the parent submits a Social Security number, as well as a spouse’s if legally married, in addition to the already required Social Security number of each qualifying child.
• On the business side, the corporate tax rate would stay at 21%.
• Business owners who run sole proprietorships, partnerships and S-corporations would see an increase, to 23% up from 20%, in the amount of business income they can deduct from their federal returns, otherwise referred to as the pass-through income deduction.
• Expensing for research and development would be restored through 2029, as well as deductions available to businesses for certain investments, including equipment purchases.

No tax on tips, but only for a few years

Trump promised on the campaign trail to eliminate taxes on tips, Social Security and car loan interest. House Republicans handed him a win in their bill, but only a limited one.

The bill allows individual taxpayers to deduct qualifying tips earned throughout the year, a tax break that would end in 2028. And like the new child tax credit requirement, taxpayers could only take advantage of the deduction by including a Social Security number on their federal tax return as well as their spouse’s SSN, if married.

No taxes on car loan interest would also go into effect through 2028, though taxpayers could only claim it for automobiles that received final assembly in the United States.

Senior citizens with incomes of $75,000 or less, or $150,000 for a married couple, would receive an extra $4,000 discount on taxable income, with the amount decreasing as incomes increase. The tax break would also expire in 2028. The bill does not specify an age for “seniors.”

Highly taxed states still unhappy 

House Republicans raised the cap on the amount of state and local taxes, or SALT, that can be deducted, but not enough to please both GOP and Democratic lawmakers who represent highly taxed states like New York and California.

Under the bill the committee advanced Wednesday morning, taxpayers could deduct up to $30,000 — three times the $10,000 ceiling in the 2017 law — from their federal taxable income. The full cap would apply to those making $400,000 or less in annual income but phases down for higher earners.

Raising the cap is costly and unpopular with lawmakers representing lower tax states.

Republican Reps. Mike Lawler and Nick LaLota of New York, and Rep. Young Kim of California, are threatening to vote no on the House floor if the cap isn’t raised. The House GOP cannot lose more than a handful of votes if all Republicans are present.

House Speaker Mike Johnson of Louisiana told reporters Wednesday he didn’t want to “handicap” negotiations by sharing details publicly and that he was talking to the SALT caucus until 1:30 a.m.

“But I will tell you I’m absolutely confident we’re going to be able to work out a compromise that everybody can live with,” he said.

A ‘tragic indifference’ for poor families

The committee’s party-line approval of the bill drew praise and criticism across organizations representing varying interests of Americans.

Kris Cox, director of federal tax policy for the left-leaning Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, wrote on social media that the temporary child tax credit bump does “zilch” for the roughly 17 million children whose parents do not earn enough money to receive a refund check from the credit.

“But it delivers an additional $500-per-kid to higher-income families,” Cox wrote.

The organization also slammed the bill for going “out of its way to take eligibility from 4.5 million US citizen kids who have at least one parent without an SSN.”

Kristen Crowell, executive director of the advocacy group Fair Share America, said in a statement Wednesday that the bill “shows a tragic indifference to the very real struggles of normal, working people.

“In order to save face in front of their constituents, Republicans are hiding behind misleading claims that everyone will see reductions in their taxes,” Crowell said.

The Natural Resources Defense Council, an environmental protection advocacy organization, estimates that phasing out and altogether eliminating clean energy tax credits would result in higher electricity bills in several states, including Ohio and Pennsylvania, according to an emailed statement.

‘Unshackle the economy’ for businesses

Groups representing businesses across the U.S. praised the House bill as a way to bolster investment and growth opportunities.

Former Republican Ways and Means Chair Kevin Brady of Texas released a statement Wednesday on behalf of the Alliance for Competitive Taxation praising the bill as a path to “unshackle the economy from burdensome taxes and unlock new growth.”

“The bill reported out by the House Ways and Means Committee is an encouraging step in that direction and, if implemented with its major pro-growth proposals intact, will help American businesses and workers compete at home and abroad,” Brady said.

The alliance hailed the extension of the 21% corporate tax rate and urged lawmakers to make permanent the research and development expensing, and capital investment deductions.

Kristen Silverberg, president and chief operating officer of the Business Roundtable, said her organization “applauds Chairman Smith and members of the House Ways and Means Committee for advancing a comprehensive, pro-growth tax bill,” referring to GOP Rep. Jason Smith of Missouri.

“Today’s vote is a critical step forward in securing a more competitive tax system for American businesses and workers,” said Silverberg, whose organization represents 200 CEOs of U.S.-based companies.

Several state coalitions have sued the Trump administration for their actions since the beginning of its second term. Wisconsin is part of 16 of those cases.

The post Wisconsin is now involved in 16 lawsuits against the Trump administration appeared first on WPR.

An electric car charges up at a charging station in New York. Wisconsin has joined 14 other states and the District of Columbia in a lawsuit against the Trump administration for cutting off federal funds that had been approved for states to build up their electric vehicle charging networks. (Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

A group of states, including Wisconsin, that were promised federal funds to establish electric vehicle charging station networks sued the Trump administration and Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy this week for cutting off the promised grants.

“The Trump Administration and Secretary Duffy are singlehandedly trying to block Wisconsin from receiving the investments we were promised,” Gov. Tony Evers said in a statement Thursday. “It’s bad for the people of Wisconsin, it’s bad for our infrastructure, it’s bad for our economy, and it’s illegal.”

The lawsuit alleges that President Donald Trump’s executive order blocking electric vehicle charging station grants was illegal.

The lawsuit was filed late Wednesday in federal court in the state of Washington, which is the lead plaintiff among the suit’s 15 states and the District of Columbia.

Trump’s order “Unleashing American Energy,” signed the day he was inaugurated, told federal agencies to pause the distribution of funds that were appropriated during the Biden administration as part of the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act or the 2021 bipartisan infrastructure law.

The order said the pause was “including but not limited to funds for electric vehicle charging stations made available through the National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure Formula Program.” The National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure Formula Program, or NEVI, is part of the 2021 infrastructure law.

Wisconsin has been approved for $62.65 million in funding under the program for 15 EV infrastructure projects that were held up after Trump’s order. The governor’s office said several projects were “located in the congressional district that now-Secretary Duffy used to represent in the U.S. Congress.”

Trump’s order stated that it was written to eliminate an “electric vehicle (EV) mandate.” No such mandate exists, the lawsuit points out.

“But in the name of eliminating this fictional mandate, the Executive Order directs the Federal Highway Administration … to usurp the legislative and spending powers reserved to Congress by withholding congressionally appropriated funding for electric vehicle (“EV”) charging infrastructure required by statute to be distributed to States,” the lawsuit states.

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President Donald Trump's budget request, released on May 2, 2025, proposes slashing $21 billion in unspent funds from the 2021 bipartisan infrastructure law for renewable energy, electric vehicle charging infrastructure and other efforts to cut climate-warming carbon dioxide emissions.  Shown are solar panels and wind turbines. (Photo by Marga Buschbell-Steeger/Getty Images)

President Donald Trump’s budget request for the next fiscal year proposes deep cuts to renewable energy programs and other climate spending as the administration seeks to shift U.S. energy production to encourage more fossil fuels and push the focus away from reducing climate change.

The budget proposes slashing $21 billion in unspent funds from the 2021 bipartisan infrastructure law for renewable energy, electric vehicle charging infrastructure and other efforts to cut climate-warming carbon dioxide emissions. The request also targets climate research spending and initiatives meant to promote diversity.

“President Trump is committed to eliminating funding for the globalist climate agenda while unleashing American energy production,” a White House fact sheet on climate and environment spending said. The budget “eliminates funding for the Green New Scam.”

The president’s budget request is a wish list for Congress, which controls federal spending, to consider. Even with both chambers of Congress controlled by Republicans who have shown an unusual willingness to follow Trump’s lead on a host of policies, it is best understood as a starting point for negotiations between the branches of government and a representation of the administration’s priorities.

A White House official speaking on background Friday, though, said the Trump administration is exploring ways to exert more control over the federal spending process, including by potentially refusing to spend funds appropriated by lawmakers.

The first budget request of Trump’s second term calls on Congress to cut non-defense accounts by $163 billion to $557 billion, while keeping defense funding flat at $893 billion.

‘Political talking points’

The proposal drew criticism for a focus on culture-war buzzwords, even from groups that are not always inclined to support environment and climate spending.

The request “is long on rhetoric and short on details,” Steve Ellis, president of the nonpartisan budget watchdog Taxpayers for Common Sense, said in a statement.

“This year’s version leans heavily on political talking points—taking aim at so-called ‘woke’ programs and the ‘Green New Scam,’ while proposing a massive Pentagon spending hike to pay for wasteful fantasies like the Golden Dome and diverting military resources to immigration enforcement missions.”

Renewable energy

The administration proposal would roll back funding Trump’s predecessor, Democrat Joe Biden, championed for renewable energy.

It would cancel more than $15 billion from the 2021 infrastructure law “purposed for unreliable renewable energy, removing carbon dioxide from the air, and other costly technologies that burden ratepayers and consumers,” according to the White House fact sheet.

It would also eliminate $6 billion for building electric vehicle charging infrastructure.

“EV chargers should be built just like gas stations: with private sector resources disciplined by market forces,” the fact sheet said.

And it would decrease spending on the Energy Department’s Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy program, which helps private-sector projects secure financing and conducts research on low-carbon energy sources, by $2.5 billion.

In a statement, Rep. Marcy Kaptur, the ranking Democrat on the House Appropriations subcommittee that writes the bill funding energy programs, slammed the cuts to renewable energy programs, saying they would cost consumers and hurt a growing domestic industry.

“The Trump Administration’s proposal to slash $20 Billion from the Department of Energy’s programs — particularly a devastating 74% cut to Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy — is shortsighted and dangerous,” the longtime Ohio lawmaker said. “By gutting clean energy investments, this budget threatens to raise energy prices for consumers, increase our reliance on foreign energy, and stifle American competitiveness. … We must defend the programs that power America’s future — cleaner, cheaper, and made right here at home.”

Diversity

Throughout the request, the administration targets programs out of line with Trump’s ideology on social issues, including those meant to promote diversity.

For energy and environment programs, that includes spending on environmental justice initiatives, which target pollution and climate effects in majority-minority and low-income communities, and organizations “that advance the radical climate agenda,” according to the fact sheet.

Research and grant funding for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration would be particularly hard hit by the proposal, which would terminate “a variety of climate-dominated research programs that are not aligned with Administration policy of ending ‘Green New Deal’ initiatives, saving taxpayers $1.3 billion.”

The budget also proposes eliminating $100 million from a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency fund dedicated to environmental justice. That funding “enabled a witch hunt against private industry” and “gave taxpayer dollars to political cronies who exploited the program’s racial preferencing policies to advance an anti-oil and gas crusade,” according to the White House.

National Park Service targeted

The budget also proposes cutting $900 million from National Park Service operations, which the administration said would come from defunding smaller sites while “supporting many national treasures.”

The document indicates the administration would prefer to leave responsibility for smaller sites currently under NPS management to states and refocus the federal government on the major parks that attract nationwide and international tourists.

“There is an urgent need to streamline staffing and transfer certain properties to State-level management to ensure the long-term health and sustainment of the National Park system,” according to a budget spreadsheet highlighting major line items in the request.

Despite laws in recent years to boost spending for maintenance at parks, the National Park Service faces a $23.3 billion deferred maintenance backlog, according to a July 2024 report from the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service.

The proposed NPS cut represents the largest single funding change – either positive or negative – of any line item under the Department of Interior, which would receive a funding decrease of more than $5 billion, about 30%, under the proposal.

Jennifer Shutt contributed to this report.

The Wisconsin Supreme Court chambers. (Henry Redman/Wisconsin Examiner)

An outside investigation found that last year’s leak of the Wisconsin Supreme Court’s order accepting a case challenging the state’s 1849 abortion law was “likely deliberate,” but was unable to determine its source. 

Last June, Wisconsin Watch published a story detailing the contents of the Court’s draft order agreeing to hear Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin v. Urmanski, the lawsuit challenging the validity of the abortion law. After the leak, all seven members of the Court condemned the order’s release, and the investigation began in August. 

According to a report released Wednesday, investigators interviewed 62 people and reviewed computer records in an effort to find the leak’s source. Despite the inconclusive findings, the report includes a number of recommendations for improving the Supreme Court’s security. 

The draft order was written on June 13 and Wisconsin Watch published its report on June 26. Investigators interviewed the 28 people who had “immediate access” to the draft. They included the seven justices, judicial assistants, law clerks and Supreme Court commissioners, as well as 18 people whose key card data shows they entered the justices’ chambers during that time period, interns and other office staff. 

Investigators requested computer usage data to determine what websites office staff visited during that time frame. The report states, however, that computer usage data from June 13 to 25 is missing. 

“The lack of complete website visitation logs for the period between June 13, 2024 and June 26, 2024 significantly hampered the ability to thoroughly examine the circumstances surrounding the leak,” the report states. “The issue underscores the importance of proper data management, retention, and verification procedures especially when such information is crucial for ongoing investigations.”

No evidence was found during the investigation that would show the leak was caused by an external breach of the Court’s network, according to the report. 

But the report also states that justices and Court staff often send confidential information to the justices’ personal email accounts and leave confidential documents unattended in printer trays. Unauthorized individuals have at times been able to access restricted floors in the Court’s Madison offices, the investigators also found. 

To improve the Supreme Court’s security, the report recommends a number of policy changes. Those include establishing better protocols for the handling of paper copies of confidential documents; stopping the justices’ use of personal email accounts; improving retention of computer history data; and using digital watermarks on confidential documents to ensure “the document remains traceable throughout its lifecycle.”

Audrey Skwierawski, the director of state courts, said in a statement that the Supreme Court would use the report’s recommendations to improve its processes.

“Integrity is the lifeblood of our court system, and we take threats to that integrity very seriously,” Skwierawski said. “Our responsibility now is to respond to and learn from the challenges identified through the investigation. This report gives us an important opportunity to strengthen the systems that support our courts and the public we serve.”

She added that her office is establishing a “Judicial Operations Integrity Task Force” to review the recommendations and proposing ways to prevent similar incidents in the future.

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U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi testifies before the Senate Judiciary Committee during her confirmation hearing on Jan. 15, 2025. (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — A handful of Democratic U.S. senators sounded the alarm Friday after federal agents arrested a Wisconsin judge on charges she obstructed immigration officials from detaining a man in her courtroom, saying the arrest marked a new low in President Donald Trump’s treatment of the law.

Some congressional Democrats framed the FBI’s Friday morning arrest of Milwaukee County Judge Hannah Dugan as a grave threat to the U.S. system of government, saying it was part of Trump’s effort to expand his own power and undermine the judiciary, with which the administration has become increasingly noncompliant.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer decried the judge’s arrest on social media late Friday afternoon as a “dangerous escalation.”

“There are no kings in America. Trump and (Attorney General Pam) Bondi can’t just decide to arrest sitting judges at will and threaten judges into submission,” wrote Schumer, a New York Democrat.

Trump administration officials, including Bondi, defended the arrest as legitimate. The FBI had been investigating Dugan after U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers sought to detain an immigrant without legal authority to be in the country who was in her courtroom on a misdemeanor charge.

Bondi wrote on social media just after noon Eastern, “I can confirm that our @FBI agents just arrested Hannah Dugan — a county judge in Milwaukee — for allegedly helping an illegal alien avoid an arrest by @ICEgov. No one is above the law.”

Democrats object

Democrats in Washington who sounded their objections to the arrest Friday argued it subverted separation of powers.

Sen. Dick Durbin, the top Democrat on the Senate Committee on the Judiciary, said Trump “continues to test the limits of our Constitution — this time by arresting a sitting judge for allegedly obstructing an immigration operation at the courthouse.”

In a statement, Durbin added that local courtrooms should be off limits to immigration enforcement agents.

“When immigration enforcement officials interfere with our criminal justice system, it undermines public safety, prevents victims and witnesses from coming forward, and often prevents those who committed crimes from facing justice in the United States,” Durbin wrote.

Sen. Tammy Baldwin, who represents Wisconsin, issued a statement shortly after news of the arrest, calling it “a gravely serious and drastic move.”

“In the United States we have a system of checks and balances and separation of powers for damn good reasons,” Baldwin said.

“The Trump Administration just arrested a sitting judge,” Arizona’s Ruben Gallego said in a social media post. “This is what happens in authoritarian countries. Stand up now — or lose the power to do so later. The administration must drop all charges and respect separation of powers.”

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, who also sits on the Judiciary Committee, was more careful in his criticism but said Trump is “constantly challenging” separation of powers laid out in the Constitution.

“I don’t know what happened in Wisconsin, but amplifying this arrest as the Attorney General and FBI Director have done looks like part of a larger intimidation campaign against judges,” the Rhode Island Democrat said in a statement.

In a since-deleted post on Bluesky, Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey accused Trump of “using immigrants to justify an all-out assault on our democracy and rule of law.

“After openly defying a Supreme Court order, calling for judges to be impeached, and bullying and belittling judges, today his FBI director took the extreme step of ordering a sitting judge arrested,” Booker wrote, referring to the high court’s order that the Trump administration “facilitate” the return of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, who is being held in El Salvador.

Spokespeople for Booker did not respond to a late Friday inquiry about why the post was taken down.

Trump officials back up arrest

Administration officials boasted online following the arrest.

FBI Director Kash Patel deleted a post on X in which he wrote Dugan  “intentionally misdirected federal agents away” from Eduardo Flores-Ruiz, a 30-year-old Mexican immigrant accused of misdemeanor battery.

Trump posted a screenshot on his social media site from the conservative activist account “Libs of TikTok” that featured a photo of Dugan and celebrated her arrest.

White House Border Czar Tom Homan said that Dugan crossed a line in her opposition to the administration’s agenda.

“People can choose to support illegal immigration and not assist ICE in removing criminal illegal aliens from our communities, BUT DON’T CROSS THAT LINE,” he wrote on X. “If you actively impede our enforcement efforts or if you knowingly harbor or conceal illegal aliens from ICE you will be prosecuted. These actions are felonies. More to come…”

Trump vs. courts

Trump and administration officials have publicly attacked judges online, including calling for the impeachment of District Judge James Boasberg for the District of Columbia after he ordered immigration officials to halt deportation flights to El Salvador.

The administration allowed the flights to reach Central America, and is now at risk of being held in criminal contempt of court as a legal fight plays out.

The president’s verbal attacks on Boasberg prompted a rare rebuke from U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts in mid-March.

And the administration has seemingly refused to do anything to facilitate the return of Maryland resident Abrego Garcia from a notorious El Salvador mega-prison, despite a Supreme Court order.

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There’s good news and bad news in a recent Wisconsin Court of Appeals decision upholding an open records judgment related to the ridiculous and ham-handed investigation into alleged 2020 election fraud headed by former Supreme Court Justice Michael Gableman.

On the good news side, the appellate court upheld a lower court ruling that the state of Wisconsin must pay $241,000 in legal fees because various officials — including Gableman and Assembly Speaker Robin Vos — flouted the public records law by failing to turn over legally requested information in a timely manner.

The bad news? There’s plenty. First, taxpayers — not the offending political characters — have to pony up the $241,000. And taxpayers clearly did nothing wrong.

Moreover, this case illustrates a near-fatal flaw in the state of Wisconsin’s otherwise exemplary Open Records Law. The statute is among the nation’s best, setting forth that Wisconsin considers openness the default position and holding that records requesters who are denied documents illegally may recover court costs and lawyers’ fees.

But think about that number again. Who has $241,000 to put on the line in an attempt to force the government to follow its own laws?

In this particular case, an established liberal organization called American Oversight fought to make the government abide by the law.

This same law, though, is supposed to empower every citizen to approach any level of government — the school board, the city council — and request access to public records, which then must be turned over except in relatively rare instances that fall within narrowly defined exemptions. That sounds better than it sometimes works in practice, as the Gableman case shows.

If authorities decide to be difficult and stonewall a records request, the citizen can hire a lawyer and go to court like American Oversight. And, in fairly short order, the citizen could wind up owing a lot of money.

That potential outcome is not a secret. Officials at all levels of government are well aware that prohibitive costs can lead to would-be records requesters relinquishing their rights rather than risking high legal fees. Any time that happens — and it does happen — a good law is turned upside down in a way that encourages public officials to just say no.

In the past, news media organizations frequently stood in for citizens and went up against public authorities bent on hiding secrets. That can cost a lot of money and, the state of the news business being what it is these days, fewer news organizations are willing to take on this risk. As a result, citizens’ rights to information are diminished.

An alternative does exist in the law. When records are refused, the law says requesters can turn to county district attorneys or the Wisconsin Attorney General’s Office. But again, in practice, that’s a weak option. Prosecutors are busy dealing with burglars and rapists and killers. Taking on their fellow government officials over a stack of paper is low on the priority list. It’s rare for a district attorney anywhere in the state to haul a city, county or state records custodian in front of a judge to enforce the law.

So too many officials believe they can get away with withholding public records. Or they can rest easy in the knowledge it will be taxpayers, not them, stuck with the bill even if they lose a challenge.

The Legislature could fix this, with a reform that sharpens enforcement teeth in the law. Instead, it’s the sound of silence that you hear coming from the Capitol, and every other government building.

Your Right to Know is a monthly column distributed by the Wisconsin Freedom of Information Council (wisfoic.org), a group dedicated to open government. Bill Barth is the former editor of the Beloit Daily News, where a version of this column originally appeared.

Your Right to Know: How cost is used to deny access to records 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.

Community and environmental justice advocates say the Biden administration is failing to deliver promised transparency and public engagement around its $7 billion clean hydrogen hub initiative.

“Engagement isn’t merely leading people into a process that’s going to happen with or without them,” said Tom Torres, hydrogen program director for the Ohio River Valley Institute, a nonprofit serving one of the regions where federally funded partnerships are trying to lay the groundwork for new local hydrogen economies. “It means meaningfully involving people in the decisions about the project.”

The U.S. Department of Energy announced funding in October 2023 for seven regional clean hydrogen hubs — clusters of interconnected projects meant to kickstart production of the fuel with little or no greenhouse gas emissions. Since then, the department has held online briefings and virtual listening sessions for each hub, but advocates say they are not getting the kind of information necessary to assess who will be impacted by the projects and how.

Torres and others say they want more than just dots on a map. They want to know how hydrogen will be produced, how it will be used, and how it will get to end users. For projects that depend on carbon capture, they want to know how and where the carbon will be captured, transported and stored. And once the specifics are known, they want a chance to have meaningful input on the final projects.

Spokespeople for the Department of Energy and regional hubs said the answers to those questions are still being worked out and that more engagement is on the horizon.  Advocates are increasingly frustrated and fear that community input will come too late to affect how the hubs are developed.

“It doesn’t make sense … on one hand to say there’s not enough on paper to tell the public about, but on the other hand there is enough to allocate almost $1 billion for these companies,” Torres said.

Are events just ‘checking a box’?

When burned as a fuel source, hydrogen does not emit carbon dioxide, but its production today almost always comes from fossil fuels. Some see a potential for hydrogen to replace natural gas in certain hard-to-electrify sectors such as industry or heavy duty transportation, but the benefits for addressing climate change hinge on whether it can be produced cleanly and at scale.

The Biden administration’s hydrogen hub program, part of the 2021 Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, aims to ramp up production of hydrogen made with low-carbon energy, including renewables, nuclear power, and fossil fuels paired with carbon capture. 

“It is literally like building the natural gas infrastructure that we have all over the place again for hydrogen,” said Shawn Bennett, energy and resilience manager for Battelle, the project manager for the Appalachian Regional Hydrogen Hub, ARCH2, which includes projects for Ohio, West Virginia and Pennsylvania. A majority of its projects will use steam methane reforming to make hydrogen from natural gas, along with carbon capture and storage. Other projects in the hub plan to make hydrogen from waste gases or from electrolysis, which uses energy to split water molecules. 

In May, dozens of groups urged the Department of Energy to suspend funding discussions for the ARCH2 project until the public receives detailed information beyond general maps and short project descriptions. On July 31 the Department of Energy formally committed the first $30 million of federal funding to ARCH2, with a total of up to $925 million to be spent over the next decade or so.

Last month, the Department of Energy committed up to $1 billion for the Midwest Alliance for Clean Hydrogen, MachH2, which spans Illinois, Indiana, Michigan and Iowa and plans to produce hydrogen from a mix of nuclear power, wind energy and natural gas. The department will hold a December 9 briefing on MachH2.

In response to the Energy News Network’s questions about community groups’ complaints about a lack of outreach, a Department of Energy spokesperson provided a statement saying it “has been actively engaged with these communities in support of the economic playbook” of the Biden-Harris administration.

The ARCH2 project held a community outreach session in West Virginia in November, and additional meetings will be held in Ohio and Pennsylvania early next year, Bennett said. Some community group members protested outside at the West Virginia session but then came inside for a good discussion, he added.

Torres said there was no general presentation at the West Virginia meeting, and company representatives were present for only a handful of the hub’s projects. Even then, project information was still sparse. 

“It wasn’t an opportunity for people’s voices to be heard,” he said. “What is the value of these events other than checking a box for these companies?”

Advocacy groups focusing on the MachH2 project said months went by without getting updates or details. Then last month, they got less than 24 hours’ notice for a briefing with general descriptions about the MachH2 hub projects.

During that session, representatives for the Department of Energy said a decision on the hub’s funding commitment would come soon, “probably next week sometime,” said Susan Thomas, the legislative and policy director and communications manager for Just Transition Northwest Indiana. Minutes after the November 20 session ended, the Department of Energy announced the MachH2 funding commitment. 

“Our jaws were on the table,” Thomas said.

Details remain to be worked out

Groups have been trying to get answers from the Department of Energy for more than a year, said Chris Chyung, executive director of Indiana Conservation Voters. In his view, the agency’s approach “is just flouting the law.” According to the Department of Energy’s website, engagement with communities and labor is a key principle required in hubs’ community benefits plans, which are part of hubs’ contractual obligations for funding.

Community groups learned in the November 20 briefing that the MachH2 community engagement would not address concerns related to any pipelines associated with the hub. Instead, those would be handled by a separate office within the Department of Energy. 

But a pipeline for northwestern Indiana “is absolutely part and parcel of [a] dirty hydrogen project that is part of MachH2,” and the community should get a say on it, said Lauren Piette, an attorney with Earthjustice, which does not consider hydrogen made with natural gas to be climate-friendly, even with carbon capture.

The Department of Energy spokesperson did not respond to the Energy News Network’s question about how community benefits for hub projects can fully be assessed if they don’t include consideration of issues and input related to necessary pipelines.

Representatives of the MachH2 and ARCH2 hubs who spoke at an Ohio Fuel Cell & Hydrogen Consortium program last month said they couldn’t practically engage in community outreach until funding commitments had been negotiated with the Department of Energy. Until then, it wasn’t certain whether each hub would move forward.

Also, as a practical matter, “there was no budget for these things,” Bennett said. Details for each hub’s projects are still being worked out, and ARCH2 is still trying to add additional project partners.

Even then, details for projects won’t be finalized until review under the National Environmental Policy Act, according to Neil Banwart, who is the chief integration officer for the MachH2 hub and also the managing director for hydrogen at Energy Systems Network. 

“It’s not a certainty that all of the projects will get built in the locations that we shared on a map,” he said.

Chyung said he felt the comments about funding were “a complete dodge on behalf of these extremely wealthy national corporations that have said since 2023 they were eager to get started on community outreach.”

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The other day, in my role as an advocate for open government, I heard from a Wisconsin resident who has waited more than five months for records he requested from a local law enforcement agency. He has gently prodded the agency several times, asking, “How much more time is my request going to take?” More than three months have passed since these queries have yielded a response.

Such long, frustrating wait times are not uncommon. Wisconsin’s Open Records Law allows any person to obtain any document in the possession of state and local government officials, with limited exceptions. But, unlike in some other states, there is no set time limit. Rather, the law simply directs record custodians to act “as soon as practicable and without delay.” 

What does that mean? Good question.

The state Justice Department has said that “10 working days is a reasonable time for an authority to respond” to simple records requests. But this is not binding advice. Moreover, no court has ever ruled that a particular wait time was excessive.

I tell people experiencing long wait times to practice their “Ps”: Be polite. Be persistent. And be pragmatic — offer to clarify or refine your request to make it more manageable. Sometimes, this helps move things along. Other times, it seems to make no difference.

That’s where Tom Kamenick comes in. He is the founder and president of the Wisconsin Transparency Project, the state’s only law firm devoted entirely to open government litigation. Since 2019, Kamenick has filed seven lawsuits alleging illegal delays in the processing of open records requests. He has lost only one case — in which the records were provided but had ended up in the requester’s spam folder. 

His other six cases ended in settlements favorable to the requestors: Records were provided, legal costs were covered and, in at least one case, the custodian apologized. The problem is that these settlement wins do not set a legal precedent that can be cited by others, although they do add credibility to threats of legal action.

Last year, Kamenick sued the Madison Police Department on my behalf after it told me to expect a wait time of 14 months to obtain records related to police discipline. The office hired additional staff and authorized overtime to reduce its backlog. Last month, Kamenick sued the Racine County Sheriff’s Department on behalf of a local resident, Mitchell Berman, over its long delays in producing records including video footage. “Delays like this are all too common,” Kamenick noted in a statement. 

Custodians often contend they lack the staff and resources to handle requests more promptly. Kamenick’s response is to say it isn’t a question of resources but priorities. One school district he sued had a $600 million budget and assigned a single staff position devoted to records requests, then allowed that position to go unfilled.  

Indeed, the records law expressly states that handling records requests “is declared to be an essential function of a representative government and an integral part of the routine duties of officers and employees whose responsibility it is to provide such information.” That means it should be more of a priority.

Eventually the courts should weigh in on this, in a precedent-setting case. The problem also cries out for a legislative solution. A revised law could still say “as soon as practicable and without delay,” but also set a time limit of, say, 30 days, for records to be provided, absent extraordinary circumstances. Perhaps the state could provide additional funding or guidance to help make this doable —  certainly there are worse ways it could spend its $4.6 billion budget surplus.

There is an old saying that justice delayed is justice denied; the same is true for records requests. If you don’t get the records until you can hardly remember what you wanted them for, the law is not working as intended. 

Your Right to Know is a monthly column distributed by the Wisconsin Freedom of Information Council (wisfoic.org), a group dedicated to open government. Bill Lueders, a writer in Madison and editor-at-large of The Progressive, is the group’s president.

Your Right to Know: Long waits undercut records law 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.