(The Center Square) – One of Wisconsin’s Republican congressmen says there is a reason why Vice President JD Vance chose Milwaukee for his speech on public benefit fraud.
“We’re seeing terrible fraud in the state of Wisconsin,“ Congressman Bryan Steil said during a Wednesday interview on News Talk 1130 WISN. “We just recently saw an individual convicted for stealing a million dollars in Medicaid fraud.”
In fact, federal prosecutors say at least five people have recently been convicted in a $15 million scheme involving prenatal care in Milwaukee.
Vance will speak about Medicaid and food stamp fraud in Milwaukee, making the case that the government can save billions of dollars by cracking down on scammers and fake service providers.
Steil said that, however, is unpopular with liberals because it wrecks their view of how public benefit programs are supposed to work.
“Democrats are measuring the programs simply by how much money we spend,” Steil explained. “As so, as conservatives, when we point out that the money they’re spending is not going to the place where they are telling — it’s going to waste, fraud, and abuse — they get really defensive, and really upset.”
Wisconsin is fighting the Trump Administration’s effort to fight fraud. Gov. Tony Evers has refused to allow the federal government to inspect Wisconsin’s food stamp rolls and Medicaid enrollment system.
The governor says he is worried about the personal data, such as social security numbers, that could be included in that data.
Steil said there’s a need to check state-based lists because, many times, that’s an easy way to flag fraud cases.
“One of the concerns we have is, are individuals double-dipping?” Steil added. “We know this occurs on occasion, particularly on the state line with Illinois or Minnesota, where an individual signs up for the program in both states. So, reviewing those rolls holistically, to make sure that individuals are not on the system in two states, is really important.”

(The Center Square) – A group of Sturtevant residents who live near Microsoft’s recently completed data center in Mount Pleasant have filed a class-action lawsuit against the company over what they call “excessive noise” from the data center.
The group is asking for compensatory damages, attorney’s fees and relief from the noise.
The Fairwater data center construction was part of $4.7 billion the company spent to build hyper-scale data centers in the state and it has $20.6 billion in total construction planned.
Microsoft is expected to be the largest beneficiary of a wide-ranging Wisconsin sales tax exemption on everything from construction materials to electricity that is estimated to lose the state $1.5 billion in initial foregone state sales tax from four data center projects, according to a new Legislative Audit Bureau report.
In addition, the state will lose $369 million annually once construction on the projects are complete.
Wisconsin’s Department of Revenue originally estimated the value of the incentives would be $8.5 million for the full multi-year construction of a facility and $735,000 recurring afterward.
The plaintiffs say that the noise from the data center has forced them to stay inside their homes and not enjoy the outdoors and prevented them from outdoor activities.
The lawsuit estimates that more than 1,000 individuals live within 1.5 miles of the data center and would be eligible to join the class action.
“Defendant intentionally, knowingly, recklessly, willfully, and/or negligently failed to properly construct, maintain, and/or operate the data center,” the lawsuit claims.
The lawsuit says that the company is aware of the noise issues but has failed to do anything about them.
Plaintiff Garret Ostergaard, who has worked for the Mount Pleasant Police Department, said in the lawsuit that he formerly worked third shift but had to move shifts due to the noise and light from the facility impacting his sleep.
“We hear a constant humming noise while trying to enjoy our outside patio/yard,” Plaintiffs Jason and Amanda Ingle wrote. “(It’s) very annoying. Since the data center construction less people hang outside in the neighborhood now, very sad to see.”

(The Center Square) – Milwaukee’s mayor says parents and young people must do better after a chaotic and violent Fourth of July weekend that resulted in two officers being injured.
Police say a shooting suspect hit an officer with a car while speeding away from a takeover along Water Street. That officer is expected to be okay, though police say they shot and wounded the speeding driver.
The second officer was hurt a few hours earlier during a chaotic scene along Brady Street. Investigators say it looks like someone fired a homemade firework into the street where the officer was walking.
“I saw some of those events and was made aware of them, and as I’ve said, everything begins at home,” Mayor Cavalier Johnson told reporters in Milwaukee. “I don’t know what’s going on in the heads, in the minds, of some of these folks out here misbehaving the way that they are. I’d imagine their parents have a lot of shame in the way that they’re behaving on the streets. I certainly do. It’s just sad.”
Johnson said it’s never okay to put police officers in danger.
Milwaukee has been dealing with violence and chaos along Water and Brady Streets for years. The two streets are part of the city’s busy tourist and bar area, and they have seen street takeovers or violent crowds in the past.
Earlier this year, Milwaukee’s city council voted to shut down the city’s food trucks at 10pm as a way to end some of the chaos along Water Street. The city passed a new ordinance, but that ordinance is on hold as a lawsuit works its way through the courts.
The mayor didn’t say whether the food truck rules would have done anything to stem the chaos over the holiday weekend, but he did say more tickets and arrests likely wouldn’t have helped.
“This is beyond a policing thing,” the mayor said. “I don’t want to put this at the feet of the police department. Those folks that go down there to cause problems, they make a decision to do that.”
Milwaukee Police say they arrested the shooting suspect who they say ran down an officer. There’s no word about an arrest or even a suspect in the firework explosion that left the second officer injured.

(The Center Square) – Republicans in Wisconsin are again asking for an investigation after Green Bay’s election clerk again mailed out duplicate ballots to some voters.
Green Bay’s clerk, Celestine Jeffreys, over the weekend said her office accidentally mailed two ballots to some voters in Green Bay.
“I regret the printing error occurred. I assure our voters that only one ballot per eligible voter will be tabulated. I encourage any voter with questions to contact our office directly,” she said in a statement.
It’s not clear just how many voters got two ballots. The city has not provided an official count. The clerk’s office said voters in wards 11A, 12A, 37A, 44, 45, 46, 47 and part of ward 43 may have received a duplicate ballot.
In all, Jefferys mailed nearly 5,000 ballots for the Aug. 11 primary.
This is the second time Jefferys has mailed some voters more than one ballot.
Before the election in April, Jefferys blamed a mail labeling error when her office mailed 152 voters duplicate ballots.
The Wisconsin Republican Party asked for an investigation then and is asking for an investigation now as well.
“Green Bay voters deserve reliable elections, not repeated failures that undermine trust,” WisGOP Communications Director Anika Rickard said in a statement. “WEC must hold the clerk accountable, investigate, and ensure these issues are fixed before November. One voter, one ballot. Wisconsin law demands nothing less.”
The Republicans want “an investigation into the initial errors and stronger safeguards for election integrity” from the Wisconsin Elections Commission.
Republican state Rep. Shae Sortwell, R-Two Rivers, went further.
“Just wondering when the complete incompetence of Green Bay municipal clerk to be able to properly run an election will result in the Mayor doing his job by asking the City Council to fire his appointee,” Sortwell said in a post on X Monday.
Jefferys has said voters are being told to send in just one ballot for the August election and has said that only one ballot will be counted.

(The Center Square) – Wisconsin’s Congressional reacted predictably to Tuesday’s rulings from the U.S. Supreme Court.
The high court ruled on cases involving birthright citizenship, boys playing in girls’ sports and campaign finances. None of Wisconsin’s members of Congress commented on the campaign finance ruling, and the state’s two Democrats were also silent about the girls’ sports case.
Instead, Madison Democrat Mark Pocan and Milwaukee Democrat Gwen Moore focused on the birthright citizenship ruling.
“The Supreme Court just rejected Trump’s limits to birthright citizenship. This right is clearly written in the 14th Amendment, and I’m glad the Supreme Court agreed,” Pocan wrote on X.
“The Trump administration tried to destroy the 14th Amendment and failed. While this is welcome news, it should have been an easy 9-0 decision,” Moore added on X. “It is a damning indictment of this Court that 3 MAGA justices believe Trump can overturn the Constitution by executive order.”
Wisconsin’s Republicans, as expected, decried the birthright ruling.
“Our Founders certainly never intended for the children of illegal aliens to automatically become citizens,” Green Bay-area Republican Tony Wied wrote. “This is the wrong decision and only incentivizes illegal immigration.”
Western Wisconsin Republican Derrick Van Orden echoed Wied’s comments.
“The 14th Amendment was enacted in the aftermath of Dread Scott to guarantee citizenship for freed slaves, not to establish automatic citizenship for individuals who are unlawfully present in the United States or temporarily here,” Van Orden said in a statement. “This ruling departs from that historical context and the original understanding.”
Van Orden also spoke about the Supreme Court’s ruling that said states can set their own rules for boys who want to play in girls’ sports.
“[This] Supreme Court ruling is a landmark victory for women and female athletes,” Van Orden added. “The court rightly recognized that states have authority to set clear standards that preserve women’s sports for female athletes. That framework protects competitive integrity and ensures that opportunities created by Title IX remain grounded in the original intent.”
Southeast Wisconsin Republican Scott Fitzgerald also weighed-in on the girls’ sports decision.
“Common sense won today,” Fitzgerald wrote on X. “The Supreme Court’s decision is a victory for women and girls across America. Women’s sports were created to ensure female athletes have a fair chance to compete, and that means keeping men out of women’s sports.”
The transgender sports ruling means little for Wisconsin after the Wisconsin Interscholastic Association updated its policy more than a year ago to ban boys from playing in girls sports.

(The Center Square) – Another Wisconsin group has filed a lawsuit against the state’s Department of Public Instruction, this time over a $34,000 price tag to receive records related to educator license denials since 2018.
The Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty requested records of those denials for applicants that failed to complete an approved program on Aug. 13, 2025 and received a response that DPI would charge $17,007 to review the 1,381 denied applications by hand.
WILL then attempted to narrow the request and DPI doubled the cost estimate to $34,014.
“An informed electorate is essential to representative government, which is why Wisconsin law strongly favors public access to government records,” WILL Associate Counsel Lauren Greuel said in a statement. “After months of delay, DPI is attempting to price the public out of that access by imposing tens of thousands of dollars in unlawful fees. Government transparency cannot depend on whether citizens can afford to pay for it.”
WILL filed the lawsuit asking the court to direct DPI to release the records without the fees, which the group calls “unlawful,” stating that state open records law allows only limited fees for producing records that may not exceed an agency’s actual, necessary, and direct costs.
“Manually reviewing by hand and screenshotting each denied application are not actual, necessary, and direct costs the DPI may impose,” WILL argued. “Even if the DPI could charge for those tasks, DPIs unreasonable delay in responding to the request, coupled with its excessive $34,014 fee, amounts to an unlawful denial of access to public records. WILL is asking the court to order production of the records and impose the remedies authorized by Wisconsin law.”
DPI’s teacher licensure process has been under scrutiny after a Capital Times series last year showing how the department kept records of sexual misconduct from teachers under wraps and out of the public eye. The series led to legislative hearings and a response from DPI claiming that the outlets’ headline was ‘completely false’ without elaborating on any errors in the story.
The Capital Times’ editor stood behind the outlet’s reporting.
WILL is just the latest to challenge DPI’s handling of public records and open meetings.
Dairyland Sentinel has fought for records related to the department’s handling of a 2024 Forward Exam standards-setting conference in the Wisconsin Dells while the Institute for Reforming Government has filed a complaint that DPI violated open meetings law at the same conference.
DPI has claimed that the work of the 88-member committee during the conference was not subject to open meetings or open records disclosure because it was setup by vendor Data Recognition Corp.

(The Center Square) – The Wisconsin Elections Commission says Green Bay’s clerk broke the law when she mailed 152 duplicate ballots before the spring election.
A draft memo from the commission said there is no doubt that Clerk Celestine Jefferys broke the law earlier this year.
“The Commission finds that the Respondent, due to an error in processing certificate envelope labels, issued duplicate ballots to electors in violation of Wis. Stat. § 6.86(1)(ar),” the memo states.
The memo is part of a challenge filed with the Elections Commission from the Brown County Republican Party.
The April ballot case is not connected to Jefferys’ latest duplicate ballot scandal. Her office sent two ballots to an unknown number of voters just last week.
Jefferys defended this spring’s duplicate ballots by arguing none of the second ballots were counted, and Wisconsin law doesn’t have any consequences for accidentally mailing two ballots.
“Wisconsin law prohibits election fraud, not the inadvertent issuance of multiple ballots. The statute does not impose liability for inadvertent duplication in issuance, rather, it establishes the elector’s right to receive a ballot,” Jefferys wrote in her response to the complaint. “While an instance of inadvertent duplication did occur in the City of Green Bay for the Spring 2026 election, Clerk Jeffreys put additional safeguards in place to ensure affected voters were notified, and more importantly, ensured that only one eligible ballot was tabulated per voter.”
The Elections Commission acknowledged that there are no penalties for mailing duplicate ballots but said Jefferys also clearly broke the law.
“[Jefferys] discusses her duty to prevent more than one ballot from any voter being counted in an election, and the Commission agrees that this is a duty of the Respondent. The Commission disagrees only to the extent the [Jefferys] appears to argue that this is the only relevant duty concerning these allegations. Multiple checks and redundancies exist within the election administration system to prevent duplicate ballots from being either issued or counted. Clerks are required to track each request made, each ballot issued, each ballot returned, and each ballot counted. In this case, there was an error and violation in ballot issuance, but procedures to track, review, record, and, on Election Day, count valid returned absentee ballots appear to have been properly carried out,” the Commission wrote in its memo. “The Commission orders [Jefferys] to continue to maintain a complete chain of custody for all ballots issued and to continue to ensure that no voter can vote more than once in an election.”
The Elections Commission is expected meet next week to talk about the challenge, and its order to Jefferys.

(The Center Square) – Wisconsin tax collections were down an adjusted 8.8% in May compared to May 2025 but the state’s fiscal year tax collections remain up 3.7% from a year before, according to new numbers released from the state’s Department of Revenue.
Individual income tax collections were down 19.3% for the month but are up 1.7% year over year for the fiscal year with more than $9 billion collected compared to nearly $8.8 billion the year before.
The state changed several income tax requirements for the 2025 tax year, which are currently being collected, including expanding the state’s second income tax bracket of 4.4% and exempting the first $24,000 of retirement income for those who are at least 67 before the end of a tax year with a maximum exemption of $48,000 for married couples.
The tax bracket change was expected to impact tax collections by $323 million this fiscal year while the retirement exemption impacted collections by $395 million.
Overall, the state has collected nearly $19.2 billion this fiscal year compared to $18.5 billion at this point in fiscal 2025.
Sales and use tax collections in the state were up 3.9% in May and are up 4.5% for the fiscal year from nearly $6.4 billion to nearly $6.7 billion.
Corporate tax collections are also up 8.8% for the fiscal year from nearly $2.3 billion to nearly $2.5 billion.

(The Center Square) – The average price of a gallon of unleaded gas was $3.59 in Wisconsin on Thursday heading into the Fourth of July weekend, ranking the state 18th in the country for lowest gas price.
Indiana had the lowest price at $3.10, followed by Oklahoma ($3.29) and Texas ($3.30) while California ($5.34), Hawaii ($5.34) and Washington ($5.05) were the highest cost states, according to GasBuddy.
While the price was above the $2.95 from a year ago, it was down from $3.68 a week ago and $4.09 a month ago, according to the American Automobile Association.
The national average is $3.83 heading into the holiday.
GasBuddy Petroleum Analyst Patrick DeHaan wrote that gas refinery restraints are the main obstacle to President Donald Trump demanding on social media that retailers bring gas prices down because oil was $68 a barrel.
“Crude oil prices have fallen to their lowest levels in months, dropping to the $60 a barrel range,” AAA wrote on Thursday morning. “Overall, gas prices remain the highest they’ve been in 4 years, but the downward trend since late May is welcome news during the busy summer driving season.”
The national average was $4.29 a month ago and $3.17 a year ago.

(The Center Square) – Inflation led to roughly $2.7 billion more in Wisconsin sales tax collections over the past five years than was projected, the same amount that the state is now projected to have in surplus at the end of its current two-year budget cycle, according to a new report from the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Center for Research on the Wisconsin Economy.
The cost of a week’s worth of goods in the state has risen 28.1% since 2021, the report said.
“That money belongs to the taxpayers who bore the brunt of inflation, not the state,” the report, written by Professor of Economics Ananth Seshadri, said. “Because the windfall is one-time money, the relief should be one-time, too. On the economic question, no governor can move the national price level, but the prices a family actually pays are set partly at home, through zoning, utility rate design, and occupational licensing.
“Behind each lies the same force: regulation that throttles supply. Loosen it and the state grows cheaper to live in; leave it and the state grows more expensive.”
Seshadri wrote that it is clear that prices will not return to 2021 levels, so the only question is whether Wisconsin returns the surplus or uses its ability to lower the state’s cost of living.
“After a historic transfer of purchasing power away from Wisconsin households, the loss is no longer in question; it already happened,” Seshadri wrote. “Wisconsin cannot undo the inflation. It can still decide who keeps the change.”
The report comes after state lawmakers failed to pass a $1.8 billion surplus bill that included income tax refund checks, $600 million for schools and an end to taxes on tips and overtime.
The bill was an agreement between Gov. Tony Evers, Assembly Speaker Robin Vos and Senate Majority Leader Devin LeMahieu that passed the Wisconsin Assembly and had the support of Gov. Tony Evers but fell 18-15 in the Senate as all Senate Democrats and three Republican Senators voted against it.
Eighty percent of the 454 Wisconsin adults polled on the topic in May in a Marquette Law School Poll believed the bill should have passed, with that support crossing party lines and spanning statewide.

(The Center Square) – Wisconsin’s data center building boom is driving the need for more electricity in the state.
The state’s Public Service Commission recently released its latest report on power needs. The draft of the Strategic Energy Assessment predicts that Wisconsin will need 40% more peak demand power.
“Based on the data electric providers submitted to the Commission in November 2025, Wisconsin peak load is expected to grow from approximately 14.2 gigawatt in 2026 to over 20 GW by 2032, an increase of nearly 5.8 GW, or over 40%, in a six-year period,” the report reads.
The PSC says demand will spike because more data centers are coming online.
“These load forecasts illustrate the outsized impact data center development is anticipated to have on the energy landscape in Wisconsin in the coming years,” the report added. “Approximately 4.17 GW1234, or over 72%, of this peak load increase is associated with three active data center developments.”
Those data center projects are the ones in Beaver Dam, Port Washington and Mount Pleasant. The data center in Mount Pleasant, owned by Microsoft, recently came online.
As recently as 2024, the same report projected just a 14.8% increase in peak demand.
That new demand will require new electricity sources, and the PSC report notes utilities in Wisconsin are planning to meet that demand with more natural gas-fired power plants.
“Wisconsin electric providers reported plans to retire approximately 1,100 megawatts of in-state generation between 2025 and 2032,” the report states. “Plans to add approximately 14,200 MW of new nameplate capacity were reported by Wisconsin electric providers, including 5,175 MW of new solar energy capacity, 5,400 MW of new natural gas capacity or upgrades to existing natural gas facilities, nearly 1,370 MW of new wind capacity.”
The report doesn’t speak about how the new demand, or the new power generation projects will impact power bills across the state. Though the PSC does acknowledge that people in Wisconsin are paying more for power than people in many other states.
“National data shows that Wisconsin had an average 2024 residential energy charge of approximately 17 cents per kilowatt-hour. Average charges in the Midwest were approximately 15 cents per kWh and National averages were approximately 16 cents per kWh,” the report added.

(The Center Square) – Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers and members of the Wisconsin Economic Development Corp. plan to go to Africa on a trade mission this summer but did not release which dates the trip will take place and how much of the trip will be paid for with taxpayer funds.
Evers and the WEDC, including former CEO Missy Hughes, spent at least $160,000 on a trip last year to Germany and France, according to public records obtained by The Center Square.
That trip included $69,000 for a chauffeur and limousine service, nearly $19,000 to AHP International for consulting and printed materials related to the trip and a nearly $3,200 group welcome dinner at Zucker restaurant in Braunschweig, Germany.
This year’s trip will include visits to both Ghana and South Africa, including visiting Niche Cocoa Industry Ltd., the largest cocoa processor in Ghana. The company operates its North American manufacturing facility in Franklin, Wisconsin.
“As a former Wisconsin manufacturer who grew our family business by exporting globally, including to South Africa, it’s important to recognize that Wisconsin businesses have a meaningful presence in both Ghana and South Africa,” WEDC Secretary and CEO John W. Miller said in a statement. “Through trade relationships, distribution partnerships, and investment opportunities, Wisconsin companies operating in these two markets contribute to job creation, technology transfer, and economic growth while strengthening the state’s commercial ties across Africa.”
The WEDC took nearly seven months to produce the records from last year’s European trip.
Evers’ office and the WEDC did not respond to questions on how the European trip was paid for but the WEDC’s budget plan summary includes $900,000 for trade missions and foreign direct investment that it says includes trips planned to Japan, Canada, Mexico and Germany.

(The Center Square) – The Knowles-Nelson Stewardship Program still exists in Wisconsin statute but, for the first time in 37 years of its existence, it does not have state taxpayer funding for land acquisition.
The funding was removed from Gov. Tony Evers’ budget proposal and separate proposals from both Republicans and Democrats in the Legislature failed, meaning funding for acquisitions in the program or things like new boat launches, trails, playgrounds and matching grants were not included.
“The Knowles-Nelson Stewardship Program enjoys tremendous bipartisan support among Wisconsin voters,” the program posted about the end of funding. “Partisan politics in the Capitol killed funding for the program.
“Knowles-Nelson isn’t gone for good, but for now it goes dark. It stays in state statute, still on the books, just with no funding behind it. The Legislature can fund it again whenever they choose to, which means the program’s future comes down to who commits to making it a priority.”
https://knowlesnelson.org/knowles-nelson-update-june-29/
Sen. Kristin Dassler-Alfheim, D-Appleton, said that she looks forward to the chance to renew funding for the program next legislative session.
“The value of this program cannot be overstated,” Dassler-Alfheim said in a statement. “It has impacted every single community in Wisconsin, and there are projects in every single county in the state. Fiscally, it’s estimated to have over a $2 billion impact annually, not to mention the benefits we all receive from having beautiful, well-maintained parks, trails, and more to enjoy.
“Legislative Democrats did everything we could to keep it alive, and I’m disappointed that those in power this session have allowed it to expire.”
Joint Finance Committee Vice Chairs Rep. Tony Kurtz, R-Wonewoc, and Sen. Patrick Testin, R-Stevens Point, proposed a bill a year ago to fund the program, a bill that Knowles-Nelson said it expected to move quickly.
But that bill ultimately was not approved in the legislature.
The bill called for called for $1 million annually to be set aside to acquire land for the Ice Age Trail, which was previously approved, along with $2 million annually for nonprofit conservation organizations to acquire and develop property.
Under the bill, the Legislature would have needed to separately budget and approve projects that cost more than $1 million.
Senate President Mary Felzkowski blamed the Wisconsin Supreme Court for the end of the funding in a recent editorial.
A Supreme Court ruling ended legislative oversight of funding for programs like the stewardship program, which Felzkowski pointed to as a reason that funding was not ultimately approved for the stewardship program this session.
“Supporters of the Court’s ruling may celebrate it as a victory for expanded executive power, but they should also acknowledge its consequences,” Felzkowski wrote. “The Court didn’t merely reinterpret a constitutional provision, it dismantled the accountability structure that made the Stewardship Program politically viable.”

(The Center Square) – Voters in Wisconsin might be able to vote on the future of abortion in the state.
Dianne Hesselbein, the top Democrat in the State Senate, last week proposed a constitutional amendment on abortion if Democrats win back the legislature in November.
“Laws can be overturned by Republican majorities in the Legislature and in our courts, and it is unacceptable to leave the door open on a fundamental right. There cannot be another generation of women who fight for abortion access and succeed, only to see it ripped away,” Hesselbein wrote in a recent op-ed. “That is why we must ultimately enshrine reproductive freedom in the Wisconsin constitution, giving the final say to Wisconsin voters who have told us time and time again that politicians in Madison shouldn’t be making personal healthcare-related decisions for women across Wisconsin.”
Wisconsin’s current abortion law bans ending a pregnancy after 20 weeks. The state did have an 1849 law that banned almost every abortion in the state, but the Wisconsin Supreme Court struck that law down last year.
Hesselbein said, however, that a constitutional amendment is the only way to make sure the abortion question is fully settled.
“Our bottom line is this: reproductive rights cannot be subject to the shifting tides of electoral politics. It is time to take this issue out of the arena of partisan politics, enshrine the right to bodily autonomy in our State’s Constitution, and guarantee Wisconsinites reproductive healthcare for generations to come,” she added.
Hesselbein promised that guaranteeing abortion rights will be one of the top priorities for a Democrat-majority legislature.
“When Democrats win legislative majorities, we will enshrine the will of the majority in our state constitution. We will pass the right to reproductive healthcare in both chambers, in two concurrent Legislatures, and when we do, the residents of our state will have the opportunity to vote on a constitutional amendment to guarantee this right for Wisconsin women,” she wrote.
Hesselbein is not offering any specifics on what the right to abortion would include or whether there would be any limits on abortion in Wisconsin.
Democrats have been locked out of power in the legislature for more than a decade-and-a-half, but they are eying victories in both the Senate and Assembly in November.
If Democrats do win those majorities, voters would not be able to have their say until the spring of 2028 at the earliest.

(The Center Square) – Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers, the state’s Department of Transportation and Amtrak have applied for a federal grant to expand the Amtrak Hiawatha train line into Dane, Jefferson and Waukesha counties.
The announcement did not include a cost to state taxpayers or the amount requested but did acknowledge it includes capital costs “to improve track capacity and speeds for passenger service, enhance safety, and increase existing service reliability.”
The plan involves using existing rail lines and building infrastructure to expand the two daily Hiawatha Chicago to Milwaukee trains to Madison, Watertown and Pewaukee.
Madison last had passenger rail service in 1971. Madison completed a Passenger Rail Station Study last year that looked at eight potential sites for a train station.
State leaders have long debated funding a passenger line between Madison and Milwaukee with former Gov. Jim Doyle applying for grants and agreeing to a deal to build two trains for a high speed line.
Gov. Scott Walker then turned down the $810 million in federal stimulus funds for the project, citing the long-term maintenance costs to maintaining the line, which could be used instead on road repair. He asked U.S. Dept. of Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood to spend the money on roads and bridges instead.
Waiker maintained a website, notrains.com, during his campaign for governor. The money was then granted to other states for train projects.
The company that built the trains, Talgo, reached a $50 million settlement with the state over the trains, which ultimately went to Nigeria.
“My administration has been working hard to fix the darn roads, make sure Wisconsinites can get from Point A to Point B safely, and expand reliable transportation alternatives to make it even easier to get to and from work, school, home, and everywhere in between,” Evers said in a statement. “After years of neglect and disinvestment, Wisconsin’s roads, bridges, and infrastructure had fallen into disrepair, and we’ve spent seven years working to reverse that trend.
“The opportunity to expand passenger rail has haunted Wisconsin for a generation because of a short-sighted political stunt—that decision cost our state dearly, and we want to right that wrong.”
Evers and Amtrak cited numbers from the Borealis train service, which saw more than 416,000 passengers between its opening in May 2024 and this May.