Here & Now

Chris Larson Reacts To Budget Passage

Frederica Freyberg:

In the state Senate Thursday Democrats had 53 amendments and debate lasted 12 hours. Democrats could not get enough Republicans to cross party lines, so the GOP budget passed 17-16 early Friday morning. In an attempt to lure Republicans across the aisle, minority leader Chris Larson even had a welcome mat outside his office for GOP colleagues. But in the end, he only managed to pick up one Republican vote. That was from Senator Dale Schultz, who along with Democrats, criticized provisions for things like the expanded school choice. He also criticized the rejection of federal Medicaid expansion money.

Dale Schultz:

No. Enough. The folks of my district have said, Dale, enough already. Because where I live, we’re an independent-natured sort of people.

Jon Erpenbach:

Are we better off than we were two years ago? Absolutely not. And it’s going to get worse under this state budget.

Frederica Freyberg:

But 17 other Republicans defended the governor’s budget, saying it would continue the business-friendly reforms.

Joe Leibham:

In this budget we really try to move forward again opportunities and provisions that will further make Wisconsin a more friendly place to do business, and to employ people and to create opportunities and jobs for our fellow citizens.

Frederica Freyberg:

We check in with senate minority leader, Democrat Chris Larson of Milwaukee now, following passage of the biannual budget bill. Thanks very much for being here.

Chris Larson:

Thanks for having me.

Frederica Freyberg:

Well, how important was it for your caucus, as opposed to the assembly, to debate this budget ahead of the vote. And did you ever have kind of a meaningful shot at picking up more Republicans, even notwithstanding your welcome mat there?

Chris Larson:

Yeah, well, we put that welcome out sincerely, trying to see if we could be able to get some Republicans. And I think it was important we offer, for one, an alternative vision of where we could end up taking this state, so we’re not heading in the wrong direction, shedding jobs as we have been. But also to make the case to Republicans, that in a lot of cases we used their own words, things that they'd said to their constituents in their communities. Promises that if they had the chance, they would accept the BadgerCare expansion, they'd accept the strengthening of Medicaid, and that they’d make sure that vouchers had a referendum. Now, we put those votes out there for them and they ended up breaking that promise. So I did have some hope that they'd be able to cross over. But I’m happy that we’re able to get some bipartisan support for some of those amendments, and in the end, bipartisan opposition to this budget, in not just the senate but also in the assembly.

Frederica Freyberg:

Does the scope of this budget that is now on the governor’s desk, including the tax cuts, the voucher expansion and the rejection, as you’ve mentioned, of Medicaid money, surprise you, though?

Chris Larson:

Well, I mean, look, Republicans are in unilateral control of the state government. They’ve got the governor’s mansion. They’ve got the assembly. They’ve got the senate. So in the end, they’re going to get what they want. What I think surprised me the most is how much they excluded the public from this entire process. They had the least number of budget hearings since 1985 and every one of them was during daytime hours, where working people weren’t able to have access to it. In the end they ended up adding more provisions to the budget that were not part of the governor’s. You actually have a record-setting budget for the number of pieces of non-fiscal policy contained in it, which is, I think, really stunning. And on top of that, we have this statewide voucher expansion where there was not town halls, where people in the state did not know that was going to happen up until about less than a month ago. And that’s going to be sprung on them without the public input.

Frederica Freyberg:

Democrats talk a lot about Wisconsin’s job performance. How are the governor’s policies to blame, though, as opposed to national or global economic trends? Because I know when everything went bad in the national economy when Governor Doyle was governor, he always said, well, it’s the national economy. So how is Governor Walker now to blame for what’s happening in Wisconsin?

Chris Larson:

You can take a look at the national economy. And back then when you looked 48 or 49 of the states were losing jobs consistently across the country. At the time Republicans tried to pin that on Governor Doyle, that he had this power to crash the entire economy across the country, which wasn’t the case. But now we’re actually in the opposite where if you look at the country, there’s record growth. We’re actually experiencing three straight years of job growth except for in the state of Wisconsin where overall for the year we’re down on jobs. Our economic outlook going forward, we're one of five states, less than five states, that are projected to actually decrease in growth. And if you go over to the last year, we are 44th in the nation in private sector job growth. And so how can you say that the rest of the country is holding us back when they are passing us by in every measure we can find?

Frederica Freyberg:

What policies do you point to on the governor’s part, or the Republican majority’s part, that would have led to that?

Chris Larson:

I think it just comes down to the divide and conquer strategies that we see from the Republicans where they’re more focused on passing special interest legislation. They’re more interested in trying to divide the state and help their special interests than they are with actually trying to bring folks together and move us forward. So I mean, on small things, of making sure that the average person can find a job, making sure they have access to health care, making sure that we have a quality education system, all of those things have been left behind. I think it’s that overall environment that is not the same as it’s been. And it’s different from where it’s at in other states. So we’ve really been struggling in this Walker economy, and unfortunately yesterday with the passage of this budget, they’ve doubled down on that strategy to take us even further into the ditch.

Frederica Freyberg:

I think it would be fair to describe the last state budget, the one that resulted in Act 10, as a stunning shift for Wisconsin. How does this budget compare to that shift?

Chris Larson:

Well, I mean, that was the beginning of it, right? And they said, well, if we do this, we are going to have so many jobs. If we just do this, we’re going to be flooded with jobs. And we know that wasn’t the case. That as soon as Governor Walker’s budget was enacted, that’s when we started on a decline in losing jobs. And so, I think, this is unfortunately doubling down on that strategy. It was divisive back then. It continues to be divisive. I think that people are still upset. Just because you may not see them at the Capitol every day– We did see people there yesterday who were saying, focus on jobs not on vaginas. That’s something where people are upset. You know, that this is where the attention has been, on extreme social legislation, on special interest legislation and not on jobs. And so that’s where there continues to be a divide.

Frederica Freyberg:

Senator Chris Larson, thanks very much.

Chris Larson:

Thank you.