Here & Now

Here & Now for June 14, 2019

Frederica Freyberg:
I’m Frederica Freyberg. Tonight on “Here & Now,” Senator Ron Johnson is here to talk about tariffs and immigration. The latest on the state budget from Democrat Evan Goyke and Republican John Nygren. And the impact the state budget could have on the state’s stewardship program. It’s “Here & Now” for June 14.

Announcer:
Funding for “Here & Now” is provided, in part, by Friends of Wisconsin Public Television.

Frederica Freyberg:
President Donald Trump this week postponed tariffs on imports from Mexico in light of an immigration agreement he said he reached with that country. Meanwhile, the acting secretary of Homeland Security sounded the border alarm Tuesday before the Senate Judiciary Committee siting a 623% increase in total law enforcement actions taken at the southern border since May of last year. Wisconsin U.S. Senator Ron Johnson is chair of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security, and he joins us now from Milwaukee and, Senator, thanks very much for being here.

Ron Johnson:
Hello, Frederica, happy to be here.

Frederica Freyberg:
The agreement the president reached with Mexico that allowed him to back off those tariffs would have that country do much more enforcement action at its own borders to cut the flow of migrants coming here. What can you tell us about the agreement and whether you think it will work?

Ron Johnson:
I think multiple administrations have been asking Mexico to do more to stem the flow of migrants from Central America coming from their southern border into America. And so what they’re going to do – what they’ve told us – is they’re going to basically place up to 6,000 National Guard troops at the border to deter further migration. As well as accept more of the Central Americans that have come in here claiming asylum, accept them back into Mexico while they have their asylum claim adjudicated. The reason we need that is because we haven’t fixed our laws that only allow our officials to hold family members for about 20 days. It’s not enough time in general. And as a result we’re releasing these family units into America, which is causing a huge incentive for more to come. The basic numbers are in 2014 President Obama declared it a national — humanitarian crisis when about 120,000 unaccompanied children, but primarily people coming in as part of a family entered illegally and we’re apprehended. Through the first eight months of this year, we’re already over 400,000 individuals. And if May’s pace continues, in the next four months, we’ll double that. We’ll be over 800,000. Now hopefully the actions that Mexico has taken, the additional National Guard troops, will act as a deterrent and that flow will be reduced and we won’t see those numbers.

Frederica Freyberg:
Does this ally your concerns about imposition of tariffs, this agreement with Mexico now?

Ron Johnson:
It certainly allays them indefinitely. I’m not a big fan of tariffs. It’s fine when tariffs are used as leverage to get the attention, whether it’s our trading partners, in this case Mexico that had to do more in terms of reducing that flow. But long term, let’s face it, tariffs is just a fancy name for a tax imposed on imports, imposed on American consumers. Long-term they’re harmful economically. But they can actually be used beneficially when it gets the attention of people we’re trying to negotiate a better deal with.

Frederica Freyberg:
So do you support legislation reasserting Congress’s authority over tariffs?

Ron Johnson:
Yeah. I’ve been original co-sponsor of every bill that’s been proposed in the Senate. This is authority that Congress gave away back in the Great Depression. After the SmootHawley Tariffs, Congress, I think, came to their senses and realized that was pretty damaging economically but they didn’t have the courage to repeal the tariffs themselves. So they gave the president that authority. So this is just one of many examples where Congress simply hasn’t had the courage to pass laws themselves and so they sluff that authority and responsibility off on executives. Generally presidents are happy to take additional power and authority. I think it’s well past time for Congress to reclaim an awful lot of this constitutional authority that has been willingly given away to past presidents.

Frederica Freyberg:
On another matter, for her part, your colleague across the aisle, Democratic U.S. Senator Tammy Baldwin has written a letter to the president this week asking him to immediately release details of a deal he announced saying Mexico has agreed to begin buying large quantities of agricultural product from the U.S. What do you know about that agreement for Mexico to purchase potentially Wisconsin agricultural exports?

Ron Johnson:
Well, I’m not involved specifically in those negotiations, so I don’t have any knowledge of it. I’m completely supportive, though, of the Senate and the House ratifying the new NAFTA, the USMCA agreement. NAFTA was highly beneficial to Wisconsin. We had a trading surplus with both Canada and Mexico. Mexico’s our largest export market for Wisconsin cheese. It’s incredibly important for Wisconsin, both the farmers and well as manufacturers now that we set up all these very complex supply chains to have an agreement in place, whether that’s NAFTA or whether it’s the new USMCA, which modernizes NAFTA. So I would call on Senator Baldwin to call on Nancy Pelosi to bring that up in the House so we can ratify that agreement for the benefit of Wisconsin farmers and manufacturers.

Frederica Freyberg:
In your belief, what are the changing winds on tariffs and retaliatory tariffs and trade doing not just to farm markets, but business certainty more broadly?

Ron Johnson:
Well, it’s created instability and uncertainty and that’s not a good thing. The thing that this administration has done for the economy is by — we stopped adding to the regulatory burden, we enacted a more competitive tax system. That brought a great deal of optimism and certainty and [unintelligible] into our economy. Which is why we got out of the economic doldrums, where under Obama they said the new normal was less than 2% growth. We’ve achieved more than 3% growth. But the whole trade wars have produced a certain level of uncertainty. What’s amazing to me though Frederica, as I talk to business interests and farmers in Wisconsin, as much as they may be feeling some of the short term pain, they really do support what President Trump is trying to do, achieve fair and reciprocal treatment by all our trading partners, or from all out trading partners but in particular addressing the abuses of China. The theft of our intellectual property through cyber theft, through espionage, through forced technology transfers. So they do support what President Trump is trying to accomplish. It’s just very unfortunate that our trading partners really require this level of attention-getting to come to the table in good faith and really do a more fair, more reciprocal trade deal with America.

Frederica Freyberg:
With just about a minute left and back to the migration levels at our border, 144,000 migrants were detained by the U.S. last month alone. Is part of the answer for our federal government to add immigration judges to process asylum claims faster?

Ron Johnson:
That is. We also need to reform the Flores reinterpretation of that agreement so we can detain people a little longer so we have enough time to adjudicate those claims. You know Frederica, one dimension that’s not being talked enough about this is the human traffickers themselves. The involuntary servitude, sex trade. The fraudulent families. You know we’ve done some pilots 13%, 25%, 33%, We’re not quite sure. But I do know when we were down on the border we were told about a three-year-old boy that was left in a hot Texas field by his fraudulent parent, the adult that he crossed with. Just abandoned with nothing more than a telephone – a contact telephone number written on his sandal. That’s a dimension we’re not talking about. This is a crisis. It’s a growing problem. We do need to enact law to fix it.

Frederica Freyberg:
All right. Senator Ron Johnson, thanks very much for joining us.

Ron Johnson:
Have a great day.

Frederica Freyberg:
You too.
In state government, legislative budget writers wrapped up their work this week on the two-year state budget. It now heads to the full legislature and then to the governor. The Republican budget differs from what Governor Evers proposed. On K-12 education, schools would see a $500 million spending increase. Evers had proposed $1.4 billion. In particular, special education funding would be 90% less than Evers plan. For the UW budget, the GOP provision gives the system $58 million as opposed to the $150 million Evers proposed. Joint Finance did approve $1 billion in capital funds for UW building projects. On health care, Republicans rejected Evers plan to expand Medicaid leveraging an additional $1.6 billion in federal money. They approved a $588 million hike in state funds for health care and related costs. As for the transportation budget, Republicans would spend $484 million on roads and highways. Evers wanted an increase in the gas tax to get to his $624 million. Instead, Republicans hiked registration and titling fees. On taxes, the Republican plan would total about $500 million in income and property tax cuts, reducing income taxes about $75 per person this year and $136 per person in 2020. Evers’ plan would mean about a $216 reduction. As the budget package heads to the legislature, some Republican state senators are balking at the spending hikes their own party approved in the process, calling it an effort to buy Governor Evers’ support.

Scott Fitzgerald:
I’m waiting for Tuesday to make any type of judgments. Obviously, I’ve been having ongoing discussion with all the members. I know that the finance team also has been talking to members along the way working with them. So, you know, I’m not going to jump to any conclusions on any one individual senator. Again, I think just like you have to do at the end of any finance process, is come together again and kind of start from scratch, run through the document and see what the issues may be.

Frederica Freyberg:
As to whether the Republican plan could see changes from the governor’s veto pen, Assembly Speaker Robin Vos had warned the budget could be delayed until October if Evers vetoes the whole thing. Vos has backed off that fear at this point.

Robin Vos:
First of all, I am not accepting the fact that Governor Evers is going to veto the budget. I think that it’s never been done in our state’s history. So I think it’s very unlikely when we have a budget that does focuses on the four most important pillars, right? What did Governor Evers say? Fix the damn roads. We’re doing that. What did he say? Make sure we have a budget that can help children. We’re doing a kid-friendly plus budget. He said make sure that we have the ability to take care of the most vulnerable. We’re doing that without expanding welfare. And we have enough resources left over that we prioritized a very large tax cut that’s going to help every single family that pays taxes in the state.

Frederica Freyberg:
Co-chair of the Joint Finance Committee, Republican Representative John Nygren, just wrapped up his heavy budget lifting. He joins us now by phone. And thanks very much for taking the time.

John Nygren:
Good to be with you.

Frederica Freyberg:
So what is your response to the criticism from some fellow Republicans that your budget “big on spending and bonding and is trying to buy Governor Evers’ support”?

John Nygren:
Well, I wouldn’t agree with them. I think the level of borrowing is the lowest it’s been since 2009. The increase in spending over the biennium is about 3.8%, within the rate of inflation. You know what? We do live in split government. I would say from my perspective, maybe that 3.8 is a little bit higher than we would like. But we do have to work with a Democrat governor and for him to be able to sign this budget, meet some of his priorities. I think we’ve done that. He proposed an 8.3% increase. We’re around 3 and still met a lot of the priorities of not only Governor Evers but the people of the state of Wisconsin.

Frederica Freyberg:
If something had to be changed though to garner the support of any defecting Republicans on the Senate side presumably, what would that be?

John Nygren:
I’m not in the Senate. I’m in the Assembly. So I think that’s a conversation for Senator Fitzgerald. I think one — some of the concerns, some of the comments that have been made has been going throughout the process. We’re not necessarily looking at the budget in totality. I think they were looking at the budget versus the bill, which had a high level of spending, as I said, 8.3%. We made those changes. We took things out as we went. So actually, I think the perspective of some of my colleagues who weren’t paying as much attention as those of us on Joint Finance every single day, when they see where we actually got to, I think they’re going to be supportive.

Frederica Freyberg:
Given what you were just suggesting about how you make trims, what do you know about whether you will get the governor’s support?

John Nygren:
Well, when we look at education funding, $500 million, $200, $204 per pupil, a 22% increase in special ed funding. Actually it’s the level that Governor Evers asked for when he was DPI Secretary. $204 is what he called a kid friendly budget two years ago. We meet those objectives when we are able to provide for our most vulnerable. In many case, going well beyond what Governor Evers had. Because we had some real problems. Because of our economy is so strong, we have issues with being able to pay a good enough wage to be able to get people to work in our nursing homes and personal care workers for our elderly and disabled in their homes. We were able to go further than him. So I believe in a lot of these cases because we solved those problems, because we met the priorities not only of Governor Evers in many cases, but the people of Wisconsin, I think he should sign it.

Frederica Freyberg:
So when you’ve said that the budget was carefully crafted to avoid the governor’s vetoes, is this the kind of thing you’re talking about?

John Nygren:
Well I mean I think what we’re talking about wanting to avoid the veto is you have to be careful what language you put into the budget. The governor can veto down spending. It can’t veto it up. But however he has a very powerful line item veto where he can actually change actually what the intent is of the different provisions. So we have to be very careful. What I’m referring to is when we’re meeting many of his objectives, perhaps maybe in a different way, yet living within the means of the people of the state of Wisconsin, I believe that it’s not only a budget that we have been careful on the vetoes, but we’ve also been understanding that we now live in split government.

Frederica Freyberg:
So on the flip side, how carefully crafted was it to apiece fiscal hawks?

John Nygren:
Well, I think that that’s the things I’ve been addressing, rate of inflation, you know, borrowing is down. Actually using cash infusion, where possible, to be able to reduce the reliance on the tax burden. And then also realizing that we do have a significant surplus so let’s utilize that rather than raising taxes as Governor Evers did. Let’s use some of those surplus dollars to reduce that burden on the taxpayer.

Frederica Freyberg:
How different would your budget have been if Governor Walker was still governor? Would you have ever included transportation fee hikes or gone for bigger tax cuts?

John Nygren:
Well, I mean I think the tax cuts, definitely, we probably would have gone for bigger tax cuts. I think we got to about $560 million of tax cuts. Governor Walker actually proposed about $800 million on increases. So if Governor Walker was still governor, I think you probably would have seen us still try to get to a solution on transportation, at least from the Assembly perspective. We’ve been trying to get there for quite some time. Our Senate colleagues and the governor, Governor Walker weren’t necessarily always with us on that. So I think we would have tried. But I think the solution we came up with, actually increasing road aids for our towns and our villages and our cities 10% and then also in what we call LREP, we also provided — we tripled that amount to be able to help catch up. We know there’s some pent-up need in the transportation areas throughout our entire state.

Frederica Freyberg:
All right. We leave it there. John Nygren, thanks very much again.

John Nygren:
Thank you very much.

Frederica Freyberg:
Democrats on the budget committee acknowledge that the Evers’ budget forced Republicans to, “move the needle on spending, “but still they say it doesn’t go far enough to address the governor’s priorities. Joint Finance Committee Member Democratic Representative Evan Goyke joins us from Milwaukee. Thanks very much for doing so.

Evan Goyke:
Thanks for having me.

Frederica Freyberg:
So you say that the Republican proposal falls short. How so?

Evan Goyke:
Well, I want to focus really on three primary areas and that’s health care, education and transportation. And just briefly on each, on health care, an ideological decision not to expand Medicaid costs the opportunity to save $324 million in state resources, while leveraging $1.6 billion in new federal funding. That created holes in other parts of the budget, like education. So the second area where the Republican budget fell short is on public school funding. And particularly how — and how much we fund special education. And so the governor proposed an historic investment in special education and Republicans cut 83% from the governor’s proposal. And then lastly on transportation, the way we fund roads I think is an imbalance. We should use the gas tax, which is closer to a user fee, and get all of those out-of-state drivers to help pay for our roads, not just rely on our registration fees.

Frederica Freyberg:
So all of that said, how do you expect the governor to handle the version that does not expand Medicaid or increase the gas tax or greatly increase special education funding?

Evan Goyke:
I think it’s a challenge for the governor. And I want to work with his team and with him on what steps moving forward he could use. You know, the state of Wisconsin has one of the most powerful vetoes in the country and it’s a unique veto. And so I don’t think we’re at a point in time today as we are talking where we can really say exactly what the right course of action should be for the governor. Now, one other point that I want to make, it’s important to note that while Joint Finance — the Joint Finance Committee is done, each chamber must agree on the budget as it’s written. And there could be further changes made by the Senate or Assembly Majority Republicans.

Frederica Freyberg:
How would you compare this Republican budget proposal to years past when the majority was working off Republican Governor Scott Walker’s plan?

Evan Goyke:
So in your introductory remarks, you hit the needle. There’s clearly a response or what I said in my closing remarks yesterday on the committee, the Republicans are trying to catch up to the governor’s leadership and his vision. So this budget that the Republicans have crafted spends about $4.1 billion in additional spending. The last budget under Governor Walker was about $2.2 billion. So almost double the level of spending than the prior Republican budget. And I think that’s a response to Governor Evers’s winning the statewide election for governor, calling for the increased investments that we’ve been discussing.

Frederica Freyberg:
You also said while you were on the committee that the Republican budget writers, you thought, tried their best. So what more can you really ask?

Evan Goyke:
Well, I think we don’t have to do things in a closed room with only one party. That’s how the budget was written by the Republicans. The Senate and Assembly Republicans would go somewhere in the state Capitol. They would close the door and they were negotiating with themselves. So that was the best they could do. But there are two parties in the Capitol. They could reach across the aisle and seek Democratic votes and Democratic input to reach a bipartisan compromise. So when I said they did their best, what we could do better is talk to one another and find common ground, especially on those three big items that I’ve mentioned.

Frederica Freyberg:
What kinds of concerns do you have about any changes that might be made in the Legislature, the full Legislature?

Evan Goyke:
I’m watching the Senate Republican Caucus very carefully. Senator Steve Nass, in the Whitewater area, has already said that he has problems with the overall level of spending. Senator Dave Craig has said the same thing, that he has grave concerns over the level of spending. If a number of other Senate Republicans have a disagreement with the level of spending, that could result in major changes and potentially throw off the entire budget as has been written.

Frederica Freyberg:
All right. We’ll be watching. Representative Goyke, thanks very much for joining us.

Evan Goyke:
Thank you for having me.

Frederica Freyberg:
More on the state budget now. Specifically, its impact on the state’s land purchase fund known as the Knowles-Nelson Stewardship Program. Marking its 30th anniversary, the program provides dollars to buy land like the land seen here in Dane County known as the Capital Springs Recreation Area. The stewardship fund also allowed the purchase of parts of the Ice Age Trail across Wisconsin and properties that became the Hank Aaron Trail that connects Miller Park with downtown Milwaukee. The program has an expiration date of June, 2020. That’s why Governor Evers says he proposed extending the program for two years with borrowing that amounts to just over $42 million per year. This week, Republicans on the Joint Finance Committee gave the governor what he originally wanted. Evers did change course, seeking a ten-year extension for the program, adding more than $300 million in bonding, but that was voted down along party lines. Jason Stein has researched the stewardship program in his work with the Wisconsin Policy Forum. He joins us now from the state Capitol and, Jason, thanks very much for doing so.

Jason Stein:
My pleasure. Thank you.

Frederica Freyberg:
So, as we’ve said, you’ve done a deep dive on the stewardship program in Wisconsin. How much land in the state is in public hands because of the program?

Jason Stein:
Well, more than 800,000 acres in the state of Wisconsin had been protected either through an outright purchase or through a conservation easement because of the stewardship program over the life of the program.

Frederica Freyberg:
Some conservative lawmakers, as you know, really take exception to the bonding that it takes to acquire all that land. How much does it take in bonding?

Jason Stein:
Well, you look at what the state has made in debt payments over the life of the program, $865 million, and there’s more than $700 million in principal and interest outstanding on stewardship bonds. So it is a significant amount of money when you look at the program over its life.

Frederica Freyberg:
What’s been the trend in recent years of spending on DNR land purchases?

Jason Stein:
So what you see when you look at what the stewardship program is actually spending is that the core state land purchases program for the DNR has fallen last year to its lowest level in the program’s history, at $2.9 million. So there’s been a big decrease in that. And at the same time, it, for the first time last year, was no longer the largest single spending item for stewardship. Instead, it was a development category involving projects on public land.

Frederica Freyberg:
So presumably that kind of trend concerns conservationists who really applaud and support this stewardship program.

Jason Stein:
Sure. On the one hand, you have critics concerned about the debt and land in government hands. And on the other side you see some concern from advocates for the program on the decline in the purchasing power and sort of the core land function of the program over recent years.

Frederica Freyberg:
Where is most of the stewardship land in Wisconsin?

Jason Stein:
So most of the stewardship land that you see purchased is in northern Wisconsin and those northern Wisconsin counties where as much as 50% or more of the land can be held by the state, local governments, mostly counties and the federal government. But you do see some, in dollar amounts, large amounts being spent in southern Wisconsin in counties like Dane as well as Waukesha.

Frederica Freyberg:
Now, it takes that land off the tax rolls, though, but then the state makes up for it?

Jason Stein:
Correct. So because stewardship land becomes public, you no longer have a private owner that’s paying property taxes to local governments like towns, schools and counties. At the same time, the state does make payments to local governments to compensate them for that lost property tax revenue, about $14 million last year.

Frederica Freyberg:
So how does Wisconsin compare to other states when it comes to land purchases for public use?

Jason Stein:
Sure. So Wisconsin’s stewardship program is unique in that it is larger than most other programs in the Midwest, that it groups together different functions in one program that may be split up among different programs in other states. You know, at the same time, there’s also a commitment in other states to do programs like stewardship. Some states use borrowing to fund those purchases and projects, like Wisconsin does. And then some other states have dedicated sources of revenue, whether it’s sales tax dollars or dollars associated with mineral rights, things like that.

Frederica Freyberg:
But, again, Joint Finance just extended this for two years. Presumably that sticks in the larger budget.

Jason Stein:
Right. I mean, given that both the governor and Joint Finance proposed a two-year extension of the program, you would expect that to stick in the state budget as long as the state budget moves forward without a hitch. And so I think that means that this program will sort of remain in the public discussion over the next two years as we talk about, okay, what comes next after that.

Frederica Freyberg:
Right. Exactly. All right. Jason Stein, thanks very much.

Jason Stein:
Thank you for having me. My pleasure, Frederica.

Frederica Freyberg:
That is our program for tonight. I’m Frederica Freyberg. Have a great weekend.

Announcer:
Funding for “Here & Now” is provided, in part, by Friends of Wisconsin Public Television.