Here & Now

Lame Duck Session Stretches Overnight

Zac Schultz:
Republicans in the legislature passed three bills this week that include hundreds of changes to state law, much of it shifting power and oversight from the governor and attorney general to the legislature. And depending on your perspective, it either threatens the fabric of our democracy or it’s no big deal. Here & Now’s Marisa Wojcik reports.

Marisa Wojcik:
It began around 4:00 p.m. last Friday, when Republican lawmakers quietly released a package of bills. It ended around 8:00 a.m. Wednesday morning when lawmakers passed most of the legislation during a lame duck extraordinary session. Among the measures put forth, the biggest is the channeling of powers away from the governor’s office and the state attorney general and giving them to the state legislature.

Chris Taylor:
The public deserves to know that this is unprecedented.

Marisa Wojcik:
The actions have been criticized as bad politics over good policy, especially just weeks away from the inauguration of Democratic Governor-elect Tony Evers and Attorney General-elect Josh Kaul. The bill’s architects, Assembly Speaker Robin Vos and Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald, said the state’s executive office has had too much power and down played the move.

Robin Vos:
And a lot of these issues are kind of inside baseball. But if you are in the legislature and you are in the executive branch, you want to make sure that the two are equal.

Marisa Wojcik:
On Monday during the only hearing for the bills, protestors hovered as the Joint Finance Committee split time between members asking questions and public commentary.

Jon Erpenbach:
So you’re saying if we ask questions, they can’t or can’t testify?

John Nygren:
Well I realize that takes away time from the public.

Marisa Wojcik:
Tuesday, the legislature was called into session. Negotiations ensued throughout the night, behind closed doors and without Democratic input.

Jennifer Shilling:
Leading to this unprecedented.

Marisa Wojcik:
By Wednesday morning, it was over. A sweeping number of proposals were approved, largely along party lines.

Zac Schultz:
The extraordinary session also took power away from the governor over the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation. The Republican leaders will be able to appoint more members to the board and therefore control who becomes chair of the board and pick the CEO of the WEDC until September of next year, at which point Governor-elect Evers would pick his own CEO, but the board makeup would become even between Republican and Democratic nominees, thereby keeping the Republican’s choice for chairman in place. We spoke with Mark Hogan, the current CEO of the WEDC earlier this week. While his predecessors at the agency both joined a statement saying the changes will hurt Wisconsins economy by eliminating trust between governor and the agency, Hogan says it’s no big deal.

Mark Hogan:
Why does any of this need to be so difficult? Honestly I think people make it more difficult sometimes than what it needs to be. I’ve worked with different people in the banking industry over a long period of time. So Im very confident that if Im the person, whoever, is working at WEDC as the CEO, that person will be able to work with Governor-elect Evers and his team. And his cabinet team as well.

Zac Schultz:
We also caught up with Governor Scott Walker last Monday at the Governor’s mansion. Walker says Governor-elect Evers should have no issues with the changes to the WEDC.

Scott Walker:
In that case, you’ve got a governor-elect who says he wants to wipe it out. So if he goes forward, I don’t know why he cares one way or another. He wants to advocate for eliminating the agency entirely. There are people in the legislature, both Republican and Democrat, who in the past at least, have expressed their support for it and suggested they want to make some changes on it.