Announcer:
The following program is a PBS Wisconsin original production.

Frederica Freyberg:
Democrats dig in criticizing federal and state Republicans on budget and policy resolutions.
I’m Frederica Freyberg. Tonight on “Here & Now,” Congresswoman Gwen Moore on a marathon meeting debating Trump tax cuts. Then state Senator Kelda Roys on the minority party’s approach to crafting the budget. And as schools vie for more funding, special education advocates push for a larger share. It’s “Here & Now” for May 16.

Announcer:
Funding for “Here & Now” is provided by the Focus Fund for Journalism and Friends of PBS Wisconsin.

Frederica Freyberg:
In Washington, congressional lawmakers are wrangling over passing important parts of President Donald Trump’s so-called “big, beautiful bill,” with three committees passing legislation to cut taxes, Medicaid and food aid. In Wisconsin, more than 1 million people are covered by Medicaid, the health care program for lower income families and individuals. The Republican provisions would also cut food aid, known here as FoodShare. These spending cuts combine with legislation extending Donald Trump’s 2017 tax cuts. A Wisconsin member of the powerful House Ways and Means Committee had her sleeves rolled up this week trying to bat back these provisions. Milwaukee Democratic Congresswoman Gwen Moore joins us from Washington and Congresswoman, thank you very much for being here.

Gwen Moore:
Always good to be with you, Frederica.

Frederica Freyberg:
So you called this a big bonanza for billionaires. How so?

Gwen Moore:
I’ll just cut to the quick. This is a program that supposedly is one of the most expensive provisions in the bill, costing maybe 800, upwards of $800 billion, and it’s supposed to help, quote unquote, small businesses. But you take Dick, Dick Uihlein, for example. He uses this pass-through method to claim $115 million in benefits and 84% of these so-called small businesses that receive this benefit have absolutely no employees. Most of the benefit goes to the 1%. And that’s why I called it a “big bonanza for billionaires.” Just stunned that they called it a “big, beautiful bill” considering how many people are harmed and left behind by the provisions of the bill in the three committees.

Frederica Freyberg:
Don’t average taxpayers also benefit, though, from extending the 2017 cuts?

Gwen Moore:
Oh, that’s one of their huge talking points, Frederica, is that, you know, if we don’t pass this “big, beautiful bill”, you know, everybody, including lower income taxpayers are going to suffer. Big gimmick that they temporarily raise some of the benefits for people in the lower quintiles. And of course, just to get them through the 2026 election cycle. and then they go away. Whereas they make the rest of the corporate benefits permanent. I mean, it is so nefarious. And it’s really not funny.

Frederica Freyberg:
On the Medicaid provisions, we know it would require able-bodied adults to work, volunteer or be in school for 80 hours a month. Why is that onerous and how could it reduce the number of people covered by Medicaid?

Gwen Moore:
What is able bodied, Frederica? You know, I just lost my nephew last October, 33 years old, had had a heart transplant, wasn’t on Social Security or SSI and yet he was very, very disabled. But he was working to try to maintain Medicaid because of the expense of his anti-rejection medication. He died October 20th. But to look at him, he looked like something snatched off the cover of Sports Illustrated. There are so many people who are disabled or have medical problems that are not — that are not designated as disabled by the Social Security Administration. It’s very, very hard to get on SSI or SSDI disability. People apply and reapply and are rejected. But you know, in the case of Medicaid, this they have actually scored throwing people off and you know, say if you’re a 54 year old man who’s done roofing all your life, it’s very likely that by the time your age 53, that you may not be really that able to climb up on that those ladders and fix roofs anymore, or you might find yourself some woman who’s 50 years old, 52, starting to have diabetes or arthritis, and you haven’t been designated as disabled. But you know, you’re not able to stand up in a restaurant for, you know, an eight-hour day and wait on tables or cook. And, you know, but you will be called able-bodied simply because you’re, you’re not, you know, designated by the Social Security Act. The other thing is that most people work when they can. Everybody likes to have money. They like self-esteem. They like it. And when people can’t work, it’s for very good reasons.

Frederica Freyberg:
So some Republicans don’t like that the work requirement doesn’t go into effect until 2029 and want steeper cuts. What else do the Medicaid provisions in this legislation do, including to the Affordable Care Act?

Gwen Moore:
They, you know, they are undermining the Affordable Care Act. And so those people who are working, those people who are getting credits through the Affordable Care Act, they’re not poor enough to qualify for Medicaid at 100% of the poverty level, but they don’t have employer sponsored insurance. These are people who are going to lose coverage because they will not be able to afford the expensive health care, as rates go way up without the premiums, and they’ll find themselves out of luck. Medicaid is part of a larger health care system. You know, hospitals, about a quarter of their income relies on Medicaid reimbursements. Nursing homes, probably 75, 77% of the cost of nursing homes comes from Medicaid. And of course, this will hurt not just individuals, but we find rural hospitals that might find themselves just being shut down. Urban hospitals that will close their maternity wards. The Energy and Commerce Committee were given instructions to cut Medicaid, and they cut it for over $700 billion. And don’t believe for a second that it won’t hurt you.

Frederica Freyberg:
Another big item are cuts to food assistance. How will that affect people in Wisconsin?

Gwen Moore:
Oh my goodness, there are probably 18,000 veterans that are going to be harmed by cuts to SNAP. With these changes that they did in the Energy and Commerce Committee, they have put in a zero tolerance for errors, zero tolerance, so that if people get even $1, $1 in extra SNAP benefits, food stamp benefits, the state will be dinged. And if they find that they have over a 6% error rate, they will be responsible for up to 15% of the cost of SNAP. You know, in Wisconsin, our governor has calculated that, that the state would find itself having to come up with $200 million just in Wisconsin to fill the gap. The other thing that’s so onerous about SNAP is that they have 53-year-old folks, 54-year-old folks, again, who will only be eligible for SNAP for three months every three years. Three months out of every three years that they’ll be eligible for SNAP. And this is, this is a way that they will, quote unquote, cut the benefits. So this budget really relies on budget gimmicks. People not being able to meet work requirements. People not being able to keep up with the paperwork. And this is, this is how they’ve calculated their loss and benefits. It’s really, really a very nefarious plan.

Frederica Freyberg:
And yet it’s very likely to pass.

Gwen Moore:
We have people in wheelchairs outside of the Energy and Commerce Committee in wheelchairs being arrested, putting, as John Lewis would say, the late great — putting their bodies on the line to stop these cuts because they’re in such dire need of them. And yet we have an administration who’s been able to intimidate them. But it’s not over yet. It’s not over yet because people are still out there raising their voices. I’m encouraging them to continue to do it. Don’t forget the John McCain thumbs down. We can always have someone who shows some spine, some guts between the House and the Senate to bring us back, pull us back from the brink.

Frederica Freyberg:
Congresswoman Gwen Moore, thanks very much.

Gwen Moore:
And thank you.

Frederica Freyberg:
We’ve invited Wisconsin Republican U.S. Senator Ron Johnson to join us next week on this program.
Milwaukee County Circuit Court Judge Hannah Dugan pleaded not guilty this week to federal charges of trying to assist an undocumented immigrant evade arrest during a hearing in her courtroom last month.

Huma Ahsan:
Our court systems must not become a tool of immigration enforcement.

Frederica Freyberg:
Rallies in Madison and Milwaukee this week voiced support for Judge Dugan. Dugan was charged by a federal grand jury for knowingly concealing a person for whose arrest, a warrant and process had been issued, and for corruptly endeavoring to influence, obstruct, and impede the due and proper administration of the law. In a motion to dismiss, her defense states this is no ordinary criminal case, and Dugan is no ordinary criminal defendant. It goes on to argue Dugan has judicial immunity in addition to challenging the veracity of the charges altogether.
Last week, we heard from a Republican Assembly leader on the Joint Finance Committee. This week, Democratic Senator Kelda Roys, a member of JFC, details how her party is positioning themselves as lawmakers craft the biennial state budget. Senator, thanks very much for joining us.

Kelda Roys:
Great to be with you.

Frederica Freyberg:
So we know that Congress is poised to cut Medicaid and FoodShare. Is it your expectation that the state will have to backfill any of those cuts?

Kelda Roys:
I think we need to absolutely be prepared to do whatever we can to make sure that families can survive the economic chaos and devastating cuts that are coming out of Washington.

Frederica Freyberg:
Your GOP counterparts say a keen priority of theirs is what they call tax reform, and they mention the middle class and the elderly. Do you expect compromise around tax cuts in the state budget?

Kelda Roys:
You know, we’ve had a mantra for decades of cutting taxes. And I think my Republican colleagues talk a good game about the middle class but when they actually show us their work, their tax proposals are always skewed toward the very, very wealthiest among us and big business. And at a time when people are really going to be struggling, struggling with higher costs of things like groceries, housing, child care, prescription drugs, we cannot be considering more tax cuts for the wealthy. That has gotten us nowhere. And so, you know, Democrats have proposed reasonable tax relief that is targeted towards the middle class, the working class, those that are striving to get there. And Republicans have kind of thrown that back in our face and said, no, we want yet more giveaways for the folks that are already doing fine.

Frederica Freyberg:
What are Democratic members’ priorities?

Kelda Roys:
Well, I would say we want to make sure that we are addressing the high costs of living for everyday Wisconsin families. So things like childcare, making sure kids have great funded public education and healthy school meals at schools. That we’re funding opportunities for advancement so that everyone can thrive. Our universities, our technical colleges, these are the things that make Wisconsin a good place to live, and we have to be prepared to fund those things. That’s also what we heard as we traveled around the state and listened to people’s public input. The number one and two issues that people cared about were K-12 public school funding and childcare. And we haven’t had budgets that have met the moment. And now it is past time for our kids to get what they need.

Frederica Freyberg:
We know that the governor’s budget included $450 million to continue the “Child Care Counts” child care program, but that was one of the some 600 provisions pulled out by Republican members of the budget writing committee. What happens in June, when the federal subsidy for that goes away if the Republican majority budget writers don’t do something around that?

Kelda Roys:
We’ve been in a child care crisis for a long time in this country, even before COVID but “Child Care Counts” stopped the losses. It stopped the closures because it put more money in classrooms and teachers. This is really a supply problem. There aren’t enough child care slots to go around. In many places, there are two, three, four, even more kids that need a slot for every one that’s available because teachers can’t afford to stay in early childhood. They can make more at a fast food restaurant or at a gas station starting wage than they can with a bachelor’s degree in early childhood. And it’s because parents can’t afford to pay more. So this is where we do need the state to step in, as we did with “Child Care Counts”, and help close that gap so that the most talented and dedicated early childhood educators can practice the profession that they love, and that our kids get what they need at a price that parents can afford.

Frederica Freyberg:
Because what happens if we don’t contribute toward that?

Kelda Roys:
We’re going to see massive closures of child care centers. We’re going to see, you know, parents completely unable to get a slot and the few that do are going to be paying even more than they do now. And a lot of people, if they have a kid, they’re paying more for their child care than they do for their housing. My husband and I – one year – had two kids in college at the University of Minnesota, and we spent less on those two kids than we did for our baby in daycare.

Frederica Freyberg:
Now we know that budget writers and the state of Wisconsin is working with about a $4 billion surplus, which we also know can, for a variety of reasons, be whittled down. But do Democrats have any kind of one-time priorities?

Kelda Roys:
There are things that we can do with one-time money that will help create future revenue sources and will help the state’s bottom line moving into the future. Funding for child care is a great example of that, because the return on investment when 90% of brain development happens, that birth to five period is enormous, right? I mean, we would, we could stop building prisons if we were investing in early childhood education. But think about the workforce impact, too. You know, every child that can’t get into child care, that means a parent is out of the workforce. And our tax collections are going down. Our entire economy is slowing down. So we should be prioritizing things that help the state’s bottom line, not just now, but into the future.

Frederica Freyberg:
Is it your sense that the Republican majority is kind of emboldened by what’s happening in Washington with DOGE cuts and others from the administration?

Kelda Roys:
You know, I think that they’re — they have a lot of different perspectives. I think there’s a lot of infighting right now amongst the Republican caucus here in Wisconsin. Certainly, I think many of them are really enthusiastic about the devastating cuts that are being contemplated and the illegal funding freezes that we’ve already seen. And then there are others that are kind of laying low and waiting to see what’s going to happen. But I can tell you that not one of them has focused on how can we help mitigate the harm that is happening to Wisconsin workers, to families, to kids, right? And it’s our job to step up and make sure that we’re responding to the needs of Wisconsinites who are being harmed.

Frederica Freyberg:
On the issue of K-12 school funding in the state budget, a push to increase funding for special education. Proponents want more state money for students with learning challenges to release the pressure that special education costs put on local property taxes. “Here & Now” reporter Steven Potter has more.

Tiffany Schanno:
Education is a right that we all have. They have a right to every bit of as good of an education as anyone else.

Steven Potter:
Students with disabilities make up nearly 16% of all children in the Wisconsin school system. There are more than 120,000 students with disabilities in the state. These students can have cognitive or emotional behavior issues, speech, health, or physical impairments, learning disabilities, or a range of other conditions that require them to have special help at school.

Jack:
This is my friend.

Steven Potter:
Tiffany Schanno’s son is one of those students.

Tiffany Schanno:
My son Jack is seven years old. He is a lot of fun. He’s a brilliant little boy and he’s also autistic. We’ve struggled finding him the right supports that he needs to be successful in the community and in school. Jack cannot write, so he is able to use assistive technology like speech to text. And he also has a 1-to-1 aide. So someone who’s with him all the time to help him navigate school.

Steven Potter:
Right now, Schanno’s son is enrolled in a public school in Sheboygan.

Tiffany Schanno:
I think that they try their best.

Steven Potter:
But she’s worried about Jack’s educational future, primarily because there aren’t enough school staff trained to do the work he needs.

Tiffany Schanno:
We have a special education educator shortage. We have a shortage of paraprofessionals who are those adults who work one on one with our kids. There are shortages of school psychologists. We don’t have enough speech therapists, occupational therapists. We’re expecting general education teachers now to also kind of step into that special education role. And I don’t think that we set them up for success with that.

Steven Potter:
Shawano says that the money public schools in Wisconsin get for special education just isn’t enough.

Tiffany Schanno:
The funding isn’t there. For every dollar that a school spends on special education, they’re reimbursed about 30 cents from the state. We believe that that number should be a lot higher.

Tony Evers:
During my first term, I fought to secure the first special education aid increase in over a decade.

Steven Potter:
Democratic Governor Tony Evers agrees. As part of his state budget proposal for the 2025-2027 biennium, Evers would like to double the amount the state spends on special education.

Tony Evers:
And we’re going to guarantee the state reimburses special education costs at 60% to ensure every kid gets a public education they deserve.

Steven Potter:
But that still needs to pass the Republican-controlled state legislature. Stakes are high for parents and their kids.

Melissa Custer:
My older son is eight and my younger son is five. My older son has — is neurodivergent. He’s got ADHD. He also has some other complex health needs. And then my younger son is five and he has autism and ADHD, and he also has a speech language disorder. Say hi Corbin.

Corbin:
Hi!

Steven Potter:
Melissa Custer says that because of the special education staffing challenges at her elder son’s Grafton School District, she removed him from the local school and now teaches him at home. Custer and Shawano created the “Learn in My Shoes” outreach campaign earlier this year. Together, they’ve been speaking up with other parents about the need for more special education funding.

Melissa Custer:
Parents are tired of competing for limited resources. We are tired of excuses, of being dismissed and of your heads nodding like you understand when you really don’t. It’s time for special education to be reimbursed at at least 60% sum sufficient, and we aren’t going anywhere until we have it.

Steven Potter:
In addition to testifying before the state budget committee, parents with “Learn in My Shoes” are also taking their demands directly to lawmakers in the Capitol, dropping off stories about their special education struggles tucked into their kids’ shoes. Milwaukee Democratic state Senator Chris Larson is a longtime advocate for increased special education funding. He says that not increasing funding at the state level will continue to cause problems at the local school level.

Chris Larson:
We need to get to that 60% or bust, because otherwise those kids are costing those schools, right? And we shouldn’t penalize schools for taking in every child that enters their classrooms.

Steven Potter:
What will happen if funding for special education remains at the current level of 30 or less than 30%?

Chris Larson:
If it goes lower, or if it stays what it is, it’s going to go — it’s going to result in property tax increases, which is what we’ve had, right? But beyond that, they are cut to the bone. People are kind of sick and tired of having to make up for the difference, and people are starting to see that this is the state’s problem, not their local school board, that they’ve been blaming.

Steven Potter:
Potentially blaming school districts for going to referendum seeking more funding from taxpayers. If Governor Evers proposal of doubling reimbursements from 30 to 60% passes the state legislature, that would be an extra $1.1 billion spent on special education over the next two years. Republican State Representative Jessie Rodriguez of Oak Creek says that that amount is a very big financial request.

Jessie Rodriguez:
It’s very difficult to say that that’s something we could possibly do when it costs $1 billion.

Steven Potter:
Rodriguez, who sits on the Joint Finance Committee, says she and her Republican colleagues are listening.

Jessie Rodriguez:
Special education is something that’s supported by pretty much everyone.

Steven Potter:
Last week, however, Republicans on JFC removed hundreds of Governor Evers’ funding proposals, including more money for special education, but Rodriguez says that special education funding increases are still on the table for the budget that the legislature will write.

Jessie Rodriguez:
I think the desire is to do more but it’s going to be a lot — a lot of discussions to see what that number is going to be.

Steven Potter:
While the state does currently have about a $4 billion budget surplus, Rodriguez isn’t in favor of using that money to fund special education increases, because it’s not a long-term solution.

Jessie Rodriguez:
We just have that one time surplus. There is an expectation in that if we’re going to put more funding into special education, that we need to continue to provide that funding moving forward.

Steven Potter:
Parents like Shawano and Custer, however, have grown tired of their children’s education needs not being met. They say it’s past time to increase and properly fund special education.

Melissa Custer:
There’s just not enough to go around right now.

Tiffany Schanno:
I don’t believe that it’s fair that these barriers that don’t need to be there keep people from accessing their right to an education, and that affects their entire life.

Steven Potter:
Reporting from Grafton, I’m Steven Potter for “Here & Now.”

Frederica Freyberg:
For more on this and other issues facing Wisconsin, visit our website at PBSWisconsin.org and then click on the news tab. That’s our program for tonight. I’m Frederica Freyberg. Have a good weekend.

Announcer:
Funding for “Here & Now” is provided by the Focus Fund for Journalism and Friends of PBS Wisconsin.