Leading Democrats in the Wisconsin Legislature were so confident that they would win a governing trifecta in the midterm election that they have been secretly meeting for months with the Legislative Fiscal Bureau to plan a left-wing agenda that they will roll out as soon as members are sworn in this January, the Heartland Post has learned exclusively.
New Assemby Speaker Greta Neubauer and Senate Majority Leader Diane Hesselbein have made their top priorities repealing Act 10 and right-to-work legislation, legalizing recreational marijuana, and enacting a firearm registry and a “red flag law” for gun confiscation, sources told the Heartland Post.
“They aren’t waiting to put that in the [2027-2029] budget,” one source said. “They will have those bills ready as soon as they convene.”
The new Legislature will be sworn in on January 4th, the same day Governor-elect David Crowley will be inaugurated. Democrats won control of both the Legislative and Executive branches of Wisconsin government for the first time since 2011 amid a national blue wave election. They have signaled an aggressive agenda that seeks to undo conservative reforms enacted under former Governor Scott Walker and push Wisconsin farther to the left on tax and social policy.
To plan quick enactment of this, members met for months prior to the election with the Legislative Fiscal Bureau, the nonpartisan service that provides the Legislature with cost and revenue estimates for proposed bills.
“This is important,” a second source told the Heartland Post. “There is plenty of time after an election to get things drafted and ready for mid-January and early February. Doing all of this in advance suggests this is going to be a deliberate tactic: Move so fast the public doesn’t realize what is being passed until it is too late.”
Wisconsin has a $3.3 billion budget surplus and a record-high $2.1 billion in its Budget Stabilization Fund (commonly known as the “rainy day fund”). Democrats have signaled for months that they intend to spend most or all of that surplus and could potentially dip into the rainy day fund to pay for what are expected to be massive increases in state government spending.
In May, every Senate Democrat voted against a budget surplus bill negotiated by Governor Tony Evers and Republican leaders that would have returned much of that surplus to taxpayers (including $850 million in individual tax rebates). The prevailing sentiment among Democrats who opposed it was that they would win control of the Legislature later in the year and then not have to work with Republicans at all on how to spend the surplus.
The last time Democrats controlled both the Governor’s Mansion and Wisconsin Legislature, they spent the state into a staggering $2.7 billion budget deficit in 2010 along with a projected $2.2 billion budget deficit for the 2011-2013 budgetary period. They were swept out of office that November and Governor Walker and the newly-elected Republican Legislature were forced to immediately work on a budget repair bill that became Act 10.
It has saved taxpayers an estimated $35.6 billion since 2012; approximately $2.5 billion per year. Democrats, though, have long promised to repeal it as soon as they regain power and a case that would invalidate the law is currently before the Wisconsin Supreme Court.
“If Democrats move quickly enough on their agenda, they’re counting on the fact that taxpayers will not have enough time to organize their opposition to stop all the tax increases they plan to pass,” a source said.
