Battleground Wisconsin

We have an exclusive interview with Eau Claire school board president

Tim Nordin about the right wing attacks on school board members, and the death threat against him that is making national and international

news. And make sure to vote April 5th!

Speaker Vos is found in contempt of court for failing to turn over records related to his sham 2020 election “investigation.” Will the political boss of the State Assembly comply with the court order to comply with Wisconsin’s open records laws? We have an exclusive interview with Eau Claire school board president Tim Nordin about the right wing attacks on school board members, and the death threat against him that is making national and international news. Claire tells us why COVID boosters were authorized for Americans 50+ while the world continues to wait for a World Trade Organization waiver to allow the production of affordable COVID vaccines. We call out Congressional inaction on expiring Affordable Care Act subsidies that could impact the healthcare of 14 million Americans weeks before the critical November elections. Can the Democrats summon the unity to fulfill their campaign promises to make health care more affordable and to prevent a political catastrophe at the polls? We close discussing Sen. Baldwin’s fight to protect Kohl’s workers from the looming threat of vulture capitalists seeking to dismantle a profitable company.

We discuss this historic week where the U.S. Supreme Court surprisingly reversed Wisconsin’s redistricting maps in its scandalous shadow docket. What is going on and where do we go from here? Next, Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson appeared before the U.S. Senate for ground-breaking confirmation hearing and faces shameful tactics from the Trump wing of the GOP. Will she survive the awful politics of the U.S. Senate? The panel reviews the Congressional Progressive Caucus’ new blueprint for executive action that includes 55 different items President Biden can implement without Congress. In Wisconsin, Speaker Vos hints that his GOP sham investigation may end soon. Will former President Trump let him get away with it? The Affordable Care Act (ACA) turns 12 this week and early voting has started for the April 5th Spring Election..

Our panel discusses Speaker Robin Vos’ meeting with conservative conspiracy theorists who are urging illegal decertification of the 2020 presidential election. Will Trump be returned to power via midterm coup? The Wisconsin Election Commission does not pursue charges against Wisconsin's fake electors. What does it mean? We review the implications of Gannett closing its West Milwaukee printing plant where it prints the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and numerous other Wisconsin newspapers. Is there any future for corporate-owned newspapers? Finally, the progressive firebrand brewer Kirk Bangstad from the Minocqua Brewing Super PAC joins us to talk about the PAC’s lawsuit alleging U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson and U.S. Reps. Scott Fitzgerald and Tom Tiffany are barred from holding public office by the post Civil War 14th Amendment. Will they suffer the fate of confederate leaders?

From the conservative leaning WI Supreme Court making up the new “least changes” redistricting criterion to the Republican attempt to funnel public dollars to private schools, it seems the Sith Lords of the WI GOP are embarrassing the dark side…again! We delve into the new political maps for Wisconsin and give some political insider perspective of the new districts pros and cons. Our eye-rolling won’t stop with the newly released "Gablegate" records showing Gableman’s massive spending of public money on himself, while continuing to drive his big-lie partisan election review into the toilet. And the hits keep rolling as we call out RoJo’s past pro-Putin support and how he continues to show his unworthiness to be in office (don’t forget to Vote Nov 8th!). Speaking of terrible leadership…did you hear about the one where a bunch of white people who don’t live in Milwaukee want to dismantle the multi-racial Milwaukee School district? Join us as we try to find the punchline.

Public option, what? A sweeping BadgerCare Public Option Bill was announced this week in the Legislature, which does more than any bill introduced in over a decade to make health care more affordable and accessible in Wisconsin. We hit on the top details of the BadgerCare Public Option Bill and why it’s so important that legislation like this gets a fair hearing. In the weird and dangerous news of the week, disgraced ex-judge Michael Gableman is back in our chatter-box telling an Assembly committee that he was joining the circus. Okay maybe not, but he did give a clownish performance that spewed anti-democracy propaganda and bizarre conspiracy theories. Will Gableman succeed in nullifying Biden’s 2020 victory in Wisconsin and selling Donald Trump’s Big Lie? We also cover the latest Marquette Law School Poll and wonder, despite the media hoopla, if we really learned anything all that valuable. We wrap it up this week with a quick yap about the stellar pick of Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson by President Biden for the US Supreme Court. Go Badgers!

We open the show with immediate reactions to the full scale invasion of Ukraine by Vladimir Putin, and the odd split on the conflict in the Trump-era GOP. Is the backing of Putin by Tucker Carlson, Donald Trump himself, and others the new normal in Republican foreign policy? We welcome new WEAC president Peggy Wirtz-Olsen for her first interview on Battleground Wisconsin to dig into what is behind the record number of teachers who want to leave their profession. Is conservative scapegoating of schools and educators making the professional unlivable? Turning to the State Legislature, we evaluate a series of historically bad bills that gut public education, expand a separate private education system, and break up Milwaukee Public Schools without any consultation from the parents and school board members of Milwaukee. Claire updates us on Senate Republican attacks on BadgerCare by GOP legislators. Congresswoman Gwen Moore, and community and labor leaders continued a push for Build Back Better and the jobs it will create this week with a media event. Finally we close by encouraging our listeners to attend a Solidarity Rally @ Noon Saturday in support of UAW Oshkosh Co. workers’ effort to land the USPS truck contract, and introduce Sulma Arieas, the new Executive Director of People’s Action.

We welcome Courtney Hayward and Tanya Atkinson from Planned Parenthood Advocates of Wisconsin to the show to talk about the impending threat to reproductive healthcare in Wisconsin. In addition to the looming threat to Roe v. Wade by a lawless right-wing Supreme Court, the State Legislature introduced a Texas style ban, which could end reproductive freedom even if Roe is not overturned. Next, Ben Wilson, Citizen Action Driftless Coop Organizer, joins us to urge you to attend the virtual, In The Wash: A Virtual Workshop About Wisconsin Water Quality, where you can learn how to help protect Wisconsin water. We discuss Republican state legislative attacks on BadgerCare and public education, Robert raises concerns about an anti-Asian hate bill in the legislature targeting the UW System, and we shout out state Sen. Jeff Smith for speaking truth telecom corporate conspiracy against universal broadband in Wisconsin.

We expose a series of GOP bills that will take lifesaving health care away from thousands of Wisconsin working families in the middle of a pandemic to appease the big business demand for poverty wage workers. We welcome Wisconsin Election Commission commissioner Mark Thomsen to discuss his experience fighting to protect democratic and fair elections and his call to all of us to speak out against the right wing assault on democracy. Citizen Action Organizing Director, Kate Beaton, joins us to talk about the critical role organizing plays in creating the the transformative changes we are seeking. Kate calls on listeners to join a Citizen Action Organizing Cooperative near you.

We discuss what’s next for the Build Back Better agenda and breaking news on Citizen Action’s upcoming Congressional Week of Action. The panel talks about a bombshell New York Times report that Wisconsin was at the epicenter of the plot to send fake electors, a key piece of Donald Trump’s insurrection plot. In the Legislature this week Republicans introduced a series of bills to rig future elections, while Senate Minority Leader Janet Bewley announced her retirement. We close with an interview of Marina Dimitrijevic, Citizen Actions’ newly endorsed candidate for Milwaukee Mayor.