Battleground Wisconsin

The panel learns the news that the U.S. Supreme Court dismissed the latest attempt overturn the ACA just as we are beginning to tape this week's episode. Listen to our immediate reactions and analysis. After digging into the ACA decision, our panel reviews the dreary final week of the Legislature’s Joint Finance Committee state budget process, including terrible healthcare decisions and the rejection of bipartisan criminal justice reform compromises. The state's 5 largest school districts tell Republican leaders they're halting 2021-22 school year planning because of funding uncertainty caused by the draconian state budget cuts to education. Meanwhile Assembly Republicans find time to to target trangendered teens, passing legislation banning transgender athletes from competing in women's sports. We close with a look at the increasing power of the QAnon caucus within Assembly Republicans, including a new push to bring the Arizona vote audit to Wisconsin as part of a plot to declare Donald Trump President. Is Robin Vos losing control of his caucus to the even more radical right?

New blockbuster ProPublica research finds the wealthiest Americans pay a true tax rate of only 3.4%. Is America finally ready for a wealth tax? Next, the panel asks on the big question of the day: Can U.S. Senate Democrats get their act together and pass pass bills to protect American democracy? As infrastructure talks with Republicans stall, the only bi-partisanship Congress can muster is behind a nationalist anti-China agenda. Meanwhile horrendous racial disparities in health care access and vaccination access continue despite all the of the lip-service payed to health equity. Does any level of government have the courage to intervene? In the WI Legislature, Republicans look to delay local redistricting a year; and to give back federal Unemployment Insurance money. Meanwhile, a revised estimate of Legislative Republican's cuts to schools finds it will cost the state $2.3 billion in federal revenue. We close the show by welcoming Peter Rickman from the Milwaukee Area Hospitality and Service Workers union (MASH) to discuss the Justice for Janitors contract campaign launching next Tuesday, June 15th at 3pm in Milwaukee’s Zeidler Park.

We discuss Legislative Republican’s scheming with their corporate patrons such as Wisconsin Manufactures and Commerce (WMC) to gin up a fake “worker shortage” to punish the unemployed. Does Robin Vos really believe Wisconsinites are lazy and irresponsible or is he just trying to exploit the working class? In a clear effort to mobilize a 2022 off-year election base of anti-vaxxers and conspiracy theorists, Legislative Republicans are supporting bills to make anti-vaxxers a protected category and pumping life into the “Big Lie” with bogus “Arizona style” voter fraud investigations into the 2020 election. Meanwhile new data from the Wisconsin Election Commission demonstrates minuscule voter fraud in Wisconsin elections, most of it generated by Jim-Crow still disenfranchisement of released prisoners. We close with a discussion on the centrality of the Senate filibuster in the success of the Biden agenda, addressing the nation’s major challenges and needs, and the survival of democracy itself.

We welcome Citizen Action’s Movement Politics Director, JoAnna Bautch, to discuss Citizen Action's new podcast, This is NOT that, which premiered this week on the 1st anniversary of George Floyd's murder. The panel reviews the BadgerCare legislative Special Session that came and went quickly due to Republican intransigance. Depite refusing even to debate BadgerCare, legislative Republicans found time to attack transgendered kids and to threaten massive cuts to public school funding. Robert discusses the latest exodus of teachers in Wisconsin. Meanwhile, America's premature reopoining threatens million with pre-existing conditions and suppressed immunity. Who sounded the "all clear" siren in the middle of a global pandemic? Chris Larson enters an already crowded U.S. Senate race to take on distraced WI Senator Ron Johnson. The GOP snipes at another U.S. Senate candiate, State Treasurer Sarah Godlewski. Why is Godlewski their early target in a multicandidate field? National Democrats and mainline pundits increasingly agree that the GOP is a threat to democracy itself. But are the Democrats unified enough to stop them? We close by welcoming Citizen Action's Driftless Organizing Co-op organizer, Ben Wilson, to discuss the proposed expansion of the Roth Feeder Pig II Concentrated Animal Feeding Operation (CAFO) in rural Crawford County. Will corporate agriculture win again over the health and prosperity of our rural communities?

Our panel discusses Gov. Tony Evers’ declaring a special legislative session on BadgerCare Expansion with Shawn Phetteplace of the Main Street Alliance of Wisconsin. We also deconstruct a Republican state legislative effort to remove $300/weekly federal Unemployment Insurance benefits and completely cut-off the self-employed and gig workers. Citizen Action’s Movement Politics Director JoAnna Bautch joins us to announce the launch of a new Citizen Action podcast called This, Is Not That, featuring JoAnna, Citizen Action Climate and Equity Director Rafael Smith, and rising journalistic star Isiah Holmes from the Wisconsin Examiner. We close with a discussion of the CDC’s mass mask confusion created by publicly declaring that fully-vaccinated Americans need not wear masks indoors or outdoors, without revising public policy guidance for businesses and employers. What is the CDC’s motive? Will at lead to a resurgence of COVID infections?

Our panel discusses Senator Ron Johnson’s continued anti-vaccination lies while the county struggles with slowing vaccination rates. How many will die because of Johnson’s political ambitions and loyalty to the ex President? We update the state budget battle following Republican’s action in the Joint Finance Committee to strip hundreds of popular items. We also review the latest rash of terrible GOP bills on everything from school vouchers to more attacks on the voting process being pushed through the Legislature and certain to be vetoed by Governor Evers. Vital Federal pandemic recovery money will start to roll out to states and local governments as Wisconsin discovers our share will be $700 million less. Legislative Republicans are also preparing to impose more Unemployment Insurance barriers to acquiring vitally needed benefits, following other red state Governor’s blaming the unemployed, while a new conservative report pushes privatization of Wisconsin’s unemployment system in the wake of pandemic dysfunction at the agency. What could go wrong? We close by encouraging our listeners to attend the Fair Maps Rally at the State Capitol next Monday, May 17th at Noon.

We discuss the partisan vote in Wisconsin Joint Finance Committee which removed 280 publicly popular items from their state budget, including BadgerCare Expansion. Does this end the budget fight or is it really just getting started? Our panel talks about a Federal court ruling this week invalidating the CDC’s eviction moratorium. What is this Trump-appointed judge thinking? We also dig into why the green transition will largely exclude people of color and women if it does not include fundamental structural reform or our economic system. We welcome Tobita Chow from People’s Action to discuss President Biden’s bold move to suspend the patents of Big Pharma corporations to get generic COVID vaccines to the rest of the world. Is this the end or just the beginning of the fight with Big Pharma to prioritize lives over profits during the worst global pandemic in a century?

Our panel discusses President Biden’s American Family Plan which makes historic investments in paid leave, child care, and tax fairness, but misses an opportunity on prescription drug affordability. Senator Tammy Baldwin and other progressive U.S. Senators are urging President Biden to approve a COVID vaccine patent waiver so all counties can have access to COVID vaccines, while QAnon Ron Johnson spent the week disputing the effectiveness of masks in slowing the spread of COVID. We welcome Eric March from Wisconsin Cannabis Activists Network (WI CAN) to talk about marijuana reform organizing at the local level in Wisconsin. We close with organizer Karen Kirsch from the Citizen Action Healthcare for All Organizing Coop who joins us to discuss her new weekly facebook live talk show which focuses on healthcare policy, focusing on Medicare For All. The show debuts next Wednesday, May 5th, 7pm – 8pm.

We welcome JoAnna Bautch, Citizen Action’s Movement Politics Director, as a guest panelist. The panel responds to the guilty verdict in the Derrick Chauvin trial and puts it in perspective. We discuss the police reform recommendations from Wisconsin’s Legislative racial disparities task force which was set up by House Speaker Robin Vos to avoid taking meaningful action. The Fox con continues, with a scaled back version that is still a terrible deal for Wisconsin. Switching to the national scene, we have a great conversation on the growing bipartisan anti-China politicization in American politics with Tobita Chow, the Director of People’s Action’s Justice is Global project. We also review Citizen Action’s Climate Equity Week of Action, putting a focus on major Green New Deal opportunities at the federal, state and local level.

We discuss the Daunte Wright murder by Brooklyn Center police, the announcement that Jacob Blake’s shooter will face no consequences, and a state Department of Public Instruction finding that the Burlington school district is a hostile environment for Black students. We analyze the Johnson & Johnson vaccine pause in the face of a new COVID variant wave. The destructive course of the right-wing Legislature continued this week, as they plowed forward with regressive COVID relief and election bills certain to be vetoed. The U.S. Senate race heated up this week with the entrance of Citizen Action Organizing Co-op member and State Treasurer Sarah Godlewski as QAnon Ron Johnson prepares to share the stage with a right winger who believes the Jan. 6 riot was ‘staged’. We close with exciting news that the Milwaukee City/County Climate Task Force made bold proposals for use of American Rescue Act money to begin climate conversion, create good jobs and dramatically reduce racial inequality.