Weekly
News from Your Wisconsin Democratic Party Chair
Did you
know we have an Election Day…18 days from now?
It’s
true! In 18 days, on February 16, Wisconsinites have a chance to cast ballots
in the spring election primaries. Offices on the ballot range from town and
city council positions to the statewide Superintendent of Public
Instruction—Gov. Tony Evers’s previous job. Some county parties will be making
endorsements in local races—check with yours to find out!
So, now
is the time to request your absentee ballot. Go to
http://myvote.wi.gov/en-us/voteabsentee, tick the box to request it for the
whole year, and then post on Facebook and text some friends to make sure they
do the same thing.
Here’s
why this is so critical: it’s at the heart of how we can win in 2022.
Under
Wisconsin law, voters can request absentee ballots for an entire calendar
year—but those requests expire when the new year rolls around. In 2020, 1.3
million voters requested absentee ballots—and 98% of them wound up casting a
ballot.
By every
indication, a huge majority of those voters were Democrats. And here’s
something else great: The first time you register for an absentee ballot, you
have to upload (or mail in) a photo of your voter ID. But once you’ve done
that, it stays on file. So this year, you don’t have to upload a thing—just
click a few boxes and your ballot will go into the mail.
If we can
ensure that Democrats get into the habit of renewing their absentee ballot
requests every single year, we could, as Trump once put it, have “levels of
voting, that… you'd never have a Republican elected in this country again.”
After
all—we won the Governor’s race in 2018 with 1.3 million votes.
Our
spring primary and general elections this year are our first chance to sharpen
our skills at helping people become repeat absentee voters. Let’s make it
happen. This is how we rebuild: By organizing our way into a democracy.
In
solidarity,
Ben
FIGHT on
the Issues & FIGHT to Win
Republicans
in the State Legislature are putting the lives of Wisconsinites at risk once
again by attempting to repeal a crucial health mandate that would in turn cost
the state $49 million in food benefits for people struggling due to the
pandemic. This latest risk to food benefits is due to the Republicans’ efforts
to repeal the mask mandate, which is finding very little public support. If
overturned, Wisconsin would be one of only ten states to not have a statewide
mask mandate.
This
attempt comes at the same time that Assembly Republicans are refusing to pass a
strong, bipartisan COVID-19 relief bill that already has the support of the
Senate and Gov. Evers by introducing their own relief bill. After rejecting the
bipartisan bill, Republican Assembly Majority Leader Jim Steineke claimed that
this latest Assembly bill made concessions and was a “give and take”, but when
pressed, it was clarified that this was purely between other Republicans in the
Assembly.
Steineke’s
false claims and latest attempts to mislead the public are dishonest and unfair
to the people of Wisconsin who desperately need relief. Wisconsin already has
the reputation for having one of the least active legislatures in the country.
At a time when COVID-19 variants are being found in this state, we need science
to lead the policies and leaders to come together immediately to help
Wisconsinites
Former
Congressional Candidate Makes Nazi Reference In Since Deleted Tweet
This
week, former GOP Congressional candidate Derrick Van Orden published a tweet
making a Nazi reference to Jewish political figure Robert Reich. He has since
attempted to apologize for the tweet while still comparing Democrats efforts to
get rid of the filibuster to a criminal regime.
Here’s
how DPW chair Ben Wikler responded, in a story in the La Crosse Tribune:
"Derrick Van Orden attended the
January 6th rally before the insurrection at the Capitol and didn't say
anything about the Camp Auschwitz shirt and other Nazi imagery. Now, he accuses
Robert Reich of being a Nazi for speaking out about the filibuster. And then,
after deleting his tweet and apologizing, Van Orden again analogizes Democrats
and Nazis. Derrick Van Orden needs to stop trying to weaponize the horrors of
the Holocaust to advance an anti-democracy agenda."
NBC News
Story Highlights Impact of Partisan Gerrymandering On Wisconsinites’ Ability to
Get COVID Relief
The
damage done by Wisconsin’s extreme GOP gerrymandering on the state’s ability to
battle COVID is generating national headlines. An NBC News story Wednesday
highlighted that Wisconsinites are the ones dealing with the consequences
without any much needed COVID-19 relief after Republicans redrew the
legislative maps to benefit them back in 2011. Since the legislative
redistricting, Democrats haven’t had any chance at gaining the majority,
despite multiple elections in which Democrats won a majority of votes for state
Assembly statewide. Now, with the Republicans in the majority, they are taking
every opportunity to work against Gov. Evers’ efforts to keep Wisconsinites
healthy and safe during this pandemic.
Despite a
recent poll finding that 53% of Wisconsin residents trust the governor more
than the state legislature to decide on COVID policies, Republicans continue to
put politics over the health and safety of their constituents. This year, we
have an opportunity to redraw the lines more fairly, as the Governor’s People’s
Maps Commission is working to do—and if Republicans refuse to do work with Democrats
to come up with a fair plan for new district lines, their proposal could face
the Governor’s veto pen.
Sedition
Caucus Extends to Republicans in Wisconsin State Legislature, Calls for Johnson
to Resign Continue
Just days
after a violent mob attacked the U.S. Capitol killing five people, several
Wisconsin Editorial Boards called on Wisconsin’s Congressional sedition caucus
- Sen. Ron Johnson, Rep. Scott Fitzgerald, and Rep. Tom Tiffany - to resign
following their contributions to Trump’s effort to overturn the results of the
2020 election.
Now,
another editorial board is pointing out that our state legislature has its own
sedition caucus: 15 Republicans in the state legislature who also helped fuel
the failed insurrection by signing on to
a Jan. 5th letter urging Mike Pence to refuse to certify the Electoral College
votes.
Assembly
Minority Leader Gordon Hintz called out his colleagues as well for their
actions: “This letter calls for sedition, plain and simple. Making the same
refuted claims 63 days after the election, and the day before the
well-orchestrated coup led by the president, can only be viewed as part of the
same dangerous threat. It should disgust all Wisconsinites that Republican
state legislators attached their names to something so false and so dangerous.
The words and actions of elected officials matter. The validation of baseless
claims that echo President Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election to
stay in power contributed to the attack on our democracy.”
The
Capital Times editorial board also expanded their original call for Senator Ron
Johnson’s resignation to a call for his expulsion: “In the case of Johnson, the
facts warrant expulsion. His lies, his abuses of his position and his threats
to obstruct governing in order to thwart accountability for incitement of
insurrection represent a rejection of his oath of office. He has no place in
the United States Senate.”
New
Climate Report Uses Native American Traditional Knowledge to Offer Climate
Change Solutions
A newly
released report by the Wisconsin Climate Change Task Force draws from the
traditional knowledge of Native American tribes in the area. The information
included in the report is critical because it describes thousands of years of
traditional knowledge of local ecology and how it has changed over time. “I
think it’s common knowledge that American Indians are culturally linked to the
land. We are part of the environment. We’re not separate from it. We try to
practice good environmental stewardship,” said Jeff Crawford, attorney general
for the Forest County Potawatomi Community and one of two tribal representatives
to serve on the Climate Change Task Force.
We
recognize that Indigenous people are the original stewards of this land and we
are glad to see input is being sought for this report from the 12 sovereign
Native tribes in Wisconsin.
New
Legislative Session Sets a Record for Female Members in Wisconsin
Statehouse
A recent
report from the Legislature’s nonpartisan research office found that more
female lawmakers are serving in the Wisconsin State Legislature than ever
before. There are currently 41 women serving in the State Legislature, up from the
34 serving last session. This makes the makeup of the State Legislature over
30% women, with about two-thirds of female lawmakers are Democrats.
"We
see, time and time again, in the literature and research on representation that
it does make a substantive difference to have women, and a diverse group of
women, at policymaking tables. We value things like being a veteran, serving in
the military, because that is a lived experience that can be applied to public
policy; so too is being a woman, because you bring experiences that are often
left out of the conversation,” said director of research at the Center for
American Women and Politics Kelly Dittmar.
Let’s
celebrate the leadership of Democratic women in Wisconsin and their work to create a more equitable state.
Lt. Gov.
Mandela Barnes “Takes the National Stage” to Discuss Climate Change
With the
new presidential administration tackling climate change just weeks in office,
Wisconsin Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes is hitting the national stage, the Wisconsin
Examiner reports, to mark the beginning of the new era of climate policy.
Recently, Barnes attended a virtual meeting alongside climate experts from
Rhode Island and New Jersey. From Lt. Gov Barnes’s comments:
“Given that the federal government has
been largely inactive, states have had to take on leadership roles. With what
has already come out, I feel comfortable that we’re going to have a partner
with the federal government. And that is going to make our work so much easier.
“As I’ve
traveled across our state. I’ve had a chance to witness firsthand how the
climate crisis has taken a devastating toll on people’s lives. We’ve seen
illness that’s caused by air pollution. Loss of life and livelihood from
extreme weather events. And also the economic toll that it takes on our farming
communities, our tourism industry and our infrastructure.”
We are
lucky to have strong leaders, both in Wisconsin with Governor Evers and Lt. Gov
Barnes and nationally with President Biden, that look to science and are
constantly working with partners to find new policy ideas to tackle the ongoing
climate crisis.
