Wisconsin Right Now

Rebecca Kleefisch met with former President Donald Trump this week at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida, Wisconsin Right Now can exclusively report. Kleefisch, the former lieutenant governor, is running in the Republican primary for governor. Trump has still not endorsed anyone in the Republican primary for governor. A Trump endorsement would be a game-changer in the primary race, of course. On Friday, March 11, 2022, Wisconsin Right Now heard about the Kleefisch-Trump meeting from two well-placed sources. Our sources are not close to the Kleefisch campaign. The Kleefisch campaign could not be reached for comment. Word had already spread that Kleefisch was in Florida for a fundraiser before the sources told us that she met personally with Trump. Kleefisch's social media has been silent on the matter. Earlier in the year, Trump dropped a grenade into the middle of the Wisconsin governor's race, when he openly urged former Congressman Sean Duffy to run for governor against ...

Jim Piwowarczyk and Jessica McBride won two Milwaukee Press Club awards for their Wisconsin Right Now coverage of the Water Street shootings/mayhem and the Kyle Rittenhouse Trial. The awards came in the video and column writing categories. The Water Street video stories involved gunfire breaking out during the Bucks' championship celebration; video of a shooting victim collapsing in the street; a Milwaukee police foot chase ; and a shooting on Water Street as city officials downplayed the violence, putting police officers and citizens in immense danger. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cDSah8TnrYs&feature=emb_logo We wrote in one of the stories, "As we stood on Water Street, just down from Juneau, a wild fight broke out in front of us, despite multiple police officers standing right there. A gunshot rang out as a shooting erupted a few feet away from us. Wisconsin Right Now’s Jim Piwowarczyk captured the chaos – and the sound of the gunfire – on video." ...

  The Biden administration extended the federal mask mandate for public transportation Thursday even as states and local governments around the country drop their mandates. The Transportation Security Administration announced the mandate would be in effect through April 18 of this year. It applies to federally regulated public transit such as planes, trains and airports. “At CDC’s recommendation, TSA will extend the security directive for mask use on public transportation and transportation hubs for one month, through April 18th,” the TSA said. “During that time, CDC will work with government agencies to help inform a revised policy framework for when, and under what circumstances, masks should be required in the public transportation corridor. This revised framework will be based on the COVID-19 community levels, risk of new variants, national data, and the latest science. We will communicate any updates publicly if and/or when they change.” The decision came as a surpris...

Fourteen Republican attorneys general, led by Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita, have sued the Biden administration for not responding to a Freedom of Information request related to the Department of Justice calling for surveillance of parents expressing opinions at school board meetings and other forums. The lawsuit follows a chain of events that began last October. It was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Indiana Indianapolis Division. It asks the court to force the Biden administration to respond to the requests for information. It names President Joe Biden, Attorney General Merrick Garland, the U.S. Department of Justice, Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona and the U.S. Department of Education as plaintiffs. The coalition, led by Rokita, are from the states of Arizona, Arkansas, Georgia, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Missouri, Montana, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Texas and Utah. On Oct. 4, Garland issued a memo on the “disturbing spike ...

The Ashanti Hamilton Bob Donovan endorsement was predictably downplayed or ignored by the liberal media. But it underscored a trend we noticed before: There is real anger in the black community toward Acting Mayor Cavalier Johnson that the media won't report on. Alderman Ashanti Hamilton, the former Milwaukee Common Council president, endorsed former Ald. Bob Donovan for Milwaukee mayor, urging people to "fight for him like he's been fighting for us." "The future of the city of Milwaukee is at stake," Hamilton said this week. "I think we have the type of leader in Bob Donovan who can get us to the places we want to be." Donovan is running against acting mayor Cavalier Johnson in the April 5 Special Mayoral Milwaukee election. Hamilton said Johnson didn’t support "some of the major initiatives that were built around these solid foundations that Bob is fighting for" on the city's north side. He cited quality schools and safe stre...

Evers/Court map actually reduces the number of highly competitive districts -- the exact opposite of what anti-gerrymandering reformers have been demanding for 10+ years. By: Joe Handrick , Executive Director of Common Sense Wisconsin As has been well established, even under the Evers map the GOP is strongly favored to retain control of the Legislature. While Democrats have blamed "gerrymandering" for their failure to win legislative seats, the truth is that Democrats are so highly concentrated in Madison and Milwaukee that 50% of the statewide vote does not translate to winning 50% of the districts. In addition, Democrats continue to lose nearly all of the highly competitive districts. Candidates matter and Madison socialism does not sell well in rural Wisconsin. Here is an overview of the partisan balance using a multi-race gubernatorial year composite: Note that the Evers/Court map actually reduces the number of highly competitive districts -- the exact opposi...