Wisconsin Right Now

The legal challenge to Wisconsin’s pre-Roe abortion law could move more quickly after Planned Parenthood announced Thursday it will resume providing abortions in the state. “With the recent confirmation from the Court that there is not an enforceable abortion ban in Wisconsin, our staff can now provide the full scope of sexual and reproductive health care to anyone in Wisconsin who needs it, no matter what,” President and CEO of Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin Tanya Atkinson said. Planned Parenthood plans to resume performing abortions Monday. A Dane County judge ruled in July Wisconsin’s pre-Roe abortion law didn’t apply to abortions. Judge Diane Schlipper said there is no such thing as an ‘1849 Abortion Ban’ in Wisconsin,” she said the state’s ban on abortion, instead, applies to feticide. Gov. Tony Evers praised Planned Parenthood’s announcement. “This is great news, but our fight to restore the same reproductive freedoms Wisconsinites had up until the day #SCOTUS overt...

NASA released a report today that found no evidence that unidentified anomalous phenomena, better known to many as UAPs or UFOs, have extraterrestrial origin. The last page of the report said "there is no reason to conclude" that extra-terrestrial sources are behind hundreds of UAP sightings Nasa has investigated. "However... those objects must have traveled through our solar system to get here," the UAP report said. Although the report did not conclude that extra-terrestrial life exists, Nasa didn't deny the possibility of "potential unknown alien technology operating in Earth's atmosphere". Read the UAP Report here [embeddoc url="https://www.wisconsinrightnow.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/65032fc206104.pdf.pdf"]   . . .   https://www.wisconsinrightnow.com/uap-report/?feed_id=872&_unique_id=650354559b6b1

Speaker Robin Vos has asked retired State Supreme Court justices to review and give him advice on the process and merit of a potential impeachment of Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Janet Protasiewicz. In an interview with WRN, Vos declined to reveal exactly which justices he has consulted with but said it was at least two and possibly more. He did confirm that retired Supreme Court Justice Michael Gableman was not one of them. Vos has not completely shut the door on impeachment, although on Tuesday he proposed instead a new process in which the non-partisan Legislative Reference Bureau would draw non-partisan maps. Gov Tony Evers immediately came out in opposition to Vos's plan as did a host of Democratic legislators who were in favor of the plan when it was introduced in 2019. https://twitter.com/GovEvers/status/1701709171962396901 Republicans have asked Protasiewicz to recuse herself in redistricting legislating over GOP maps that is pending before the liberal-cont...

Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers came out in strident opposition to non-partisan maps, calling them "bogus." Evers' comments came after Assembly Speaker Robin Vos proposed non-partisan maps using a process that Democrats have advocated for years, until now. Vos is pushing for legislation to use "an Iowa-style nonpartisan redistricting" to create legislative maps. In this format, the nonpartisan Legislative Reference Bureau would write the new legislative maps instead of partisans, whether they be Republicans or Democrats. The current maps are Republican-drawn, following a longstanding practice. The U.S. Supreme Court previously invalidated maps chosen by an Evers' commission. "Republicans, who've been ramping up their efforts to interfere in Wisconsin elections, are now demanding Legislature-picked and Legislature-approved map drawers for legislative districts. That's bogus," Evers wrote on X. Vos responded, " Actually, I'm w...

Neighbors say the sounds have destroyed their quality of life for years, but officials have done nothing about it. The Rock's owners refused to allow a sound study team commissioned by the Milwaukee County access to their facilities or sound monitors, but Franklin city officials eventually revealed that two of the development's three monitors weren't operable, and the remaining one hadn't been calibrated for four years. That's according to the new sound study and attorney's summary accompanying it. The study found that the city isn't proactively enforcing sound concerns at the Rock but rather places the burden on citizens who live nearby "to enforce the noise standard" by making complaints. Franklin officials then enforce complaints by gathering "unreliable" data from the inoperable or non-calibrated monitors, using a flawed ordinance and development agreement that makes violations almost impossible to achieve, the documents say...

The push against school choice in Wisconsin comes after a report last week that showed choice schools in the state saw better test scores with fewer state dollars than traditional public schools. Democrats at the Wisconsin Capitol may be trying to roll back school choice in the state after presenting a package of legislation they say would reinvest in public schools and bring transparency to voucher school spending. “This is about public dollars, public schools, and public oversight,” Sen. Chris Larson, D-Milwaukee, told reporters. The Democrats’ transparency plan would require the state to tell taxpayers how much money goes to voucher students each year. “If this bill passes, each property tax bill would have a line that says something like: The gross reduction in state aid to your school district in the current year is a result of people enrolled in one of the choice programs. Or as a result of payments to a private school under the special needs scholarship program,” Rep....

Wisconsin is home to one of the nation’s oldest school choice programs. Since starting in Milwaukee in 1990, the program has offered tens of thousands of students the opportunity to escape from schools that are not working for them. The program has since expanded to offer opportunities to students across the state. But now, the educational lifeline for more than 50,000 students from low-income families hangs in the balance. A political action committee created by Wisconsin-based Minocqua Brewing Company has announced that they plan to file a lawsuit in an effort to end school choice in the state. Seemingly emboldened by a perceived new direction of the Wisconsin Supreme Court, special interests like the Minocqua Brewing Company Super PAC are launching an effort to rip quality education options from tens of thousands of Wisconsin families. The owner of the Minocqua Brewing Company is a longtime opponent of school choice. The prospect of a wealthy, Harvard-educated rural craft brewer...