WisGOP: Evers’ first week in office: All talk, no action

[Madison, WI] – Today marks one week since Tony Evers was officially sworn in as Wisconsin’s 46th Governor. Despite the lofty promises of the campaign trail, Governor Evers spent most of his first week engaging in media stunts, avoiding responsibility, and finding creative ways to circumvent state law. Here is a recap of Governor Evers’ first week in office:

One of Evers’ first actions as Governor was to sign a pair of executive orders relating to Medicaid expansion and insurance coverage for pre-existing conditions. But as noted by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Evers’ executive orders “focused mostly on studying the issues and making recommendations, rather than implementing changes to state policies.” Simply put, these orders are all talk and no action.

Evers even blasted Assembly Republicans, who on Thursday introduced a bill that guarantees access to health insurance statewide for people with pre-existing medical conditions. Evers claimed that any legislation – “no matter what they pass” – wouldn’t be good enough. Instead of leading on the issue and working with Republicans, Evers would rather sign do-nothing executive orders and score political points with his base.

On the campaign trail Evers promised to defund the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation in his first budget. Now that he’s in office, Evers is singing a different tune as he tells state business leaders that he will work WEDC. This comes just days after Evers retracted his earlier commitment to abolish the agency, telling WisconsinEye “I’m not going to be proposing anything in the budget about WEDC.”

In September, Evers promised to provide his transportation plan after the election. With the election come and gone, Wisconsinites have yet to see any sort of plan from Governor Evers. Last Wednesday – just two days after being sworn in – Governor Evers brushed off any responsibility on the issue, instead telling reporters he thinks transportation is an issue the legislature can solve.

In another about-face, Governor Evers wasted no time breaking yet another campaign promise. During the election, Evers repeatedly promised not to select “political hacks” to run his administration. But that didn’t stop evers from appointing his campaign manager to be chief of staff, selecting Democrat operatives to serve has his top deputies, naming recently ousted State Senator Caleb Frostman to run the Department of Workforce Development, or choosing several political campaign staff to serve in senior leadership roles.