Joint Finance co-chairs on ‘UpFront’ shrug off looming cuts from federal government

The Republican co-chairs of the Joint Finance Committee said the GOP budget will aim to reduce the size of government as the pair brushed off concerns about the impact of looming cuts from the federal government.

“I’m not overly concerned about it,” Rep. Mark Born, of Beaver Dam, said on WISN 12’s “UpFront,” which is produced in partnership with WisPolitics. “I think the federal government makes changes all the time. They’ve made changes in previous budgets. I think people are curious about it now, it’s getting a lot more attention, but they still have to actually make changes before it actually impacts the budget.”

One area of potential concern is the state’s Medicaid costs. The Legislative Reference Bureau estimates that about 54% of the state’s Medicaid funding comes from the federal government, as congressional Republicans consider cuts to Medicaid nationally.

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“We don’t know what’s going to happen yet,” Sen. Howard Marklein, of Spring Green, said. “I mean, Mark and I don’t have any inside information as to what’s going on in D.C.,; we’re going to just wait and see. …We’ve always based our budget decisions on the best available information, and that includes new tax collection projections next week.”

The pair offered little insight into the state of GOP negotiations with Dem Gov. Tony Evers surrounding a potential tax cut agreement. The state’s projected surplus is more than $4 billion.

“I think right now the governor doesn’t seem serious about talking about it, and he keeps trying to push it into the budget discussions more,” Born said. “And we would prefer to know our starting point, and so talks are ongoing, and hopefully they’ll be more productive than they have been.”

The pair expressed slight optimism about the potential for a sweeping prison reform package. Evers has proposed closing Green Bay Correctional Institution while modernizing Waupun and expanding the state’s early release program.

“I think it’s possible; there’s just a lot of work to be done there,” Born said. “And so it’s going to depend on how serious people are about it. If the governor was doing it to check a box to make it look like, for the first time, he cared about prison reform and closing Green Bay and stuff like that, then probably not. If he’s going to be open to some other ideas, because his plan is not the complete path to do this.”

“Realistically, I’m not sure,” Marklein added, “The solution needs to be comprehensive. The easiest part is closing Green Bay. Then what do you do? What is the ripple effect throughout the system?”

Both said the Republican plan would strive to include no numbers or digits in response to the Wisconsin Supreme Court ruling upholding Evers’ 400-year education veto.

“I think it’s a strong possibility,” Marklein said. “The court, I don’t know that they’ve made our drafters’ job easier by any means, but I don’t see any dates. You know, 2027 will have to be written out.”

Meanwhile, Sen. LaTonya Johnson, the longest-serving Democrat on the budget committee, said she believes Dem votes will be needed to pass the budget, at least in the state Senate.

“I hope they do because then that gives us more room for negotiations,” Johnson said. “Our numbers are extremely close in the Senate. We are only two people down, and so I think that’s going to force them to come to the table, and I hope they do. We are now at an opportunity to actually have input in what happens in the State Capitol, and before we were not. So I’m banking on the fact that they’re going to need our vote.”

Johnson said the role of Dems in the minority will be to continue to highlight the governor’s proposals Republicans removed from the budget.

“I think the role of Democrats on this committee is to highlight the differences between the governor’s budget and what’s being proposed,” Johnson said. “There is a difference. Oftentimes we see things under-resourced in our budget coming out of Joint Finance, and if you’re funding things and you’re not funding them to scale, then you’re doing a disservice because you’re guaranteeing those programs to fail or to struggle, such as special education.”

Johnson backed Evers’ continuing negotiations with Republican leaders surrounding a potential tax cut agreement.

“I think that’s important,” Johnson said. “It’s important for the taxpayers, especially for those areas that are going to referendum. We are asking those residents to pay twice. They’re already paying for their property taxes for their school system, and then they’re having to go to referendum and say, look, we’re willing to pay extra just as long as our kids get the education that they deserve. And it’s unfair. We need to be trying to give some money back to residents, but we need to make sure that we’re funding the things that we’re supposed to be funding, so we don’t have to ask them for extra.”

The Rev. Andrew Matijevic, a priest at Holy Name Cathedral in Chicago, says Pope Leo XIV’s Midwestern roots will carry with him as he leads the Catholic Church.

“I think he’ll be someone who is there and who won’t just assume things, but he’ll listen, he’ll think, he’ll ponder, he’ll converse with others for opinions and make a decision for whatever he needs to take on,” Matijevic told “UpFront.” “I would say that he will use the office given to him to be a moral voice in the world, whether it be for immigrants, for refugees, for life issues. But I think ultimately his goal as the pope is to build bridges between people.”

Matijevic helped Pope Leo, then Robert Prevost, several years back during a mass in Chicago.

“I was a junior in college seminary at the time,” Matijevic said. “And he came back to ordain a priest on the south side of Chicago, and I was the emcee for that. I would tell him what to do and where to go, and it’s just kind of unique. Did I think he’d be the pope then? Probably not, but when he went to the Vatican in 2023, when he was made a cardinal, he was a good person to know and a good person to look up to.”

Retired U.S. District Judge Nancy Gertner led an effort of more than 150 former state and federal judges strongly criticizing the Trump administration’s arrest of Milwaukee County Judge Hannah Dugan.

“Judge Michael Luttig, who was appointed by a Republican, and I drafted the letter and then opened it up to everyone we knew who was a retired federal or state judge to see if they wanted to sign on,” Gertner told “UpFront.” “And the reaction was extraordinary.”

Gertner and Luttig wrote the letter sent to U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi that said, “The circumstances of Judge Dugan’s arrest make it clear that it was nothing but an effort to threaten and intimidate the state and federal judiciaries into submitting to the Administration, instead of interpreting the Constitution and laws of the United States.”

Gertner also criticized the way the arrest was handled. 

“Worst of all, the notion that they had to parade her, what we call the perp walk, to handcuff her, take a picture of her getting into the car, having Kash Patel, the head of the FBI, post the picture is humiliating, degrading, and ultimately intimidating,” Gertner said. “That was the only point of it.”

Dugan is accused of helping an undocumented migrant, who appeared in her courtroom on domestic violence charges, evade ICE agents inside the courthouse.

“I don’t think it would be acceptable behavior if it’s true,” Gertner said. “The question is, if it’s true. The affidavit in support of the arrest says that she sent him out the side door to a public hallway. Let me repeat that, to a public hallway. So I’m going to withhold my judgment until I hear want the hell they’re talking about.”

The impact of the case, Gertner said, could be long-standing.

“I think the impact of this arrest, the intention was to intimidate judges,” Gernter said. “I think that the response of the 150 judges who signed Judge Luttig’s and my letter makes it clear that’s not going to work.”

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