Source: Politics<\/p>\n
BURLINGTON, Wis. \u2014 Robin Vos isn\u2019t the governor of Wisconsin. But he certainly acts like he is.<\/p>\n
For nearly three years, the state Assembly speaker has used his Republican majority \u2014 and the support of the Republicans who control the state Senate \u2014 to block, thwart or resist almost every significant move made by Democratic Gov. Tony Evers.<\/p>\n
Before Evers even took office in 2019, Vos led the charge to strip power from the incoming governor. When the pandemic hit, Vos helped curb Evers\u2019 authority to declare public health emergencies. This spring, Vos tried to commandeer federal rescue money that the governor had the authority to dole out.<\/p>\n
And when it comes to the governor\u2019s legislative priorities, Vos has killed every one. He threw out Evers\u2019 budget proposals and had Republicans write their own. When the governor called a special legislative session to force lawmakers to discuss gun control, Vos dismissed the idea out of hand. Both chambers adjourned almost immediately. Lawmakers did the same when the governor called further special sessions on school funding (twice), police reforms, expanding Medicaid and moving the date of the April 2020 primary election because of Covid-19.<\/p>\n
In January, Evers delivered his annual State of the State speech to lawmakers via video message. After it was over, Vos gave his own speech from the same spot in the Assembly chamber where Evers would have normally stood during his address. Vos tore into the governor, attacking him on everything from vaccine distribution to tax policy to unemployment benefits. \u201cGov. Evers,\u201d Vos said, \u201cdo your job.\u201d<\/p>\n
Vos\u2019 brazen moves to box in Evers \u2014 and his success in doing so \u2014 make him a rare specimen among state lawmakers. Governors asserted unprecedented powers in the early days of the pandemic, and lawmakers in many states chafed at the broad executive reach. But few have done more to constrain gubernatorial power than Vos, the president of the National Conference of State Legislatures.<\/p>\n
His approach is simple and offers a model for Republican legislators serving with Democratic governors in other swing states: Deny Democrats any big policy wins, thus depriving them of any major accomplishments to promote when seeking reelection. Evers, like most governors, is up again next year.<\/p>\n
Vos, the longest-serving speaker in Wisconsin history, blames the governor for their antagonistic relationship, but he is especially irked by Evers\u2019 decision not to meet regularly with legislative leaders. Vos and Evers often go months without talking face-to-face.<\/p>\n
\u201cI am somewhat jealous of my colleagues around the country when they have a relationship with a governor who at least is smart on policy or is passionate about X, Y or Z,\u201d Vos said in an interview over the summer.<\/p>\n
Sitting at a table at one of his favorite restaurants, munching on a lunch of burgers and cheese curds, the legislative leader relished the chance to explain how he has outmaneuvered his opponents \u2014 particularly the governor. He said he wished he had a better adversary in the governor\u2019s office, someone with the inclination to take him on. <\/p>\n
\u201cOur governor,\u201d he said as he folded his hands in front of him, \u201chas no passion and no policy chops on the vast majority of issues. So it\u2019s very hard to have an intellectual conversation and get into the topic to say, how do we fix that problem with [someone] who doesn\u2019t necessarily think of that as their job.\u201d<\/p>\n
Evers, who recently announced he is running for a second term, isn\u2019t bothered by the criticism from his frenetic adversary. \u201cI have nothing against Robin Vos personally,\u201d Evers said in another interview, speaking by phone. \u201cI just told him pretty much that my job is not only to listen to the speaker but to the people of Wisconsin. … I don\u2019t spend a lot of time worrying about our relationship.\u201d<\/p>\n
Many Wisconsin Democrats see Vos as the biggest obstacle to passing changes they say are popular among Wisconsin residents \u2014 an obstructionist out for political gain.<\/p>\n
\u201cHaving a Democratic governor dramatically changed things, especially the Republicans\u2019 ability to continue the downward spiral of our state,\u201d said state Rep. Gordon Hintz, the leader of the Assembly Democrats. \u201cBut the same toxic politics that the speaker was known for before Gov. Evers [continue]. You\u2019re seeing the same national model being applied to suffocating the Democratic governor during his four years.\u201d<\/p>\n
Vos, 53, has long been influential among Wisconsin Republicans. He helped turn Wisconsin into a perpetual political battleground, starting a decade ago when he shepherded legislation promoted by then-Gov. Scott Walker that weakened unions and brought 100,000 protesters to Madison.<\/p>\n
But Vos became a more prominent figure with the general public \u2014 almost a household name in his state \u2014 after 2018. Democrats swept all the statewide offices in that fall\u2019s election and many prominent Republicans left public life. Vos\u2019 counterpart in the state Senate ran for Congress and won. That leaves Vos front and center as the voice of Republicans in his state.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe’s probably the highest-profile elected Republican in the state right now, at least when it comes to state issues,\u201d Walker, the Republican former governor, said in an interview. \u201cThat\u2019s because the Legislature really is the safeguard from things going absolutely crazy in Wisconsin.\u201d<\/p>\n
But that also means a lot of the media scrutiny and criticism from the left \u2014 animosity that used to be directed at Walker \u2014 is now focused on Vos, Walker said.<\/p>\n
Rep. Mark Pocan, a Democrat who became friends with Vos when they both served in the Wisconsin Assembly, said much of Vos\u2019 influence had been overlooked when Walker was governor.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhile Scott Walker might have been talking about the ham sandwiches in his brown paper bag, the real person probably doing the heavy lifting was Robin Vos behind the scenes,\u201d Pocan said. \u201cNow his role is more visible, but I think he\u2019s always been fairly influential.\u201d<\/p>\n
As one of Wisconsin\u2019s most powerful Republicans, Vos has also had to placate former President Donald Trump. Vos met with Trump<\/a> on the former president\u2019s plane in August, after Trump criticized Vos for blocking investigations into the 2020 election.<\/p>\n And despite Vos\u2019 reputation for hardball politics, he comes across as friendly and engaging in person. He seems eager to answer tough questions, and he never seems at a loss for words. <\/p>\n \u201cHe\u2019s very sharp, very savvy,\u201d says Tim Storey, the executive director of the National Conference of State Legislatures. \u201cHe\u2019s one of the most savvy political thinkers that I\u2019ve ever worked with. And he sees the world through that lens.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cHe\u2019s a skilled conversationalist,\u201d Storey added. \u201cHe\u2019s sharp with facts, and he doesn\u2019t just skim along the surface. He\u2019ll get down in the weeds.\u201d<\/p>\n Vos said one of the things that sets him apart from other politicians is that he is not interested in any higher office. It\u2019s a point he made several times, unprompted, during an hourlong interview.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen I made the decision to be speaker, I thought long and hard about it: Is this something where I\u2019m going to want to run for Congress or for governor?\u201d he said. \u201cI am very much at peace with saying: This is the last elected job I am going to hold. So I feel like my perspective as a legislator is dramatically different than everybody else\u2019s.\u201d<\/p>\n He talked over lunch at one of Vos\u2019 favorite stops, a restaurant called Fred\u2019s, in Burlington, Wis. It\u2019s a squat brick building next to a railroad crossing where freight trains regularly rumble by. Inside, the restaurant is surprisingly bright, its wooden walls decorated mostly with memorabilia from local high school teams, the Packers and the Bucks. Vos\u2019 aides suggested meeting there.<\/p>\n The speaker, who showed up in a trim red University of Wisconsin polo shirt, said his staff didn\u2019t even tell him what the interview was about, but he was eager to talk about his relationship with the governor. Vos is not the kind of guy who needs notes, much less talking points.<\/p>\n He groused about the news of the day, an announcement about Evers\u2019 plan to give federal money to 10 groups to improve workforce development<\/a> (\u201cHow innovative is that?\u201d Vos asked. \u201cThat\u2019s not even lazy. That\u2019s sad.\u201d) He wondered why Evers hasn\u2019t tried to govern from the center, like Republican Gov. Charlie Baker has with the solidly Democratic legislature in Massachusetts. (\u201cIt would have frustrated me, because it would have made [Evers] more effective. It would have made him harder to target,\u201d Vos said.)<\/p>\n Throughout his political career, Vos has never strayed far from his home in Racine County. The speaker has spent all of his life in southeastern Wisconsin, in small towns just inland from Racine and Kenosha, which sit on the shore of Lake Michigan. <\/p>\n The landscape near Vos\u2019 home is carved up with creeks and small lakes, with plenty of corn and soybean fields in between. It is also close enough to the industrial cities along Lake Michigan that Vos’ predominantly white district includes subdivisions and strip malls on its eastern edge. Vos\u2019 district, in which he won with 58 percent of the vote in 2020, is adjacent to a Racine-based district that, in the same election, a Democrat won with more than 70 percent of the vote.<\/p>\n Vos got his start in politics in college at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater, where he graduated in 1991.<\/p>\n Then-Gov. Tommy Thompson, a Republican, picked Vos to serve as a student representative on the University of Wisconsin\u2019s board of trustees. Vos was also college roommates with Reince Priebus, who later became chair of the Republican National Committee and Trump\u2019s first White House chief of staff. Priebus didn\u2019t respond to inquiries about Vos.<\/p>\n Vos first won elected office in 1994, the Republican wave election that gave the GOP control of Congress during Bill Clinton\u2019s first term as president. Vos won a seat on the county board, where he stayed for 10 years before running for and winning his Assembly seat in 2004.<\/p>\n By the time Scott Walker won the governorship in the 2010 elections, Vos earned enough standing in his caucus to secure a spot as one of two chairs of the Legislature\u2019s powerful Joint Finance Committee. That gave Vos a hands-on role in advancing the legislation known as Act 10, Walker\u2019s effort to undermine teachers unions in the state.<\/p>\n \u201cOther than myself and maybe my lieutenant governor, Rebecca Kleefisch, I don\u2019t think there was any better, more forceful advocate for the reforms we were doing in Act 10 early on,\u201d Walker said. \u201cHe knew his stuff, he articulated it, and that went a long way.\u201d<\/p>\n Vos became the Assembly speaker after the 2012 election. His caucus ended up with 61 percent of the Assembly seats while getting fewer than half of the votes cast in Assembly races that year. It was the first time the state used Republican-drawn legislative maps that Evers and other Democrats say give Republicans an unfair advantage<\/a>. A professor working for Republicans to draft the map concluded that Democrats would have to win 54 percent of the statewide vote<\/a> to take the majority in the Assembly.<\/p>\n Democrats challenged the maps in court for denying their party fair representation, but eventually the U.S. Supreme Court ruled against them.<\/p>\n With Republicans solidly in control of the statehouse, Vos was able to get many of his priorities passed, including large tax cuts, a voter ID law and making Wisconsin a \u201cright-to-work\u201d state. Vos met with Walker and then-Senate President Scott Fitzgerald (who is now a member of the House) every Wednesday.<\/p>\n Wisconsin Republicans enjoyed national prominence, especially as the \u201cCheesehead Revolution\u201d brought Priebus into the White House, Paul Ryan into the speakership in Congress and Walker into national fame as a conservative icon.<\/p>\n Their clout was on display in 2017, when the White House and Foxconn Technology Group announced that the company would spend $10 billion to build high-end video screens in Wisconsin. Trump later described the planned facility as the \u201ceighth Wonder of the World.\u201d Vos helped steer an incentive package for the development through the Wisconsin Legislature, and Foxconn eventually chose a site in Vos\u2019 district for the development.<\/p>\n But the Cheesehead Revolution turned out to be short-lived. After the 2018 election, Priebus and Ryan had left the federal government and, most importantly for Vos, Walker lost his bid for a third term as governor.<\/p>\n Now Vos would have to work with Evers, a mild-mannered former state superintendent of education who had largely stayed out of the partisan clashes that consumed Wisconsin under Walker. The incoming Democrat had talked about expanding Medicaid, boosting state funding for schools and renegotiating the state\u2019s incentive package for Foxconn. Before Evers could even celebrate his victory, Vos began working on ways to limit his power.<\/p>\n Less than 24 hours<\/a> after Evers won his election, Vos started talking to reporters about weakening the power of the executive branch and strengthening the power of the legislature.<\/p>\n But Vos had actually started planning the move half a year earlier, when Walker warned that a blue wave could swamp Republican candidates in Wisconsin. GOP lawmakers eventually approved changes that give the legislature more say in the formation of administrative rules, increased lawmakers\u2019 power over the state economic development agency and prevented the governor from applying for waivers from federal programs without legislative approval.<\/p>\n Walker signed the changes into law. They were \u201coverwhelmingly things that codified practices that I already had,\u201d he said. Walker says, though, that he rejected proposals from some Republican lawmakers to scale back the veto powers of Wisconsin governors, which are some of the most expansive in the country.<\/p>\n The speaker insists that the moves were primarily to push back against the growing power of the governor\u2019s office and that he would have sought similar changes even if Walker had been reelected. <\/p>\n \u201cWe made a mistake in the first two years after Governor Walker [took office]. We ceded too much authority to the governor. We did it for generations,\u201d Vos said. \u201cSo when I became speaker, I became very focused on giving no additional power to the executive.\u201d<\/p>\n Whatever the motivation, it was certainly a rocky start for the relationship between the speaker and the governor.<\/p>\n It didn\u2019t get any better after Evers took office.<\/p>\n Vos says he asked for one-on-one meetings with the governor, with no staff present. The Evers camp accused him of being sexist, because the governor\u2019s chief of staff is a woman. <\/p>\n Evers, meanwhile, remembers inviting lawmakers of both parties over for a night of euchre, a favorite card game of the governor\u2019s and a staple of Wisconsin culture up there with Friday fish fries. But only one Republican showed up because, the governor says, Republican leaders warned their lawmakers not to attend.<\/p>\n The onset of the Covid-19 pandemic made the relationship between Vos and Evers even worse. Not only did they disagree over how to handle the public health crisis, the governor and speaker also lined up on different sides as Wisconsin became an electoral battleground and protests against police brutality in the state turned deadly.<\/p>\n When the pandemic started, Evers wanted to postpone Wisconsin\u2019s April presidential primary and state Supreme Court election. Vos and other Republicans filed a flurry of lawsuits to block the governor\u2019s moves and won, meaning the state held an in-person election (pictures of Milwaukee voters in long lines to vote in-person circulated the country) while the governor\u2019s stay-at-home order was still in effect.<\/p>\n Vos volunteered as a poll worker on Election Day and conducted an interview with a local newspaper where he assured voters that it was \u201cincredibly safe to go out.\u201d The video showed him dressed in latex gloves, a surgical mask, goggles and a plastic gown. He later clarified that the city election agency he volunteered for required all poll workers to wear the protective gear<\/a>, but Democrats mocked him for pushing for an in-person election under those circumstances anyway.<\/p>\n Later that month, Vos and Fitzgerald sued to block the Evers administration from extending a stay-at-home order, arguing that it would leave Wisconsin\u2019s economy \u201cin shambles.\u201d The conservative majority on the state supreme court agreed in May, and Wisconsin became the first state where a court invalidated a governor\u2019s coronavirus restrictions.<\/p>\n The rebuke from the high court left Evers with fewer options as the pandemic stretched on. He didn\u2019t issue a mask mandate until July, after most governors had already done so. Vos and Fitzgerald supported an unsuccessful effort to strike down the mask mandate last fall, but, eventually, the state Supreme Court also blocked Evers from requiring masks this March.<\/p>\n Protests against police brutality broke out in August 2020 in Kenosha, not far from where Vos lives, after a white police officer shot a Black man, Jacob Blake, seven times and left him paralyzed.<\/p>\n The governor tried to call the Wisconsin Legislature \u2014 which had been largely absent in Madison during 2020 \u2014 into a special session to address police misconduct. Predictably, Vos adjourned the session as soon as it started.<\/p>\n The Republican speaker also criticized Evers for not calling out the National Guard to disperse the protests. He blamed the governor after Kyle Rittenhouse, an Illinois teen, shot three protesters and killed two of them.<\/p>\n \u201cThose people did not need to die,\u201d Vos said in a radio interview at the time<\/a>. \u201cBut, because of Tony Evers\u2019 actions, they\u2019re dead. \u2026 People are literally dead, because folks have had to take to themselves to try to protect their own property.\u201d<\/p>\n As the November elections drew near, the governor tried to blame Vos and other Republicans for not taking the Covid-19 crisis seriously. Evers wasn\u2019t even on the ballot last year, but Vos was. The speaker faced the best-funded Democratic challenger in his career in that election, thanks to outside groups that wanted to rattle the speaker. Vos won easily. Still, he admitted he was nervous about the outcome. When he won, he called the vote a \u201crepudiation of Tony Evers\u2019 leadership style.\u201d<\/p>\n The pandemic is by no means over, but the governor says Vos and other Republican lawmakers did more to hurt, rather than help, the state\u2019s recovery efforts.<\/p>\n \u201cThey were not in session for 300 days during the pandemic,\u201d Evers said in an interview. \u201cThe work that was done in the state of Wisconsin, that I\u2019m proud of \u2014 getting the PPE, making sure we were getting shots in arms, making sure we had a good testing program \u2014 all of the things that happened during this pandemic, we did alone. The Legislature had nothing to do with it, except to make it more difficult for people.\u201d<\/p>\n The speaker says the pandemic underscored how much power governors across the country exerted, and he worried that too many of them failed to work with their legislatures as the pandemic progressed.<\/p>\n Vos argues that it is legislatures that should take the lead.<\/p>\n \u201cI want the Legislature to never weaken, because we are the most representative body in the country,\u201d Vos said. \u201cWe are the ones who have public hearings. We are the ones where you can call somebody and get a return call. You can go to a town hall meeting anywhere in the state and talk to a legislator, because we\u2019re that accessible.\u201d<\/p>\n Democrats chafe at the idea that the Wisconsin Legislature is \u201crepresentative,\u201d because of what they see as gerrymandered districts that prevent Democrats in urban areas like Milwaukee and Madison from having their votes count in the statehouse. (A panel of federal judges also redrew two legislative districts under the original GOP plan<\/a>, because they found the districts would have weakened Hispanic voting strength.)<\/p>\n Hintz, the leader of the Assembly Democrats, says the district maps protect Republican lawmakers from repercussions at the polls.<\/p>\n \u201cThe speaker and the Republicans have suffocated the legislative process, because they don\u2019t want Gov. Evers to be successful,\u201d Hintz said. \u201cSo they scheduled fewer days, we meet fewer days, we pass fewer bills and the governor signs fewer laws. And there\u2019s no accountability, because there\u2019s no chance that they were going to lose their seats.\u201d<\/p>\n But Evers could erase some of the Republicans\u2019 advantages in upcoming legislative races. The governor can veto any redistricting plan Republican lawmakers advance now that new Census numbers are out, which would likely throw to the courts the decision over what maps to use. (Democrats have already filed a lawsuit to try to get federal judges to draw new maps.)<\/p>\n That\u2019s not a guarantee that Democrats will prevail in the 2022 legislative elections, but it probably beats trying to win under the maps drawn by Republicans a decade ago.<\/p>\n The governor and Republican legislators recently clashed on the rules for the upcoming elections, too. Evers vetoed six GOP bills<\/a> that would have made it harder for voters to obtain and use absentee ballots, put restrictions on voting in nursing homes and stepped up scrutiny of local elections officials. <\/p>\n That came after Vos announced the Assembly would hire its own investigators, including a former state supreme court judge, to investigate what he calls irregularities in the 2020 elections. Vos said he regards Joe Biden as the winner of the state\u2019s presidential contest, but he raised questions about disparities in how officials in Wisconsin\u2019s 1,850 municipalities ran their elections. <\/p>\n Vos has not gone far enough to satisfy many critics on the right \u2014 including, initially, Trump<\/a> \u2014 who falsely claim Trump won the 2020 election. The Republican chair of an Assembly elections committee has issued subpoenas<\/a> for election officials in Milwaukee and Green Bay to turn over materials. Evers has said the local officials should respond to the subpoenas with a \u201chell no!\u201d Legal experts say Vos must sign off on the subpoenas first, and Vos said he will leave the decision to the investigators the Assembly Republicans hired.<\/p>\n There is one move that Evers recently pulled that has flummoxed Vos and his fellow Republicans: He agreed with them.<\/p>\n Specifically, the governor signed the Republicans\u2019 proposed budget into law, including a $2 billion tax cut.<\/p>\n It was a far, far different spending plan than the one the governor proposed himself earlier in the year, which included tax increases, Medicaid expansion, a minimum wage hike, the legalization of marijuana, the repeal of Act 10 and more spending on schools.<\/p>\n Evers said he approved the Republican-drafted budget, with a few minor changes, because he promised to cut income taxes for middle class residents by 10 percent. He made progress toward that goal in an earlier budget, but \u201cI knew this would get us over that hump,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n The governor also points out that, if he had vetoed the bill, the state could have lost out on $2.3 billion in federal coronavirus relief funds for schools.<\/p>\n Wisconsin political experts have also speculated that signing the budget could boost Evers\u2019 reelection effort, because it lets him take credit for a major Republican priority: lowering taxes.<\/p>\n Even though Evers\u2019 decision is a major win for Republicans, Vos is incredulous. Once Republicans rejected the governor\u2019s budget, Evers never tried to fight for his priorities in the ensuing negotiations, Vos said. \u201cNever a call. Never an email. Never even a text message or a contact to say: \u2018Why don\u2019t we talk about my priorities?\u2019\u201d he said. \u201cPhoning it in would be the kindest way of putting what he did with the budget. If you\u2019re serious about it, wouldn\u2019t you actually lobby for it?\u201d<\/p>\n Evers doesn\u2019t see what good it would do to engage with such an intransigent foe.<\/p>\n The governor said if he called up Vos and pushed for, say, expanding Medicaid, which 70 percent of Wisconsin voters<\/a> supported in a 2019 Marquette University Law School Poll, \u201che\u2019d say, \u2018No.\u2019 End of story.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n \u201cHe wouldn\u2019t say, \u2018If you did this, I\u2019d give you Medicaid.\u2019 That\u2019s not going to happen,\u201d Evers said. \u201cIt might be dysfunctional, but he makes it clear he can essentially ignore the will of the people of Wisconsin, and, frankly, there\u2019s nothing I can do about it.\u201d<\/p>\nA rocky start<\/h5>\n
Pandemic deepens divisions<\/h5>\n
\u2018There\u2019s no accountability\u2018<\/h5>\n