Your Representatives in the News

Your Reps

State Assembly Representative Garey Bies

Bies sponsored a bill with Senator Luther Olsen, a Republican from Ripon, that would make it a felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison to hide someone wanted for a serious felony. Hiding someone wanted for a less serious felony would be punishable by 3.5 years in prison.

The current law protects a suspect’s spouse and immediate family from prosecution for hiding a felon or hiding or destroying evidence.

The bill passed the Assembly Committee on Criminal Justice 7-4 and will go to the full Assembly.

Source:  The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Governor Scott Walker

Walker was selected for jury duty for a personal injury lawsuit, but wasn’t allowed to be part of the deliberations. After being selected he told the judge that he had received $2,000 in campaign donations from the CEO of Secura Insurance, the firm that was defendant in the case. Walker was then asked to serve as an alternate juror, and dismissed from the case after closing arguments.

“Nobody should consider themselves too busy to be picked [for jury duty],” Walker said.

Source:  The Associated Press, Politico

U.S. Senator Ron Johnson

Johnson talked about his lawsuit to block the federal government from helping to pay for Congress and staff’s health care coverage at an event in Waukesha, Wis. He said Congress shouldn’t get special treatment.

Johnson has long been an opponent of the Affordable Care Act, and has told the story of his daughter’s life-saving heart surgery she underwent as an infant. He said the Affordable Care Act would have prevented his daughter from having access to doctors qualified to perform the surgery.

The surgeon who did perform the surgery, Dr. John Foker, spoke with a liberal news blog Uppity Wisconsin about his general support of the Affordable Care Act.

Source:  Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Huffington Post

U.S. Senator Tammy Baldwin

Baldwin has pledged to support the state’s timber industry and wants to reform the forest management system by increasing funding to support additional logging and clarifying regulations to promote environmentally sound harvesting. The reforms would result in increased logging in the Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest in the state’s north woods region. She doesn’t support mandated cutting.

Forest service funds have been diverted from timber restoration and road maintenance to go toward putting out fires in the western U.S.

Baldwin also advocates passing the Farm Bill to clarify rules for loggers and investing in conservation programs.

Source:  Stevens Point Journal

President Barack Obama

Fifty years after Lyndon B. Johnson’s war on poverty, Obama announced efforts to encourage private investment, job creation and increases in student performance in five “promise zones” around the country. The first five promise zones include an eight-county area of Kentucky, San Antonio, Philadelphia, Los Angeles and the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma.

Source:  The Courier Journal