Republicans in the Assembly re-elected Speaker Robin Vos, while Democrats in the Wisconsin Senate re-elected Dianne Hesselbein as Minority Leader.
Senate Republicans last week re-elected Sen. Devin LeMahieu as Majority Leader.
Democrats in the Assembly are the only ones who have not yet voted for their leader. That vote is set for Tuesday.
The leadership re-elections signal that next year likely won’t be that much different from the past two years at the Capitol in Madison.
In fact, both Vos and Hasselbein said their priorities for the new session are no different than their priorities from the one that’s about to end.
“We have an opportunity to make sure that the wishes of the public in Wisconsin become the reality that we work on over the next 14 to 15 months,” Vols told reporters.
The new legislature will be tasked with writing a new state budget.
Hesselbein said Democrats want to add to that state budget and spend more on Gov. Tony Evers’ top priorities.
“We know that there’s no reason we should be fighting on these. Whether it’s Medicaid expansion, supporting K-12 [education], higher education, technical colleges, paid family medical leave, and helping support those people that with Child Care Counts. These are issues that we all care deeply about, and those are the things that we’re going to be fighting for on day one,” Hesselbein said.
Vos said Assembly Republicans are not looking to spend any more money in the new state budget.
“Voters are saying they want us to focus on what’s important to them. I think our campaigns really did that. They were focused almost entirely on ‘How do we deal with the inflation that’s ravaging through every income strata and every part of Wisconsin?’ If you talk to most folks they know the price of groceries. They know that rent is higher. They know that the cost of just about everything is higher,” Vos said. “We have a record-surplus and…at least for Assembly Republicans, we are not in a rush to spend that. We are in a rush to return it back to the people of Wisconsin. The best way that we can help folks deal with inflation is by putting the money that they overpaid back in their wallets, so that they can choose to spend it on things that are important to their family. So that’s going to be something that we work on right away next spring.”
The new legislature will take its oath and begin its new session in January.
