MADISON, Wis. — Republicans who control the Wisconsin Legislature said two big cases before the state Supreme Court could delay their work on a new state budget.
Both cases address the governor’s partial veto powers and could determine how much authority Democratic Gov. Tony Evers has to strike down portions of the spending plan Republicans propose.
“We’re kind of stuck, in many ways, until we see what happens with those two court cases,” Assembly Speaker Robin Vos said.
The Wisconsin Supreme Court heard a challenge last October to a creative veto by Evers that extended a school funding increase for more than 400 years. However, justices still have not issued an opinion in the case. It’s not uncommon for the court to take upwards of six months to rule.
The delay in receiving a ruling poses a greater problem for legislative Republicans in a second case pending before the court. That lawsuit challenges Evers’ partial veto of a plan to spend $50 million that had been appropriated for literacy education in the last budget.
Watch: Will we have a state budget on time? GOP says it depends on the Supreme Court
The court isn’t set to hear that lawsuit until next month. Meanwhile, a new two-year budget is due on June 30.
“You don’t actually know the rules that you’re operating under in passing a budget,” Senate Majority Leader Devin LeMahieu said.
Republicans argue that Evers’ partial veto of the literacy bill was unconstitutional because the governor’s partial veto power only applies to appropriations bills. If the court’s liberal majority rules in Evers’ favor, it could greatly expand the kinds of legislation he can amend going forward.
“This idea that the governor—who’s already got the strongest line-item veto in the country—is now going to be able to take bills that clearly don’t have an appropriation and rework them—that’s not acceptable,” Vos said. “We just have to wait and see.”
Democrats accused Republicans of delaying much-needed aid for state agencies and local governments.
“Cities, towns, villages and school boards, and everyone across the state of Wisconsin is counting on us to do our job,” Senate Minority Leader Dianne Hesselbein said. “Not passing a budget is unacceptable and reckless.”
If the Legislature doesn’t pass a budget by June 30, Wisconsin government won’t shut down. Instead, funding will remain at current levels until a new budget is in place. That could be an issue for agencies dealing with the costs of inflation or local governments trying to plan their own budgets around an uncertain amount of state funding.
For now, Republican leaders say they're still on track to pass a budget on time. The Legislature's powerful budget-writing committee recently scheduled a series of budget listening sessions across the state in April.
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