This week's survey question

This week, Representative David Crowley (D-Milwaukee) and Senator Dave Hansen (D-Green Bay), introduced LRB-1105, a bill to make voter registration automatic. Under this proposal, Wisconsinites would be automatically registered to vote when they receive or renew their driver's license or state-issued identification card. There is a provision in the bill, however, that would allow individuals to opt out of having the Wisconsin Department of Transportation transfer their personal information to the State Elections Commission. Similar legislation, introduced during the 2015 session, never received a public hearing in either house of the legislature.

Wisconsin has online and same-day registration, making registering to vote already easily accessible. This legislation attempts to solve a problem that does not exist: access to voter registration. If access to voter registration were a problem, 2.7 million Wisconsinites would not have cast ballots in the 2018 midterm elections; the highest turnout ever in a non-presidential election year.

Please, take a minute to answer my one-question survey regarding automatic voter registration. 

Click here for my survey

Survey Results

Thank you to everyone who provided input on Medicaid expansion. In total 57 individuals responded to last week's survey question. 69 percent of survey respondents agreed with the Joint Finance Committee's decision to remove Medicaid funding from the 2019-21 biennial budget. 

Conversely, just 28 percent of respondents believed Medicaid expansion should have remained in the budget.

As more information regarding this issue becomes available, my office will keep readers abreast.

Spring Survey

Thank you to everyone in the 60th Assembly District who has taken the time to complete my 2019 spring budget survey; I have enjoyed reading your thoughts on the biennial budget. At this writing, 712 individuals have completed this year's survey. If you have yet to do so, there is still time. If you want to save on postage, feel free to take the survey online. I look forward to reading your thoughts on Governor Evers' 2019-21 budget and the issues of greatest interest to you and your families. 

Memorial Day

On Monday, May 27, we commemorate the nearly three million Americans who made the ultimate sacrifice to ensure that liberty, freedom, and opportunity remain the bedrocks of our society.

Originally known as Observance Day, the last Monday of May--which became an official day of observance following congressional passage of the National Holiday Act of 1971--now observed as Memorial Day, is a day of remembrance for those who have perished in defense of this country. 

Born out of the Civil War, a battle that divided the nation, free and slave, resulted in more than 200,000 thousand casualties, Observance Day was established in a proclamation on May 5, 1868, by John Logan, national director of the Grand Army of the Republic.

In his oft-forgotten Order Eleven, John Logan wrote of the heroic sacrifice made by hundreds-of-thousands of Americans, "The 30th of May 1868, is designed for the purpose of strewing with flowers or otherwise decorating the graves of comrades who died in defense of their country and whose bodies now lie in almost every city, village, and hamlet churchyard in the land."

151 years later, Logan's words remain true: we remember and observe the sacrifices made by our comrades on the battlefield to ensure that the freedoms we have come to cherish; chiefly, liberty, free speech, and individual freedom, will forever be enshrined in the foundations of our republic.

Memorial Day is one in which Americans from all walks of life, creeds, religious backgrounds, and political parties, come together to honor our brave servicemen and women who answered America's call to serve and gave the ultimate sacrifice. It is a day for Americans to stand up as a united force to thank the men and women died fighting to protect our freedom.

Let us never forget these courageous men and women who gave their last full measure of devotion to ensure that America would remain the great bastion of hope, freedom, and opportunity, our world has ever known. 

James Garfield, a Major General in the Union Army who fought in the battles of Shiloh and Chickamauga, and later served as the nation's 20th president, echoed in his 1868 Observance Day speech, the meaning of this day. Surrounded by the graves of those who perished at Gettysburg, just four years earlier, Garfield said of those who gave their lives in defense of this country: "We do not know one promise these men made, one pledge they gave, one word they spoke: but we do know they summed up and perfected, by one supreme act, the highest virtues of men and citizens. For love of country, they accepted death, and thus resolved all doubts, and made immortal their patriotism and virtue."

Please take some time this week to reflect on the sacrifices made by these brave men and women. Have a happy Memorial Day weekend. 

60th District Events

The following are a few events that will be occurring this week, in the 60th Assembly District. If you have any upcoming events that you would like included in my weekly e-update, please contact my office.

May Bird Walk at the Cedarburg Bog, May 25, Cedarburg

Ozaukee Master Gardeners Heirloom Plant and Herb Sale, May 25, Mequon

53rd Cedarburg Maxwell Street Days, May 26, Cedarburg

12th Annual Port Washington Community Street Festival, Port Washington, May 26

Memorial Day Parade, Saukville, May 27

West Bend Memorial Day Parade, West Bend, May 27

Ethnobotany at the Cedarburg Bog, Cedarburg, May 27

Stay up to date

One of the best ways to date with what is happening in Madison is to sign up for the legislature's notification tracking system. This service affords you with the opportunity to track legislative activities in Madison. Upon creation of a free account, you can sign up to receive notification about specific bills of committees as well as legislative activity pertaining to a subject (i.e., health care, education, etc.).