From WisPolitics.com/WisBusiness.com …
— U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin blasted the Trump administration over mass firings at the Department of Health and Human Services.
The administration earlier this month moved to fire roughly 1,000 HHS employees amid the government shutdown. Baldwin, D-Madison, and 30 of her Democratic congressional colleagues in a letter argued the move “hurts and endangers all Americans in every state, in communities across the country.”
They also charged President Donald Trump and Budget Director Russell Vought with “relishing the government shutdown they created to play politics with Americans’ health and well-being.”
“Continuing to fire employees who administer and oversee critical HHS programs in every state does not make the government more efficient—it will only lead to more funding delays this year, less effective use of taxpayer dollars, and more risk of fraud and abuse,” they argued. “This leaves the United States less prepared in the face of a public health emergency and puts the health and well-being of every American at risk.”
See the release and letter here.
— A group of Democratic lawmakers today rolled out legislation that would fund a project to identify remains of missing Wisconsin servicemembers, spend $5 million on mental health services and recognize Veterans Day as a state holiday.
One of the bills in the “Veterans Promise” package would spend $500,000 on the UW Missing-in-Action Recovery and Identification Project. Rep. Christine Sinicki, D-Milwaukee, said the federal government currently has a program to identify the remains of veterans who have been reported as missing in action. Sinicki at a news conference today said “to date, they have not assigned our MIA team to any Wisconsin MIAs.”
“With 1,500 Wisconsin servicemembers still missing, more of this can and should be done as soon as possible,” she said.
Another bill would provide $5 million to the Department of Veterans Affairs to help prompt and assist access to mental health services for veterans.
“We need to ensure our veterans have at the ready the support and resources they need to address any mental health challenges they are experiencing,” Sen. Sarah Keyeski, D-Lodi, said. “We owe them this.”
The third and final bill in the package would recognize Nov. 11, Veterans Day, as a state holiday.
Wisconsin is currently the only state in the union that does not officially recognize the day as a state holiday.
Watch the news conference here.
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