1/ Gov. Evers gave his 2023-2025 budget address tonight in Madison. The Governor spoke for about 40 minutes, a very short speech compared to years past and a speech that was scarce on details, especially given the unprecedented amount of new spending that he is proposing.. pic.twitter.com/UnPWr2sH6V
— MacIver Institute (@MacIverWisc) February 16, 2023
2/ In press releases leading up to the speech, the Gov has outlined several dozens of new programs and billions more in higher spending, tonight he barely touched on any of it. Evers had a prime time opportunity to make the case for his vision for WI but he did not take it.
— MacIver Institute (@MacIverWisc) February 16, 2023
3/ Gov. Evers is proposing another massive & unsustainable state government spending spree, his 2023 budget would spend $103 billion all funds, a $13 billion dollar increase over the last budget or a 14% increase.
— MacIver Institute (@MacIverWisc) February 16, 2023
4/ In Gov. Evers’ first two budgets, all funds spending increased $14 billion. For comparison, Gov. Walker’s first budget spent $66 billion all funds. Walker’s budgets increased on average about $2.5 billion all funds. pic.twitter.com/ujfiDIoowx
— MacIver Institute (@MacIverWisc) February 16, 2023
5/ If this budget passed unchanged, each of Evers’ budgets will increase on average about $9 billion all funds. Keep in mind, all of these recent increases in state spending come on top of the massive amount of covid aid that the federal government has handed out recently.
— MacIver Institute (@MacIverWisc) February 16, 2023
6/ Wisconsin governments, businesses and individuals have received $58 billion in covid aid. Gov. Evers tried to gloss over his reckless spending and portray himself as a moderate tonight by uttering the words “we need to save where we can. “
— MacIver Institute (@MacIverWisc) February 16, 2023
7/ Not sure if even the mainstream media will buy that given these unfathomable spending increases. Evers of course talked about bipartisanship and working together w/ Republicans just before he criticized them from the podium.
— MacIver Institute (@MacIverWisc) February 16, 2023
8/ Evers proclaimed that he would be meeting his promise of a “10 percent, middle-class tax cut.” What he forgot to mention is that his $1.2 billion in additional tax credits for the select few are paid for by increasing taxes by $1.4 billion on the successful and job-creators.
— MacIver Institute (@MacIverWisc) February 16, 2023
9/ Evers congratulated himself for proposing the largest K12 investment in state history but for some reason did not spend much time at all on K12. And Evers certainly did not talk about the real crisis in K12 education – our plunging academic and literacy scores. pic.twitter.com/xlKCQADoCc
— MacIver Institute (@MacIverWisc) February 16, 2023
10/ Almost 60% of our children are failing – testing BELOW their grade level – English and Math on the Forward Exam but the Gov refused to talk about the problem. Instead, he said free breakfast and lunch for all students, not just the needy, will make them “course-work ready.” pic.twitter.com/Iq7OVv4E6v
— MacIver Institute (@MacIverWisc) February 16, 2023
11/ Our K12 academic achievement/literacy scores are so poor, his whole speech should have centered around why the education establishment is failing our children and how we are going to fix the problem. I wish our dismal test scores could be simply solved by a full stomach.
— MacIver Institute (@MacIverWisc) February 16, 2023
12/ It is infuriating that Gov. Evers refuses to own up to the problem and beyond disappointing that he won’t help our children get back on track.
— MacIver Institute (@MacIverWisc) February 16, 2023
13/ Evers talked about the latest Youth Risk Survey and the daunting challenges that our kids face, he repeated his slogan that what is best for our kids is what is best for our state. He even went so far to say that parents are the first and best educators for their children,
— MacIver Institute (@MacIverWisc) February 16, 2023
14/ yet Gov. Evers didn’t mention his veto last session of the Parents’ Bill of Rights which would force educators to recognize a parent’s right to make decisions about their child’s education, healthcare, and welfare.
— MacIver Institute (@MacIverWisc) February 16, 2023
15/ Gov. Evers – How can we be the best educators for our children, how can we be their parents if schools deliberately keep us in the dark about what our kids are going through or feeling?
— MacIver Institute (@MacIverWisc) February 16, 2023
16/ Gov. Evers finished his short and obtuse speech by stating that his priorities are not extreme, his are not fringe ideas, and this is not a wish list. In some ways, this was the perfect backwards way for Evers to end the night –
— MacIver Institute (@MacIverWisc) February 16, 2023
17/ by telling everyone, not what he stands for and why, but by telling everyone what he is NOT – he is really telling us he is not much of a leader and, despite his feigned protestations, he is telling us he prefers partisan skirmishes to finding solutions to our challenges.
— MacIver Institute (@MacIverWisc) February 16, 2023