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By Scott Bauer and Todd Richmond, AP

MADISON, Wis. (AP) Wisconsin Republicans voted May 18 to put $125 million aside to combat pollution from so-called forever chemicals, but delayed a decision on how exactly to spend the money.

The influx of money to deal with PFAS pollution comes after Republicans for years have declined to spend as much on water pollution as Democratic Gov. Tony Evers has called for. But the Republican spending in the budget would exceed the $107 million that Evers proposed to spend on additional statewide water testing, investigation, mitigation, new positions and grants.

Allocating money to fight PFAS, while eliminating testing for it and new positions to work on the pollution, doesnt make a bit of damn sense, Democratic Sen. LaTonya Johnson of Milwaukee said.

Republicans heralded the $125 million, calling it a historic investment in the fight against PFAS pollution.

The Legislature is taking this problem very seriously, committee co-chair Sen. Howard Marklein said.

There will be follow-up legislation to spell out how the money will be spent, said Rep. Mark Born, co-chair of the budget-writing Joint Finance Committee.

We need to give ourselves time to find the right solutions, Republican Sen. Eric Wimberger of Green Bay said at a news conference.

Johnson called the funding pretty significant, but said more should have been done sooner.

We dont get to sit here and act like were doing the Lords work when our constituents and their children are being harmed every single day, she said. We should be ashamed that we did not address these issues earlier.

Democrats also faulted Republicans for not specifying what the $125 million should be spent on, saying they feared it would sit unused or at least delay action.

Meanwhile, our communities continue to struggle with this significant problem, Democratic Sen. Kelda Roys of Madison said.

The committee approved the spending with all Republicans in support and Democrats opposed. The committee is working to crate the two-year spending plan, which must next be approved by the Senate and Assembly and then signed by Evers.

The committee is expected to complete its work in June. The budget takes effect in July.

Democrats, including Evers, have called for enacting tough standards about acceptable levels of PFAS in the water, moves that have met resistance from Republicans and the states business community.

PFAS, or per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, are man-made chemicals that dont easily break down in nature. Theyre found in a wide range of products, including cookware, firefighting foam and stain-resistant clothing. The chemicals have been linked to health problems including low birth weight, cancer and liver disease, and have been shown to make vaccines less effective.

Municipalities across Wisconsin are struggling with PFAS contamination in their groundwater, including Marinette, Madison, Wausau and the town of Campbell on French Island. The waters of Green Bay also are contaminated. The state Department of Natural Resources has issued an advisory warning people to limit their consumption of fish from the bay of Green Bay as well as from portions of the Peshtigo, Oconto and Menominee rivers due to PFAS contamination.

Republicans have passed bills in recent years restricting the use of firefighting foam that contains PFAS, but have resisted doing anything more substantial amid concerns from industry and wastewater treatment operators that clean-up and filtration efforts and new well construction would cost tens of millions of dollars.

The Evers administration adopted regulations in 2022 establishing limits on PFAS in surface and drinking water. Conservatives on the Department of Natural Resources policy board blocked a proposal to limit the chemicals in well water, however.

Evers administration has since relaunched an attempt to write standards for PFAS in well water. The governors budget lays out a multipronged approach for dealing with the chemicals as well.

Republicans previously stripped language from Evers budget that called for restricting PFAS levels in state waters and air and requiring the DNR to create rules on how to determine financial liability for PFAS contamination.

Democratic Attorney General Josh Kaul sued about 20 companies in 2022 alleging their products contaminated the environment with PFAS. Those cases are still pending.

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Republican budget-writers approve $125 million to fight PFAS but ... - PBS Wisconsin

Republican minority leaders in the Michigan House and Senate are expressing another concern about a large battery plant slated for construction near Big Rapids.

Republican legislators have voiced dismay about the large amount of state tax incentives for the Gotion project, as well as fears that the company is tied to the Chinese Communist Party.

That's because Gotion is owned by a China-based parent company.

Now, their third concern is the prospective plant's impact on the environment. In a letter to the acting director of the Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy, the legislators asked for the release of all the documents the agency has in its possession about those impacts.

But the department says it hasn't received a single permit request from Gotion yet. EGLE says all the documents related to the Gotion project will be made available to the public once they exist.

See more here:
Republican say they're concerned about environmental impact of ... - Michigan Radio

The expansion of basic scientific research enshrined in a 2022 bipartisan law, funded through the National Science Foundation, is at pretty serious risk, Atkinson said in an interview. Biomedical research at the National Institutes of Health and clean energy programs at the Energy Department also are at risk, he said.

After signing the legislation, which authorized $81 billion for the National Science Foundation over five years to advance research in several critical areas, President Joe Biden called it a once-in-a-generation investment in America itself.

Lawmakers from both parties called it a long overdue response to Chinas growing strength in high-tech areas including artificial intelligence, quantum computing and biotech.

The legislation also separately appropriated $52 billion in federal grants to U.S. semiconductor manufacturers to rebuild domestic chip production that has moved abroad over the years.

House Republicans, faced with a vote to raise the national debt limit, are using it to put pressure on Biden and congressional Democrats to cut spending. The House passed a bill last month that would reduce the deficit by $4.8 trillion in exchange for lifting the debt limit until the first quarter of next year.

See more here:
House Republican deficit plan seen as shift in thinking on China - Roll Call

The fight for democracy

Michael Adams, who defended his states election system from claims of fraud, goes on to face Buddy Wheatley in November

Tue 16 May 2023 19.57 EDT

Kentuckys Republican secretary of state, who had earned widespread praise for increasing his states voter turnout during the coronavirus pandemic and for expanding opportunities to vote, won his primary on Tuesday.

Michael Adams faced a primary challenge from two Republicans who align themselves with the growing faction within the GOP who believe elections are frequently rigged and stolen. Adams will now face Buddy Wheatley, a Democrat and former state representative, in November.

During his time in office, Adams has shot down conspiracy theories about the 2020 election and defended his states election system from claims of fraud, a stance that he said earlier this week could cost him his job.

In an interview, Adams said it would absolutely be worth it if he lost the race to have defended and expanded Kentuckys elections, but he was hopeful that Kentucky Republicans understood the ways his reforms had benefited them.

Im not surprised that I have a primary, but I also think in my gut that if these Republicans utilized early voting and absentee voting, then theyre not going to hold it against me that I implemented those things, he said.

The race marks the latest in what is likely to be a long series of primary contests in which more moderate, mainstream Republicans are challenged by candidates to their right who are allied with Trump and who deny the results of the 2020 election.

There wont be a GOP primary that doesnt have election denialism as part of it, said Ben Ginsberg, a conservative elections lawyer, at a recent conference for election officials in Washington DC.

The Republicans challenging Adams were Stephen Knipper, an information technology project manager who has twice run unsuccessfully for secretary of state, and Allen Maricle, a former state legislator. Knipper is endorsed by Mike Lindell, the MyPillow CEO, who has spread conspiracy theories about Trump winning the 2020 election. Knipper has also said he has serious doubts about the 2019 victory of Kentuckys Democratic governor, Andy Beshear, and alleges that voting machines were hacked.

Maricle has said he disagrees that the states elections are rigged, but he has maintained that voter fraud affects them.

Both challengers wanted Kentucky to join the eight states that have recently left the Electronic Registration Information Center (Eric), a national database used by a majority of states to compare voter rolls and keep them accurate. Fueled by false claims and conspiracy theories about the networks ties to the liberal donor George Soros, Republicans who once praised Eric now claim it does not protect election integrity.

Adams has defended Kentuckys participation in Eric and has said Kentucky will remain a member as long as it is beneficial and worth the dues. Prior to the last couple of months, when critical states have pulled out, Eric has been a godsend for us in helping us get people off the rolls, he said.

Since taking office in 2020, Adams has worked with Beshear and the GOP-controlled legislature to expand absentee and early voting. During the height of the pandemic, he worked to open countywide polling supercenters in large venues. The work helped Kentucky see a primary turnout record in 2020 and earned him praise from Democrats.

Adams said his biggest reason for running was to protect the expansions he has made to voting.

I do think if I get beat, that will send a message to other Republicans in the legislature, especially, that doing things the way Ive done them is bad politics, and Im afraid theyll dismantle expanded voting and absentee voting for political reasons.

That desire overpowers his reluctance to continue serving in a job he calls miserable given the environment of threats and harassment for election officials.

I didnt especially want to run again, he added, but I felt like I had to do it to protect what weve done.

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Republican who expanded Kentucky voting opportunities wins primary - The Guardian US

Cameron was the frontrunner for the GOP nomination since announcing his bid this time last year, picking up an early endorsement from Trump before his main opponent even got in the race.

He will face popular incumbent Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear in November. Republicans acknowledge that beating Beshear will be tough. Defeating a popular incumbent governor is generally one of the hardest things to do in politics.

But they argue that Cameron, a rising star in Kentucky Republican politics, is the best positioned to do so.

Daniel has a strong case for being the advocate for people who feel like they were disenfranchised or not listened to or just trampled upon during Covid, said Scott Jennings, a prominent Republican consultant in the state who was neutral in the primary. I mean small business owners, churches, parents. Theres a lot of people out there that are still pretty sore about that.

It is something that Cameron himself has signaled he was going to lean into. His opening ad for the primary went after Beshear, saying he ignored the Constitution and shut churches down.

Republicans argue they have significant structural advantages. Republicans officially overtook Democrats in voter registration totals last summer, capping off a long-running trend of ancestral Democrats voting for Republicans at the federal level.

But perhaps most importantly, one of the biggest things Cameron has going for him is that he is not Matt Bevin, the deeply unpopular Republican incumbent that Beshear narrowly defeated in 2019. Bevin was incredibly confrontational with even members of his own party, and he was dogged by a bevy of scandals that ultimately led to his undoing.

The most bipartisan thing Matt Bevin ever did was be disliked by everybody in both parties, said Jennings. People just didnt like the guy and Daniel does not have that problem.

Cameron will, however, have to unite the party after a particularly brutal struggle for the nomination.

Craft and her allies pummeled Cameron for months, ranging from ads that labeled him as establishment teddy bear before literally morphing a photo of him into a stuffed bear, along with other ads that tried to tether him to Beshear and President Joe Biden.

Cameron began fighting back in April, firing shots at his deep-pocketed rival. It was ultimately successful for Cameron, but it came with a cost: Campaign finance data indicate his campaign account has just over $340,000 left in its coffers as of the beginning of this month. The Republican Governors Association is expected to spend significantly, and has already run an ad taking an early shot at Beshear.

Beshear has stockpiled over $7 million, and the Democratic Governors Association has signaled it would spend heavily to boost the only incumbent Democratic governor on the ballot this year.

DGA executive director Meghan Meehan-Draper told POLITICO last month defending Beshear is the committees number one priority.

Democrats argue that Beshear is also well positioned from his tenure as governor. Beshear has had the duty of overseeing recovery efforts for several major tragedies, from the pandemic to a major mass shooting to significant natural disasters. It has placed him regularly in front of Kentuckians, where he positioned himself not as a partisan fighter but as a steady hand to helm the state through uncertain moments.

He has been a rock solid governor, he has led the state with integrity and with dignity, he has ushered in a dramatic transformation in terms of our economy, said Colmon Elridge, the chair of the state Democratic Party.

Democrats have signaled they planned to try to tie Cameron to Bevins administration, arguing the two men share similar political networks, with Elridge saying he is unprepared to lead and he is too self-involved to lead our commonwealth.

The race could also bring early signs of the larger political environment heading into next years presidential election. Although Kentucky will not be competitive on the presidential level, it is the biggest off-year contest this year and has long been seen as a messaging testing ground.

Trey Grayson, a former Kentucky Republican secretary of state, noted that for decades the Kentucky gubernatorial election has helped shape national party messaging the next year, like when Beshear successfully targeted Kentucky suburbs in 2019 before his nail-biter of a win.

The swing suburbs of Pennsylvania look like the swing suburbs of Kentucky, he said.

Read more:
Trump-endorsed Daniel Cameron wins Republican nomination for ... - POLITICO