#kaul

I’m fine but then I remember that Hilo repeatedly used to cheat on Wen in the beginning of JL and my stomach actually churns.

The Green Bone Saga- Jade City by Fonda Lee 

The Stone-Eye and The Weatherman

In November of 2010, Wisconsin elected Republican Scott Walker as Governor. (Walker’s predecessor, a Democrat, did not run for reelection.) In the same election, Republicans won control of both houses of the Wisconsin legislature. After taking office in 2011, the Republican-controlled legislature passed laws substantially increasing the Republican governor’s power.

In November of 2018, Walker lost his bid for reelection to the Democratic challenger, Tony Evers, and Democrat Josh Kaul also defeated Republican Attorney General Brad Schimel. Republicans, however, retained control over both houses of the state legislature. Following in North Carolina’s footsteps, the “lame duck” Republican legislature immediately (as in “Less than 24 hours after Tony Evers was elected governor,” and weeks before Evers was to take office) met in special session to pass a package of laws severely restricting the power of the incoming governor and attorney general--including reversing the very same laws it had passed eight years earlier.

Some of the changes affecting the Governor:

Taking away the governor’s new power to approve or prevent the adoption of administrative rules

Providing more legislative authority over state agencies

Restricting the governor’s power over rules used to implement state laws

Limiting the governor’s flexibility in how he runs many public benefits programs, such as his power over state work requirements for benefits like Medicaid and food stamps

Allowing Republican lawmakers to prevent Wisconsin from withdrawing from a lawsuit challenging the Affordable Care Act

Requiring the governor to get permission from lawmakers to make changes to security provisions in the state Capitol, including banning guns or increasing the number of patrol officers

Requiring the administration to track and report if the governor pardons anyone or his aides release anyone from prison early

Some changes for the Attorney General:

Allowing lawmakers to replace the attorney general with private attorneys of their choosing for key cases

Requiring lawmakers to sign off on court settlements

Giving lawmakers instead of the attorney general control of how to spend court settlements

Eliminating the solicitor general’s office that oversees high-profile litigation

And as long as Republican legislators were pushing through laws while they still had a Republican governor to sign them, they also took the opportunity to make it even harder to vote, including:

Limiting early voting to roughly two weeks before an election

Requiring a two-year expiration date on student IDs used for identification at the polls

Limiting the use of receipts as valid voter identification for individuals trying to get a valid ID without a birth certificate

Moving the 2020 presidential primary election to March in order to benefit a conservative Supreme Court justice’s election bid