Wisconsin Democrats Win Their Trifecta

David Crowley promised to repeal Act 10, open BadgerCare to every family, close the special education funding gap and pass universal pre-K and child care within his first 30 days as governor. Tuesday's election handed him the 18-15 Senate and 53-46 Assembly. Public workers who lost their bargaining rights in 2011, low-income adults shut out of BadgerCare and school districts asking neighbors for operating money now have a government that says it will act for them, and it will have to do so with a state budget that already spends more than it collects.

Democrats have waited 16 years for this. UW-Madison elections scholar Barry Burden told Wisconsin Watch their plans have been "stymied since 2010." Senate Democratic Leader Dianne Hesselbein said her caucus has been planning priority bills so it knows "on day one what we're going to be doing." The new Legislature convenes in January, with most of the list running through a budget that must take effect July 1.

The Surplus Shrinks Under the Next Budget

The state closed its last fiscal year with $3.3 billion on hand, about $350 million above estimates, plus a record $2.1 billion in its rainy day fund. Those are one-time dollars. A May memo from the Legislative Fiscal Bureau shows base revenues falling $582 million short of appropriations this year, with the gap widening to about $819 million and $898 million in the two years of the next budget.

On those numbers the balance falls to $525 million by the end of the 2027-29 budget, before a dollar goes to anything new. The memo is only a starting point. It leaves out revenue growth and predates October's stronger close, and new estimates will change it. It also leaves out rising caseloads and inflation, which push the other way.

Senate Democrats have already argued this point in public. In May all 15 of them voted down a $1.8 billion deal negotiated by Gov. Tony Evers and Republican leaders, which would have sent $870 million in rebates to taxpayers and more than $300 million to schools through special education aid. Hesselbein called it a "completely reckless proposal." Crowley dismissed its property tax relief as "a one-year" measure, though he later told WPR that as governor he "absolutely would have signed it."

Crowley has named places to look for recurring money. He told WSAW he'd review tax breaks for large corporations and billionaires, and he told WPR he'd sign a repeal of the sales tax exemption for data centers. Any such change would have to come through the Legislature. Voters narrowly approved an amendment Tuesday, 50.7% to 49.3%, barring governors from using the partial veto to create or raise a tax or fee. Crowley had said he'd use the partial veto if elected. Republicans, for their part, want the surplus handed back. Sen. Patrick Testin argued for property and income tax relief and returning the money to families.

Claims on that money are stacking up. Wisconsin Watch reported that Democrats want the surplus to go to child care, local government aid, public schools and higher education. Crowley told WPR he wants a child care slot for every working family and wants the Knowles-Nelson Stewardship Fund, which expired in June, restored to at least its prior level. He'd also repeal the sales tax on gas, which would reduce revenue. Hesselbein has listed free meals for all K-12 students and more state aid to schools. SEIU Wisconsin President Pat Raes pressed the party to serve lower-income residents, saying, "We have to find a way to make things livable."

BadgerCare Lost Its Biggest Federal Bonus

Democrats ran for years on a simple pitch: Wisconsin was leaving federal money on the table by refusing to expand Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act. Hesselbein's office, citing the Legislative Fiscal Bureau in 2024, put the gain at nearly $1.8 billion in one budget, including a one-time incentive of nearly $1.3 billion. The people at the center of that pitch haven't changed. The Wisconsin Policy Forum estimated in 2024 that about 90,900 residents would join, 61,100 of them parents and 29,800 childless adults.

The incentive has changed. The federal law Republicans passed in 2025 ended the extra 5% match for newly expanding states as of Jan. 1, 2026, and the state Department of Health Services warned at the time that Wisconsin would lose $1.3 billion if it hadn't acted by then. The same law bars new or increased provider taxes, which states use to help finance their share of Medicaid. Estimates of ongoing savings, such as the $423.8 million per budget the health department projected in 2024, predate that law, and Fox Watershed found no updated figure.

Crowley's own proposal also differs from the classic expansion. He has described a public option that seniors, farmers, gig workers, students and small-business owners could pay into as an alternative to for-profit insurance. "This isn't going to just be a free service," he told WSAW, adding that it would take the Legislature and a stronger federal partnership. Wisconsin Watch lists eligibility expansion among legislative Democrats' goals. Fox Watershed found no published cost estimate for the buy-in, and the two ideas aren't the same program.

Federal cuts arrive first. New BadgerCare applicants without dependent children in the home face work requirements starting in January, and current members follow at renewal starting in March. About 200,000 adults will be subject to the rule, and the state says about 63,000 are at immediate risk of losing coverage because it lacks records showing they qualify. Wisconsin voters also replaced Reps. Bryan Steil and Derrick Van Orden with Democrats Mitchell Berman and Rebecca Cooke on Tuesday, but undoing the federal law would still take President Donald Trump's signature.

Act 10 Has Two Routes

Crowley's most direct promise is a bill rather than a budget item. "As governor, I will repeal Act 10 in full," he said during the campaign, and he has pledged the same for the 2015 right-to-work law. The 2011 law ended union bargaining rights for most public employees while keeping them for police and firefighters. The conservative MacIver Institute estimates it has saved taxpayers $35.6 billion since 2012. A repeal would need 17 Senate votes and 50 in the Assembly.

The courts could get there on a separate track. The 2nd District Court of Appeals upheld Act 10 2-1 on July 29, reversing a Dane County judge, and the unions asked the state Supreme Court to step in within three weeks. Their argument is that treating public safety workers differently from everyone else violates equal protection, and that correctional officers, conservation wardens and Capitol Police are wrongly lumped with general employees. That group would include the officers working at Green Bay Correctional Institution. Liberals now hold a 5-2 majority, Justice Brian Hagedorn won't participate, and Fox Watershed found no report that the court has decided whether to take the case.

What's on the List for Green Bay

Northeast Wisconsin's most concrete stake is school money. Green Bay voters just approved $158 million with about 54% in favor, after the district said reduced state and federal funding left it short. State aid was meant to cover 45% of special education costs, and the district will get 38%. Chief Financial Officer Angie Roble told FOX 11 after the vote that "the funding system is broken." Crowley told WPR he'd use the surplus to lower property taxes, mainly by funding schools so communities lean less on referendums. More than a dozen area districts had questions on Tuesday's ballot.

The other big local item is the closure of Green Bay Correctional, which has climbed from $325 million to $585 million and now can't finish before late 2032. Crowley has said he'd work with legislators and the community on it, and that shrinking the prison population wouldn't solve the problem alone. Several area lawmakers now sit in the majority: Reps.-elect Brandy Tollefson in the 88th and Becky Nichols in the 53rd, along with Rep. Ryan Spaude in the 89th.

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A One-Vote Cushion in the Senate

Democrats can lose one senator on a party-line bill. Two defections sink it, assuming every Republican is opposed. In the Assembly they can lose three. That margin matters most on items where the caucus isn't uniform. Three Democrats, Sens. Sarah Keyeski, Brad Pfaff and Jamie Wall, crossed over in January to support a Republican bill ending the state tax on tips. Hesselbein told WPR in late 2024 she considered recreational marijuana unlikely to advance and preferred starting with medical use, though that was with Republicans in charge. And the bill to raise the $7.25 minimum wage to $15, then $20 by 2030, which matches Crowley's stated goal, hasn't yet faced a vote count in a Democratic chamber.

The last Democratic trifecta began with the identical 18-15 Senate margin and a 52-46 Assembly, facing a $5.4 billion deficit that led one Democratic lawmaker to call sweeping health reform "almost impossible." This majority starts with money in the bank instead. It also starts short on experience. Only four current Democratic senators and one representative served the last time Democrats ran the Legislature, according to Wisconsin Watch, and outgoing Assembly Speaker Robin Vos has already said Republicans will prepare for "the moment when voters again choose balance" over one-party control.

What Comes Next

County canvasses come first, and all of these results stay unofficial until they're done. Democrats must then fill the budget committee, whose Republican co-chair, Sen. Howard Marklein, lost Tuesday. Assembly Democratic Leader Greta Neubauer has named school meals, prescription drug costs and a larger homestead credit for low-income homeowners and renters among her priorities. Abortion rights will take longer, since a constitutional amendment has to pass in two consecutive sessions, which puts a statewide vote no earlier than the 2029-30 session.