TWO RIVERS, Wis. (WFRV) — It’s been nearly four months since 3-year-old Elijah Vue disappeared in Northeastern Wisconsin.

Vue has been missing since February and was said to have last been seen at the Two Rivers home of 39-year-old Jesse Vang, who was in a relationship with Vue’s mother, Katrina Baur.

Search efforts by authorities and community volunteers have continued since Elijah’s disappearance, with little progress. In March, Vue’s blanket was found, but additional discoveries have been limited.

Still, Two Rivers Police have continued to provide updates on their investigation, including the latest, posted on Monday.

Police Chief Ben Meinnert confirmed Vue has not been found and spoke out about recent rumors that have surfaced on social media claiming the boy has been found.

“The spreading of false and misleading information is disrespectful to the family of Elijah and detracts from our efforts in locating him,” added Chief Meinnert. “We remain the sole source of factual information in this investigation and will release more information and updates when they are available to share.”

Meinnert continued, saying the department’s search efforts are ongoing, including additional drone searches. Future search efforts will focus on the water, using sonar searches and assistance from Bruce’s Legacy, a volunteer organization.

The FBI and state, county, and local agencies are also following up on leads within Wisconsin and around Two Rivers, the Wisconsin Dells, and Portage. Investigators are still analyzing an “extremely large amount of video and other data.”

Meinnert encouraged the community to participate in “coordinated and legally permissible search efforts for Elijah.”

“We will continue a variety of search efforts in our attempts to locate Elijah,” said Chief Meinnert. “We, like many of you, want to find answers and are working hard to do so. We believe in transparency and keeping everyone up to date with facts. We will share facts as much as we are able and as timely as we can when new information is present, but please understand that we cannot jeopardize any portion of the ongoing investigation. We remain committed to investigating the circumstances regarding the disappearance of Elijah.”

No additional details were provided.

A combined $40,000 in rewards is being offered in the search for Elijah.

Anyone with information is asked to contact the Two Rivers Police Department tip line at 844-267-6648.

What happened to Elijah Vue?

Elijah Vue was reported missing on Feb. 20. He was allegedly last seen by Jesse Vang, 39, inside Vang’s residence in Two Rivers, about 40 miles southeast of Green Bay. Vang is reportedly in a relationship with Elijah’s mother, Katrina Baur.

On the day Elijah went missing, Vang claimed he saw Elijah asleep as he got his own son ready for school. Vang says he later went back to bed. When he awoke, he said he found Elijah had disappeared. Vang reportedly told authorities he had locked the door, including using the doorknob lock, a deadbolt and a security chain.

According to a criminal complaint obtained by Nexstar’s WFRV, Vang had been trying to help Baur correct Elijah’s “bad behaviors.”

Baur, 31, of Wisconsin Dells, reportedly told authorities that Elijah had been in the care of Vang for about a week. She allegedly described Vang as the “enforcer of rules” in the relationship and said she sent Elijah to stay with him to learn how to “be a man.”

A criminal complaint also alleged neglect by both Baur and Vang, citing photographic evidence that appeared to show bruising on Elijah’s jaw, neck, side and arm. Authorities also found text messages between Vang and Baur that appeared to reference making Elijah “fear” Vang.

Baur, who was charged with chronic child neglect and obstructing an officer, entered a not-guilty plea in March. She is scheduled to appear in court on Thursday for a status conference, online records show.

Vang, charged with one felony county of party-to-a-crime child neglect, has also entered a not-guilty plea. He is scheduled to appear for a status conference in late June.

Wisconsin Democratic Sen. Tammy Baldwin has a long history of criticizing tax loopholes for the rich, despite her partner’s career reportedly helping ultra-high-net-worth clients pay less in taxes.

Labeled by Morgan Stanley as one of its “private wealth advisors,” Maria Brisbane, Baldwin’s partner since 2018, works to deliver “tax minimization strategies” for her clients at the firm.

Brisbane’s work, as well as how it stands in contrast to Baldwin’s own preaching about wealthy Americans using tax loopholes to avoid paying their fair share in taxes, was first highlighted in a report by the Washington Examiner on Tuesday.

On Tax Day this year, Baldwin and two other Democrats in the upper chamber introduced the Carried Interest Fairness Act in an effort to eliminate the “carried interest tax loophole and make wealthy fund managers pay what other American workers do,” according to an April press release.

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“Hardworking Wisconsin families should not be paying more in taxes than the wealthiest Americans. But right now, our tax code has loopholes that allow super wealthy hedge fund managers to avoid paying their fair share,” Baldwin said at the time. “By closing the carried interest loophole, we’ll make our tax code fairer for working families, cut the deficit, and ensure that those at the top of the food chain aren’t exploiting the system to further enrich themselves.”

Brisbane, who was named to Forbes’ “America’s Top Women Wealth Advisors” list in February, has worked alongside private wealth adviser Alex Zachary at Morgan Stanley since early 2024. Their practice, the Brisbane Group, previously operated under Merrill Lynch’s “private wealth management unit focused on ultra-wealthy clients,” according to a January report by Advisor Hub.

“The Brisbane Group is focused on helping Ultra High Net Worth individuals, families, and not-for-profit organizations create customized investment strategies with a focus on custom tailored equity portfolios,” Morgan Stanley states on its website.

Additionally, Morgan Stanley touts the firm’s private wealth management division, which is “dedicated to serving the firm’s most affluent clients, including some of the world’s most accomplished entrepreneurs, executives and stewards of multigenerational wealth.”

Based in New York, the multinational investment bank and financial services company touts its wealth management division’s offering of “investment opportunities spanning private equity, private credit, real assets, hedge funds and more.”

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Sen. Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis., speaks during a hearing on Capitol Hill on April 20, 2023, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, File)

In February 2022, Baldwin targeted “activist hedge funds,” saying they “promote short-term gains at the expense of workers, taxpayers and local communities.”

The Tuesday report from the Examiner also included a comment from the Wisconsin Republican Party, which took aim at Baldwin and Brisbane:

“Baldwin and Brisbane are enriching themselves by helping out-of-state clients avoid paying their taxes,” Matt Fisher, a Wisconsin Republican Party spokesman, told the outlet.

Regarding Baldwin’s past comments and Brisbane’s work at Morgan Stanley, Baldwin’s campaign insisted the senator’s record “speaks for itself.”

“Tammy Baldwin has been a leader in the fight to ensure the wealthiest Americans pay their fair share for years … Attacking Tammy Baldwin for her partner’s work is baseless and wrong,” Andrew Mamo, a spokesperson for Baldwin’s Senate campaign, told Fox News Digital.

Baldwin’s campaign also pointed to legislation the senator has introduced or supported in recent years to address certain loopholes, including the Carried Interest Fairness Act, Paying a Fair Share Act, and the Billionaires Income Tax Act.

Baldwin is expected to face off in the state’s Nov. 5 general election against Eric Hovde, her leading Republican challenger in the race. (Scott Olson/Getty Images)

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The report comes as Baldwin, who has represented Wisconsin in the Senate since 2013, seeks re-election to a third term in office. She is expected to face off in the state’s Nov. 5 general election against Eric Hovde, her leading Republican challenger in the race.

Baldwin’s campaign accused Hovde of refusing “to disclose his finances” and claimed he “worked to avoid taxes.” Additionally, the campaign highlighted Hovde’s efforts to self-finance his campaign and his investment in a hedge fund based in the Cayman Islands.

While dozens of other states have line-item vetoes, Wisconsin stands alone when it comes to the power it gives its governors through what’s known as the partial veto. Now, it’s up to the Wisconsin Supreme Court to decide whether it stays that way.

The state’s partial veto dates back to 1930, when concerns about state lawmakers adding multiple appropriation and policy items into what are known as omnibus bills came to a head. The Wisconsin Constitution was amended to give more power to governors to reject those items, one by one.

“Appropriation bills may be approved in whole or in part by the governor, and the part approved shall become law,” the new amendment read. 

According to a study by the Wisconsin Legislative Reference Bureau, proponents believed governors needed a check on the new budgeting process. But opponents worried giving governors more veto authority extended the already broad powers of the executive branch.

When he was campaigning for governor, Phillip La Follette said the proposal to expand veto powers “smack[ed] of dictatorship.” The amendment was approved by around 62 percent of voters in 1930, and after he was elected, La Follette became the first governor to use it.

Nine times, the Wisconsin Supreme Court has heard challenges to the partial veto. The case now pending before the Wisconsin Supreme Court will make it an even ten.

Evers used partial veto to extend school funding increase for 400 years

The latest challenge focuses on Gov. Tony Evers’ partial veto in the last state budget, which extended a school funding increase through the year 2425. It’s the latest of many attempts to restrict a veto power that a federal judge once described as “quirky.”

Evers’ partial veto last summer caught the Republican-controlled Legislature by surprise. By crossing out a 20 and a dash before he signed the state’s two-year budget, Evers authorized school districts to collect additional property taxes to fund a $325 per-pupil increase for more than 400 years. The Legislature intended the increase to expire in two years. 

Republican lawmakers were outraged. The GOP-controlled Wisconsin Senate voted to override Evers’ veto, but the Assembly never followed suit. 

The challenge the Wisconsin Supreme Court agreed to hear Monday, which was brought by the business lobbying group Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce, alleges Evers’ veto violates the state’s constitution. The first legal briefs are due by July 16.

Democratic and Republican governors have used partial vetoes extensively

Evers’ latest veto received national attention, but he was hardly the first Wisconsin governor to push the limits of the unique power.

Former Republican Gov. Scott Walker struck individual digits from dates written in the 2017 state budget to change a one-year moratorium on school referendums aimed at raising taxes for energy efficiency projects into a 1,000-year moratorium. The Supreme Court’s former conservative majority threw out a challenge to Walker’s veto because it was filed too late.

Former Democratic Gov. Jim Doyle used his partial veto to combine parts of unrelated sentences in the 2005 budget to move more than $400 million from the state’s transportation fund into the general fund. That led to a constitutional amendment in 2008 at preventing future governors from using what became known as the “Frankenstein Veto.” 

With his first state budget in 1987, former Republican Gov. Tommy Thompson partially struck phrases, digits, letters and word fragments, using what was known as the “Vanna White” veto, to create new sentences and fiscal figures. The Supreme Court upheld Thompson’s partial veto, but in 1990, voters approved a constitutional amendment specifying that governors cannot create new words by striking individual letters. 

University of Wisconsin Law School State Democracy Research Initiative Attorney Bryna Godar told WPR governors have gotten creative with how they’ve used partial vetoes, “but we now have this very long standing practice that is really codified in state law.” 

Godar said even the constitutional amendments aimed at restricting a governor’s partial veto powers were — in some way — a stamp of approval from the Legislature.

“They didn’t completely do away with this,” Godar said. “If people really wanted that, you could argue that they could have amended the constitution to completely do away with this type of partial veto.”

Godar said it’s possible that current lawmakers don’t want to restrict partial veto powers too much in case the current political power structure of the Legislature and Governor’s office switch in the future. 

Until 2020, Supreme Court generally allowed partial vetoes to stand

For as long as Wisconsin has had a partial veto, there have been lawsuits about how governors have used it.

The first came in 1935 and challenged the governor’s partial veto of an emergency relief bill, which approved funds but struck provisions related to how the Legislature wanted the money to be spent. The court upheld the partial veto so long as the remaining language equates to “a complete, entire, and workable law.”

Future courts upheld partial vetoes in 1936, 1940, 1976, 1978, 1988, 1995 and 1997. 

Things changed in 2020 when three of four partial vetoes by Evers in the 2019 state budget were struck down by the Supreme Court’s former conservative majority. But instead of a single majority opinion, the court issued what’s known as a fractured ruling. There were four opinions issued by justices that provided different tests for whether a partial veto can be constitutional.

“Those vetoes in that case were pretty in line with what governors from either party have done in prior decades,” Godar said. “They weren’t a significant departure from how this has been used in the past, but the court struck down three of them.”

But not having a “unified majority opinion” in the 2020 case, Godar said the court didn’t offer clear reasoning on how governors can use the partial veto in the future. But that could change in the latest case challenging Evers’ veto.

“I am really curious to see how the court rules in this case,” Godar said. “Because I think they will tell us a lot about what type of partial veto we will have going forward, and if it will continue to be this pretty broad, granular veto, or if it will be more based on subject matter.” 

Looking at the big picture, Godar said the question is whether the legislative and executive branches are “striking the right balance” of power. 

“And so, it is ultimately up to the Legislature and the people if they want to restrict it more significantly, which they could do in the future,” Godar said. 

Meanwhile, Republican lawmakers are pushing for another constitutional amendment in reaction to Evers’ latest veto. Earlier this year, the Legislature passed a proposed amendment aimed at keeping future governors from using the partial veto pen to “create or increase or authorize the creation or increase of any tax or fee.”

Before the new language can be added to the constitution, the measure must pass the full Legislature during the next legislative session and be approved by voters in a statewide referendum.