Wisconsin
In Wisconsin, Tim Walz says Democrats must ‘push as far as we can’ against Trump
Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz on how Democrats can combat President Trump
Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz traveled to Des Moines Friday, March 14, 2025, as part of several stops to competitive congressional districts.
EAU CLAIRE – Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz said Tuesday he and other Democratic governors should not follow unconstitutional mandates from President Donald Trump in an effort “to challenge and push as far as we can” against the new administration.
The former Democratic vice presidential nominee in his first visit to the Badger State since the 2024 presidential election made the comments ahead of a town hall-style event in Eau Claire, a liberal-leaning city in a congressional district held by Republican U.S. Rep. Derrick Van Orden.
Walz stopped in the battleground district this week to rally voters for liberal state Supreme Court candidate Susan Crawford and as part of a multi-state tour to highlight Republicans who have stopped holding in-person town halls after backlash over the Trump administration’s government cuts.
Walz told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel in an interview that he attributes losing Wisconsin and other battleground states in November to an inability to effectively offer enough change to rural voters.
Trump defeated Harris in Wisconsin by about 29,000 votes as part of a victory that swept battleground states. Now, as he is floated as a potential 2028 presidential candidate, Walz said he and other Democratic governors should refuse to go along with orders from the Republican president made outside of the bounds of the U.S. Constitution. “What governors can do is use our authority and states’ rights, which, again, the Trump administration doesn’t believe anything about right now … and we’re very clear about that,” Walz said.
“I’ll continue to follow the law, but I think we have a responsibility to challenge and push as far as we can. And when Donald Trump issues an order that is unconstitutional, we have no responsibility to follow that, and we won’t in Minnesota.”The event was part of a tour Walz organized characterized as filling a gap where Republicans have declined to hold public events so to avoid confrontational audience members.
Three Trump supporters turned away from Tim Walz event
However, at least three supporters of Trump were turned away from the Eau Claire event. One told the Journal Sentinel he had a ticket and was stopped after entering the Pablo Center in downtown Eau Claire because of the red Make America Great Again hat he was wearing.
“We were proud to welcome more than 900 people to our town hall in Eau Claire tonight, and I’m confident we had folks join in who did not agree with us on absolutely everything,” Joe Oslund, a spokesman for the Democratic Party of Wisconsin, said when asked about the decision to turn the Trump supporters away. “We’re always happy to engage with folks who hold different points of view, but when you show up in funny hats looking to cause shenanigans, let’s just save each other the trouble here.”
A Republican who tracks Democrats at events to find content for attack ads was allowed to stay in the audience, according to the party.
Ahead of the event, Van Orden said Walz’s tour to his district that borders Minnesota “is simply a desperate attempt to save face and remain relevant after his embarrassing defeat, which sent him back to Minnesota in disgrace.”
“America is finally moving in the right direction, thanks to President Donald J. Trump and Vice President JD Vance, and voters throughout the Third District have no desire to Minnesota their Wisconsin.”
Walz’s first stop was Friday in Des Moines, Iowa, in a district represented by U.S. Rep. Zach Nunn, a Republican who has not committed to holding town halls this year.
Walz took questions for about an hour from Democrats who asked how to combat potential cuts to Medicaid programs and ways to compete with Republicans in public appeal, among other topics.
“I don’t think we would have won the election if we’d gone on Joe Rogan, but I don’t think we would’ve got beat any worse,” Walz told the crowd, referring to a decision by the Harris campaign to not appear on Rogan’s mega-popular podcast.
“I worried about this in the last couple weeks of the election. I was in Pennsylvania and North Carolina and in the countryside, I saw a sign split in half: Trump good, Kamala bad,” Walz said.
“I’m like, Jesus, are we first graders? What the hell, it worked. It worked. They did it. They made it simple.”
Walz told the Journal Sentinel the Harris-Walz campaign failed to represent enough change to turn out the number of voters needed to defeat Trump.
“It was our job to win these these states, I think especially rural Wisconsin, they wanted change. They didn’t feel like they were getting that. And quite honestly, they didn’t think the message they were hearing was the one to make a difference.”
Walz stopped in Eau Claire two weeks ahead of the April 1 spring election when Wisconsin voters will cast ballots in the state Supreme Court race for ideological control of the court.
The race has broken national records for the most expensive state court battle in history. The race is being eyed as a test of support for Trump after the first few months of his presidency during which he and billionaire Elon Musk have leveled massive cuts to the federal workforce, including to agencies serving veterans and schools.
“Look, you can start to lame duck this on April 1,” Walz told the crowd Tuesday. “Then we win the Virginia governor’s race. And then you got guys like (Van Orden) here saying ‘shit, Trump’s done in a couple of years, this is looking bad. The momentum is changing. I think I’m feeling something, and it feels like maybe I’m growing a spine and I’m going to stand up for my people, because if I don’t, I’m going to get my ass kicked in the midterm election.’”
‘People v. Musk’ town hall event
Tuesday’s event was billed as a “People v. Musk” town hall event as part of a new Democratic focus on Musk. On Friday, a handful of Senate Democrats joined with Republicans to pass a budget fix that will avert a government shutdown, but which many Democrats derided as caving to Republican pressure and handing Musk a blank check.
Some Democrats have called for Schumer to step down as minority leader. Walz declined to weigh in.
“I don’t question his commitment to protecting the American public but I think being through this fight in the fall and being through this fight as a governor, this is a different fight, and we have to have different tactics,” he told the Journal Sentinel.
Republicans have argued that Democrats are targeting GOP town halls for organized protests as liberal groups have encouraged turnout at the events. Some Republicans, like House Speaker Mike Johnson, referred to those voicing dissatisfaction with the Trump administration as “professional protesters.”
Rebecca Cooke, the Democrat who narrowly lost to Van Orden last November, said this week she will challenge him again in 2026.
Some Wisconsin Republicans have suggested they’ll continue to hold in-person town halls despite the directive from party leadership, though others have been noncommittal.
Van Orden, whose western Wisconsin House seat has become a main target for Republicans as they seek to flip control of the House, said at a tele-town hall earlier this month that he would not hold in-person town halls, citing the push from Democratic groups to send protesters to the events.
Van Orden did not take live questions from the audience during the tele-town hall. A staffer during the call noted “a few folks sent in questions ahead of time,” which the staffer read. Multiple people who participated in the call told the Journal Sentinel that the comment function was turned off on the video call.
Last week and on Tuesday, Democratic Rep. Mark Pocan, one of Van Orden’s loudest critics, held in-person town hall events in Belmont and Viroqua in an effort to highlight Van Orden’s decision not to hold in-person town halls.
Lawrence Andrea of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and Brianne Pfannenstiel of the Des Moines Register contributed to this report.
A Dane County judge heard arguments Monday in a lawsuit that seeks to make electronic absentee ballots available to Wisconsinites with disabilities.
Disability Rights Wisconsin joined the League of Women Voters in suing the Wisconsin Elections Commission two years ago. Those groups argued that voters with disabilities should be allowed to receive, fill out and return an absentee ballot electronically.
Currently, some disabled Wisconsinites have to rely on help from someone else when filling out a paper absentee ballot. People with print disabilities have difficulty reading print because of issues including visual, cognitive or developmental disabilities.
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That violates the right to a secret ballot as guaranteed by the Wisconsin Constitution, attorney Jared Grubow argued on behalf of the plaintiffs.
“The print disabled voters of Wisconsin cannot vote on the same terms as all other Wisconsinites,” Grubow said during a hearing Monday before Judge Everett Mitchell. “That is discrimination.”
In June 2024, Mitchell issued a temporary order in the case, which would have required Wisconsin to send ballots over email to voters with print disabilities ahead of the November 2024 election. That ruling would not have allowed voters to return completed ballots electronically. Instead, they would need to be turned in via mail or at a clerk’s office.
Wisconsin’s Republican-controlled Legislature appealed the lower court order, however, an appeals court halted Mitchell’s earlier ruling.
Attorneys for the people suing pointed to the Americans with Disabilities Act and argued that Wisconsin is required to provide electronic absentee voting options as a “reasonable accommodation,” for people who rely on screen readers and other devices.
But Assistant Wisconsin Attorney General Karla Keckhaver argued that voters with print disabilities already have sufficient options, because they can either vote in person using electronic machines or they can fill out a ballot at home with the help of a caregiver or assistant.
“The ADA says nothing about privacy and independence in voting, and it doesn’t give voters with disabilities the right to vote without an assistant,” she said.
She also argued that electronic ballots would pose cyber-security issues and put “undue financial and administrative burdens” on Wisconsin’s elections officials.
“Wisconsin’s absentee voting program is a paper-based system, and that’s not an empty procedural requirement — it’s fundamental to the security of the program,” she said. “Internet voting is not an existing service that Wisconsin already provides to others.”
There are roughly 110,000 eligible Wisconsin voters with print disabilities, who may be affected by a ruling in the case, Grubow said.
One of the plaintiffs in the lawsuit, Donald Natzke, is blind, and unable to read or mark a paper absentee ballot on his own. He can’t rely on his wife for help because she is blind as well.
That problem would be solved if Natzke had access to an electronic absentee ballot, since he would be able to use a speech synthesizer and other accessibility devices to read that ballot and fill it out in the privacy of his own home, the lawsuit argues.
In theory, Natzke could go to a polling place or early in-person voting location to fill out a ballot using an electronic voting machine. But Grubow said that option is “extremely difficult” in practice.
“Any amount of poor weather, be it wind, rain, ice or snow, makes getting to the polling place very dangerous for Mr. Natzke,” Grubow said Monday.
Currently, Wisconsinites may return absentee ballots via mail or by dropping them off at their local clerk’s office. In some communities, ballot drop boxes are also available for returning those ballots. Additionally, Wisconsinites can fill out out absentee ballots in-person at early voting locations.
But, based on a declaration filed by Wisconsin’s elections administrator, Wisconsin clerks are “encouraged” but not “required” to make sure that accessible voting equipment is available at early voting locations, Grubow said.
“(If) there is no accessible voting machine, they’re going to face the same issues,” Grubow said. “Which is why often a lot of these voters are deterred from doing that and prefer to vote absentee at home.”
During Monday’s hearing, attorneys for both sides said they believed the matter can be resolved without a trial. Earlier this year, lawyers representing the state of Wisconsin filed a motion asking for summary judgement.
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Japanese hiker takes on Ice Age Trail, welcomed by Wisconsinites
Masafumi Saito, a Japanese outdoor writer, is hiking the Ice Age Trail.
If a trek up a faraway mountain won’t fit on your summer to-do list, maybe you can still find time to hike to Wisconsin’s highest point.
That journey would take you up Timm’s Hill in Price County, which stands at nearly 1,952 feet above sea level, according to the State Cartographer’s Office.
Timm’s Hill is nestled in woodlands of north central Wisconsin, just off County Road RR in Ogema. At the summit, hikers can climb an observation tower that offers 30-mile views of the surrounding area, according to Travel Wisconsin.
Highpoint Guide, a website with information on peaks across the country, says Timm’s Hill was named after Timothy Gahan, a late-1800s logger. Gahan often set up camp near the woods surrounding the hill, which now make up Timm’s Hill County Park.
What to know if you’re visiting Timm’s Hill
Timm’s Hill County Park is open year-round. The park gate is open 7:30 a.m. to 9:30 p.m. approximately May through October, and winter parking is available at the intersection of Ring School Road and County Road RR, the Price County website says.
The park has a boat landing and fishing pier, along with picnic shelters and hiking trails. The 10-mile Timm’s Hill National Ice Ace Trail is accessible for hiking, biking and horseback riding and intersects with the statewide Ice Age Trail, which spans over 1,000 miles.
How does Wisconsin’s highest point compare to other states
Timm’s Hill, at 1,952 feet, ranks as the 39th-highest high point among the 50 states, according to Highpoint Guide.
Minnesota and Michigan both rank just above Wisconsin, though Illinois, Indiana, Iowa and Ohio all have high points below 1,700 feet. The highest point anywhere in the United States is Alaska’s Mount McKinley, formerly known as Denali, at 20,320 feet.
In Wisconsin, Price County is one of six counties in north central Wisconsin with points above 1,900 feet. Powder Hill and Holy Hill have the highest elevations in the southeastern part of the state at just above 1,300 feet.
The Lake Michigan shoreline boasts the lowest elevation in Wisconsin at just 579 feet above sea level, according to the State Cartographers Office.
RANDALL, Wis. – Two people are in critical condition after a motorcycle crash on the Illinois/Wisconsin state line, according to officials.
Around 3:28 p.m. on Sunday, crews responded to the 12500 block of Fox River Road for reports of a motorcycle crash.
Officials found two people lying in the road. One individual had sustained a significant head injury and was reportedly not wearing a helmet at the time of the crash. The victim was transported by helicopter to Froedtert Memorial Lutheran Hospital in critical condition.
The second victim was transported to Froedtert South Pleasant Prairie in critical but stable condition.
Kenosha County Major Crash Assistance Team is investigating the incident.
The public are reminded to wear helmets while riding motorcycles and urged to use caution during the ongoing road construction in that area.
The Source: Details for this story were provided by the Twin Lakes Fire and Rescue.
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