Wisconsin

Prisons make headlines for abhorrent conditions. Where’s the will to fix them? | Opinion

Published

2 years ago

February 19, 2024

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Prisons make headlines for abhorrent conditions. Where’s the will to fix them? | Opinion

Inmates can still be shackled while giving birth in Wisconsin prisons

Wisconsin prisons have been in the headlines a lot lately. The stories have exposed abhorrent conditions for inmates and documented long-festering problems. While the crisis has generated months of headlines, it hasn’t produced much will to tackle the issues.

At the beginning of this month, the New York Times and Wisconsin Watch published a joint investigation on the extreme shortage of correctional officers. The story outlined the extent of how significant the shortage is and how little had been done prior to last year, despite a decade of warning signs.

Ever since Act 10 passed, there has been an increasing exodus of correctional officers who no longer could collectively bargain. As of today, almost half of the guard jobs in Wisconsin’s prison have been unfilled.

The story goes on to highlight what the effects of this shortage has led to: shortcuts in how prison officials run facilities, two men escaped from Columbia Correctional Institution in 2020 when four out of the five guard towers were unmanned, and two of the state’s prisons have been in lockdown, or what Department of Corrections Secretary Kevin Carr called “modified movement”, for 10 months due to not enough staff to handle the number of inmates.

Rodents, lockdowns, shackles, suicides happening under state’s care

Multiple Wisconsin publications have been reporting on limitations being imposed on inmates due to the lockdowns despite Governor Tony Evers declaring in November that restrictions would be lifted. The Journal Sentinel reported last month that, “limitations on recreations, visitation, meals, showers programming and more persist without a clear end in sight”.

There has also been reports of the horrendous condition of some of the prisons are in, including a ongoing rodent problem.

All of this is also happening while an ongoing investigation and lawsuit against the DOC is playing out in the aftermath of a Waupun prison suicide, where staff allegedly failed to give the inmate his bipolar and antidepressant medications as prescribed in the months leading up to his death.

In addition to these current conditions, investigations and lawsuits, there are further conversations happening at the Capitol regarding sentencing and protocol for pregnant incarcerated women.

There are dual bills circulating in the Legislature that would end life sentences for children. Under Wisconsin statute, children as young as 10 are subject to adult treatment for first-degree intentional homicide with a life sentence without parole.

There is also a bill that would ban shackling pregnant inmates during childbirth, since that is still allowed under Wisconsin law and left up to the discretion of staff.

There are reports. There are lawsuits. There are noncommital suggestions of independent investigations. There are Senate committee questions. But, after months of journalists informing the public about the conditions incarcerated people in Wisconsin are living under, there doesn’t seem to be a lot of urgency to fix it.

Kristin Brey is the “My Take” columnist for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

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Wisconsin judge found guilty of obstruction for helping an immigrant evade federal agents | CNN Politics

Published

5 hours ago

December 18, 2025

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Wisconsin judge found guilty of obstruction for helping an immigrant evade federal agents | CNN Politics

AP
—

A jury found a Wisconsin judge – accused of helping an undocumented immigrant dodge federal authorities – guilty of obstruction Thursday, marking a victory for President Donald Trump as he continues his sweeping immigration crackdown across the country.

Federal prosecutors charged Milwaukee County Circuit Judge Hannah Dugan with obstruction, a felony, and concealing an individual to prevent arrest, a misdemeanor, in April. The jury acquitted her on the concealment count, but she still faces up to five years in prison on the obstruction count.

The jury returned the verdicts after deliberating for six hours. Dugan faces up to five years in prison when she’s sentenced, but no date had been set as of late Thursday evening.

Dugan and her attorneys left the courtroom Thursday, ducked into a side conference room and closed the door without speaking to reporters. Steve Biskupic, her lead attorney, later told reporters that he was disappointed with the ruling and didn’t understand how the jury could have reached a split verdict since the elements of both charges were virtually the same.

US Attorney Brad Schimel denied the case was political and urged people to accept the verdict peacefully. He said courthouse arrests are safer because people are screened for weapons and it isn’t unfair for law enforcement to arrest wanted people in courthouses.

“Some have sought to make this about a larger political battle,” Schimel said. “While this case is serious for all involved, it is ultimately about a single day, a single bad day, in a public courthouse. The defendant is certainly not evil. Nor is she a martyr for some greater cause.”

According to court filings that include an FBI affidavit and a federal grand jury indictment, immigration authorities traveled to the Milwaukee County courthouse on April 18 after learning 31-year-old Eduardo Flores-Ruiz had reentered the country illegally and was scheduled to appear before Dugan for a hearing in a state battery case.

Dugan learned that agents were in the corridor outside her courtroom waiting for Flores-Ruiz. She left the courtroom to confront them, falsely telling that their administrative warrant for Flores-Ruiz wasn’t sufficient grounds to arrest him and directing them to go to the chief judge’s office.

While the agents were gone, she addressed Flores-Ruiz’s case off the record, told his attorney that he could attend his next hearing via Zoom and led Flores-Ruiz and the attorney out a private jury door. Agents spotted Flores-Ruiz in the corridor, followed him outside and arrested him after a foot chase. The US Department of Homeland Security announced in November he had been deported.

The case inflamed tensions over Trump’s immigration crackdown, with his administration branding Dugan an activist judge and Democrats countering that the administration was trying to make an example of Dugan to blunt judicial opposition to the operation.

Prosecutors worked during Dugan’s trial to show that she directed agents to the chief judge’s office to create an opening for Flores-Ruiz to escape.

Prosecutors also played audio recordings from her courtroom in which she can be heard telling her court reporter that she’d take “the heat” for leading Flores-Ruiz out the back.

Her attorneys countered that she was trying to follow courthouse protocols that called for court employees to report any immigration agents to their supervisors and she didn’t intentionally try to obstruct the arrest team.

This story has been updated with additional details.

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Wisconsin students can soon use Pell Grants to enroll in short-term programs

Published

17 hours ago

December 18, 2025

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Wisconsin students can soon use Pell Grants to enroll in short-term programs

Wisconsin students enrolled in short-term, workforce training programs will soon be able to use federal grants to pay their tuition.

Millions of low-income students rely on Pell Grants to pay for college, including more than 70,000 in Wisconsin. The awards have long been limited to courses that span a minimum of 15 weeks or 600 “clock hours.”

The Trump administration’s “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” signed into law this summer will extend Pell Grant eligiblity to include short-term nondegree programs as short as eight weeks beginning July 1, 2026. The expansion is the largest in decades, making programs previously paid out of pocket – from truck drivers to machinists to nursing assistants – more affordable to students.

These types of programs are mostly offered by community and technical colleges, which have long lobbied for the change. They are studying their programs and deciding which need adjustments ahead of the eligibility expansion.

“Opening up financial aid and making financial aid policy more flexible and relevant to how folks are accessing workplace today, I think it has the potential to be really exciting,” said Wisconsin Technical College System President Layla Merrifield. “How do we bundle these skills? How do we construct these programs and get students a credential that’s very relevant to their field that could potentially provide a great on-ramp to a further credential later on?”

Some education policy experts have reservations about the financial aid expansion and whether it will deliver for students. There’s concern about online training programs and for-profit institutions, some of which have a pattern of predatory practices and poor graduation outcomes. Research also shows short-term programs lead to less upward mobility and lower long-term earnings for students than associate or bachelor’s degrees.

“There is a big risk here,” said Wesley Whistle, the higher education project director at New America, a left-leaning think tank. “An eight-week program is really easy to crank out lots of people. You could have a lot of low-quality programs that don’t lead to much. Students could waste their time, exhaust their Pell eligibility and be left without the right skills to succeed in the workforce. That’s my worry.”

Short implementation timeline, outcome requirements among Workforce Pell challenges

Advocates say the proposed regulations approved Dec. 12 by the federal education department include accountability measures to prevent programs from taking advantage of students and wasting taxpayer money.

The programs must be run by an accredited institution of higher education, and be offered for more than one year before being approved. States must track outcomes, requiring programs meet a 70% completion and job-placement rate, and demonstrate they lead to in-demand, high-wage jobs.

The law includes no additional funding for states to take on the new role of approving individual programs, a worry of Whistle’s.

The tight timeline is also a concern to him. States could quickly throw together an approval process and never again look at it. Whistle advocated for states to start with a pilot approach and reassess in the coming years. He also suggested they creatively leverage state funding to target specific programs that serve high workforce needs.

“This could actually be a moment where we have laboratories for democracy,” Whistle said. “To see what works and what doesn’t.”

Merrifield said technical colleges are working closely with the state Department of Workforce Development on program approvals. She said she’d love to see the expansion in place for fall 2026 but it may realistically take a little longer than that.

Wisconsin technical colleges take stock of programs

State technical colleges already have some programs that will qualify for the expanded financial aid. But they are considering which ones to revamp.

Take the certified nursing assistant program, Merrifield offered as an example. Students pursuing their registered nursing degree earn their CNA as part of the program. But some students aren’t in the RN program and are seeking only their CNA.The program is 75 hours, which is not enough to meet the new financial aid criteria.

Do technical colleges keep the program short, meaning students continue paying out of pocket? Or do they overhaul it, add skills that hospitals and medical facilities may be looking for and allow students to qualify for Pell Grants?

“There’s potential to re-examine why is it that we package skills the way that we do,”Merrifield said. “What is it that employers are really loooking for in the marketplace?”

Merrifield said manufacturing and agriculture programs may also be ripe for revamp.

Milwaukee Area Technical College has identified eight technical diploma programs that will qualify for a Pell Grant under the expansion, said Barbara Cannell, the executive dean of academic systems and integrity. The programs include nail technician, office technology assistant, real estate broker associate, truck driver training, IT user support technician and food service assistant.

MATC has a number of other programs, mostly certificates, that are too short to qualify for the expansion, she said. College officials are deciding whether to keep the programs as-is or tweak them to allow students to qualify for Pell Grants.

Both Cannell and Merrifield see the Pell Grant expansion as a way to make work-force training more accessible to nontraditional students.

“This opens the door to populations of students who just never saw themselves in that way before,” Merrifield said.

Kelly Meyerhofer has covered higher education in Wisconsin since 2018. Contact her at kmeyerhofer@gannett.com or 414-223-5168. Follow her on X (Twitter) at @KellyMeyerhofer.

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Wisconsin

Wisconsin to receive $750k in multistate Menards settlement

Published

1 day ago

December 17, 2025

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Wisconsin to receive 0k in multistate Menards settlement

MADISON, Wis. (WMTV) – A more than $4 million multistate settlement was reached with Menards Wednesday over deceptive rebate advertising and price gouging, Wisconsin officials announced Wednesday.

Attorney General Josh Kaul and the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection said the settlement resolves claims that Menards falsely marketed its merchandise credit check program, also known as the Menards’ 11% Rebate Program, and allowed price gouging during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Wisconsin will receive $750,000 in the settlement, according to DATCP.

“Figuring out how much you’ll have to pay to buy something should be straightforward,” Kaul said. “It shouldn’t be an adventure.”

Investigators involved in the multi-state lawsuit, which included Illinois and Minnesota, reviewed several aspects of Menards’ sales practices.

Wisconsin officials said investigators reviewed allegations that Menards’ use of the 11% off rebate program falsely claimed a point-of purchase discount, when the home improvement chain only offered in-store merchandise credit for future use, among other advertising claims.

Officials also investigated price gouging on four-gallon bottles of purified water at two locations in Wisconsin, including in Johnson Creek.

As part of the settlement, Menards will need to follow several advertising and sales practices. The terms, noted by DATCP, are as follows (wording theirs):

Not advertising or representing that any program that offers store credit for making purchases at Menards provides consumers with a point-of-purchase discount;
Clearly and conspicuously disclosing material limitations of the rebate program and disclosing all applicable terms and conditions of the rebate program in a readily available manner;
Investigating whether and to what extent it can offer a process by which consumers can safely and securely submit rebate application forms and receipts online;
Investigating whether and to what extent it can offer a process by which consumers can safely and securely redeem their rebate for online purchases;
Clearly and conspicuously disclosing that Menards is doing business as Rebates International;
Allowing consumers at least one year from the date of purchase to submit a rebate claim;
Updating their online rebate tracker with information about the rebate claim within 48 hours of the application being input into Menards’ system;
Updating their online rebate tracker with additional information about the rebate, including updates about returns affecting the rebate; and
Not engaging in price gouging during a period of abnormal economic disruption.