Wisconsin
Wisconsin Democrats Engage Black Voters in Milwaukee with Roundtable Discussion – Milwaukee Courier Weekly Newspaper
Kwabena Nixon, DNC Chairman Jaime Harrison and Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley (Photo/Karen Stokes)
By Karen Stokes
Wisconsin Democrats continue efforts to gain support among Black voters with a roundtable discussion Saturday in Milwaukee.
Wisconsin Democrats hosted Black Men Chats with DNC Chair Jaime Harrison, Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley and WNOV On the Porch Radio Host Kwabena Nixon.
“It’s called Black Men Chat. It’s directed to Black issues and how we can really help the community best,” said Key Jennings, Coalitions Manager for the Democratic Party of Wisconsin.
“These are conversations about Black men. We are going out to vote for the presidential election. What happens in DC does affect us but it’s nothing like what affects you here on 5th and Burleigh. There are some Black men that have no idea that this event is going down because they’re disenfranchised. There are young men that don’t know how to plug in,” Nixon said.
When asked why we should vote, the Black men identified challenges they face, such as economic opportunities, upward mobility, representation in positions of power, racial profiling, access to capital, mental health issues, trauma, racism, lack of hope, access to resources, and home ownership.
Jaime Harrison and David Crowley (Photo/Karen Stokes)
DNC Chair Jaime Harrison, the first Black chairperson selected by a president, shared a personal story to explain his dedication to the work he does.
Raised by his grandparents in South Carolina, his grandmother had an 8th-grade education, she picked cotton and cleaned houses and his grandfather had a 4th-grade education.
“They taught me the value of hard work. My grandfather taught me to protect my name,” Harrison said.
When Harrison was in 6th grade, his grandparents lost their home to fraud, and his grandfather lost his job. Harrison felt helpless and realized that bad credit is the barrier to the American dream. He promised to one day buy them a house. He later attended Yale, supported by a community businessman who helped him get a loan. Harrison graduated, attended Georgetown for law school, and bought his grandparents a house in 2004.
Kwabena Nixon (Photo/Karen Stokes)
“I do this work for my grandparents,” Harrison said.
“There’s power in vulnerability, there’s power in building a connection and you have the opportunity to learn something so deep about a person it allows you to fight even harder for that person,” Crowley acknowledged.
Crowley shared his story. He’s the youngest person and first African American to be elected Milwaukee County Executive.
“I grew up on 23rd and Burleigh, 22nd and Brown, 24th and Lloyd, 29th and Walnut, and 34th and Good Hope. My story is about housing insecurity, mental health and drug addiction because that’s where I come from. When I think about my story, it’s also a story of resilience. So why do I do this? I believe God put me in this position,” Crowley said.
“My father was a master electrician, my mother was a Jane-of-all-trades, and they did everything they could to take care of us, but mental health and drug addiction were detrimental to them,” Crowley explained. “They eventually got clean, but we lost our homes. We moved every year from ages 15 to 24. MPS was my stability. When I was a junior in high school, I got involved with Urban Underground, which taught me how to love myself and my community. I wanted to give back to the same community that saved my life.”
Key Jennings, Democratic Party of Wisconsin (Photo/Karen Stokes)
Crowley has been in this seat under both Trump and Biden and highlights the differences. He admits he would have never seen the investment in housing under Trump. There were over 15,000 families in their homes prevented from eviction under Biden. Milwaukee has been able to invest in more single family homes being built in the city because of President Biden. He believes there’s no way it would be done under Trump.
Nixon stated that there’s a concern about the apathy of young people voting and questioned if they should vote for Biden.
There is also a concern that Democrats need to market their successes better to the American people. Their message is being drowned out by the spectacle of Trump’s conviction.
Harrison shared examples of the differences between the two candidates.
“The stark difference is one person is actually speaking to the future of this country and who we can become. The other wants to live in the past.
“Under the Trump administration most of all of the PPP loans went to big banks; it did not go to the community banks,” Harrison said. “Small Black barber shops, beauticians, grocery stores needed loans but didn’t get them until Joe Biden got in the White House and Democrats had control of the House and Senate. From the PPP loans under Trump, there were 1700 loans for small Black businesses $592 million, under Biden 4781 loans, $1.4 billion. Also, Child poverty was cut in half the first year of the Biden Administration because of the tax child credit.”
Harrison said Biden could have stopped with the American Rescue Plan, but then came the Infrastructure Law, with the largest infrastructure bill since Eisenhower, $1.2 trillion. In Wisconsin, $6 billion to projects in the state for the first time. In addition, Biden has forgiven $157 million in student loans.
Crowley added that Democrats are not going to win this election without Black women and men showing up to vote.
A new Marquette Law School Poll national survey of registered voters reported May 23, 2024 finds President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump are tied with 50% each in a two-candidate matchup.
Wisconsin is now considered a critical swing state ahead of the 2024 presidential election.
Wisconsin
‘Moving Menace’ faces death investigation, 10 criminal cases in Wisconsin
MILWAUKEE – A Wisconsin man – who FOX6 Investigators once dubbed the “Moving Menace” – now faces a death investigation plus 10 criminal cases from nine police departments.
‘She’s ice-cold, dude!’
What they’re saying:
A 2015 Toyota Corolla was going 80 mph down Forest Home – in a 35 mph zone – when a Greenfield police officer flipped on his emergency lights and siren, revved the engine and began a rapid pursuit. As the vehicle slowed, a hand emerged and waved from the driver’s window. He yelled something about an unresponsive woman in the back seat.
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Officers found 40-year-old Mina Abidi slumped over behind the passenger seat of the car, dragged her onto the pavement and started CPR.
Seated on a curb nearby, Daniel Berczyk started talking.
“I noticed her lips,” he said. “I noticed her lips.”
Abidi was pronounced dead at the scene. The medical examiner’s office ruled the cause of death to be an overdose from a combination of fentanyl, cocaine, alcohol and xylazine.
Daniel Berczyk sits on a curb on August 13, 2024, as first responders tend to Mina Abidi’s overdose.
Berczyk told officers he was trying to get her to the nearest hospital, but he admitted he’d been driving her around in that state for more than an hour, including two trips to Walgreens.
Officer: “Why didn’t you call 911 immediately?”
Berczyk: “When I went into Walgreens, she wasn’t acting like she was dead or anything.”
At times, Berczyk described Abidi as a friend.
“I can’t believe she’s ****ing gone man, what the ****? It’s crazy.”
But moments later, he couldn’t seem to remember her name.
Berczyk: “What the hell’s the girl name in the car?”
Detective: “You called her Bidi.”
Berczyk: “Yeah Bidi.”
Detective: “Oh, that’s pretty close to her last name.”
Abidi’s death became the subject of a Greenfield Police investigation that is still awaiting a charging decision from the Milwaukee County District Attorney’s Office nearly two years later.
She was my ‘sister’
Why you should care:
Abidi was married, had a daughter and lived in the picture-postcard suburb of Cedarburg. But her relationship was nothing to write home about. Her husband had been convicted of domestic abuse. Michailah Belle said when she met Abidi, she was contemplating suicide.
“There was just this look in her face,” Belle said. “She looked sad.”
The two became fast friends and Belle, who has 11 children of her own, said she eventually considered Abidi a member of her family.
“She was so optimistic,” Belle said. “She was just going through some things.”
Belle said she believes drugs are what led Abidi to a meet-up with one of the area’s most prolific criminals.
‘Get off my property!’
The backstory:
FOX6 Investigators first encountered Berczyk in 2008, ripping off customers of his moving business that operated under multiple names, including Best Way Movers and Affordable Moving and Storage.
A few months after that investigation, police said Berczyk went on a three-week crack cocaine binge, during which he broke into dozens of cars at area park-and-ride lots. He fled to Arizona.
FOX6 Investigators noticed he was updating his MySpace page – yes, MySpace – and police used that to find him and bring him back to Wisconsin.
Between 2009 and 2016, Berczyk was in and out of prison, often finding his misdeeds the subject of FOX6 Investigators reports.
Daniel Berczyk orders FOX6 Investigator Bryan Polcyn to leave his parents’ property in Muskego in 2008.
“You told me you were going to turn your life around,” FOX6 Investigator Bryan Polcyn said in a courthouse hallway in 2015 before Berczyk bumped him with his left hip.
“Did you just hip-check me, Dan?” Polcyn replied.
For nearly 30 years, starting in the late 1990s, Berczyk racked up criminal cases faster than birthdays – mostly involving theft, drugs or both. But in 2016, something unexpected happened: The criminal charges largely stopped for 10 years, but for a single misdemeanor case in 2020.
That is, until Mina Abidi’s death.
A visit to Milwaukee
Timeline:
On Aug. 12, 2024, Abidi was in Cedarburg. Berczyk said she wanted to “hang out,” but needed gas money. So Berczyk paid a friend to send her $14 through Cash App. She arrived at the Travelodge near 20th and Layton, just off the interstate in Milwaukee, sometime after dark. He said they were “fooling around” in her car but never had sex.
Berczyk claimed he never saw Abidi use drugs, but noticed she was “acting weird,” like she was “fighting off a Xanax buzz.” In a video recorded interview hours later, Berczyk reflected on that moment.
Berczyk: “Man, she’s kind of ****ed up (he remembered thinking) I should get some Narcan.”
Detective: “You thought that then?”
Berczyk: “I don’t know why. It just popped into my head.”
Berczyk tells a Greenfield detective he sought life-saving Narcan at Walgreens, but left when told it would cost money.
At one point, Berczyk said, Abidi got out of the car and laid down on the pavement. So he loaded her into the backseat of her own car and drove to Walgreens hoping to get Narcan. Surveillance video shows him entering the store alone, approaching the pharmacy counter, then leaving without any medication.
“Thirty-four dollars for Narcan? I’m like, ‘What the ****? ****’s free?” he said.
It’s not clear what Berczyk actually said to the pharmacist, but Belle believes he should have told them a woman in the car outside might be dying.
“They could’ve called 911,” she said. “They could’ve called the ambulance. The ambulance could’ve came there, and they could’ve saved her.”
Instead, Berczyk got back in the car at 12:50 a.m. and sat there for 12 minutes.
At 1:02 a.m., the car pulled away. Berczyk said he spent the next hour dumpster-diving at a nearby apartment complex.
“Have you ever seen those dumpsters?” he told a detective. “Dude, I have pulled some ****ing amazing **** out of there, dude.”
The whole time, Abidi was in the car, unwilling or unable to talk.
“I’m like, ‘Bidi, what’s up?’ She’s like, (Berczyk makes a growling noise). She made like a weird noise or something. I’m like, ‘What the ****?’”
It wasn’t until 2:11 a.m. that police spotted Berczyk speeding down Forest Home and pulled him over. By then, it was too late.
Abidi’s death was officially ruled an accident, and while the case is still under review by prosecutors, Berczyk has never been charged.
But four months later, the criminal charges started piling up again.
Ten criminal cases in 18 months
Downward spiral:
In December 2024, Big Bend Police said Berczyk stole $3,500 worth of aluminum rims from a commercial trucking company. Wauwatosa police said he stole rims at a business there, too.
In May 2025, Berczyk was caught on surveillance video stealing a bicycle from a University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee residence hall garage.
In July 2025, he’s accused of stealing a gun, tools and sporting goods from a Glendale apartment complex.
In late 2025 and early 2026, four different police departments found him in possession of cocaine, meth and narcotic drugs.
Click here to read the criminal complaints:
But while the criminal charges kept coming, Berczyk stopped showing up for court. So FOX6 Investigators went looking for him where we found him 18 years ago – at his parents’ house in Muskego.
“I’m looking for your son, Dan,” said Polcyn to a gray-haired man who answered the knock, but refused to open the storm door.
Berczyk has been charged with more than 100 crimes in his adult life. He is 50 years old.
“No idea where he is,” mouthed Daniel Berczyk Sr.
After four months on the lam, Milwaukee police arrested Berczyk at a house near 12th and Ring in Milwaukee’s Borchert Field neighborhood. They said they found him after he listed a stolen generator on Facebook Marketplace.
He’s back in custody, facing a flurry of new charges. In all, he now has 10 open criminal cases in Milwaukee and Waukesha counties, with a total of 35 criminal charges among them.
“That is how you get an absolute Level 5 highest risk category,” said prosecuting attorney Karine O’Byrne.
Belle is still focused on the one case for which charges remain elusive.
Polcyn: “Was Mina Abidi’s life worth saving?”
Belle: “It was. It definitely was.”
It is the only case that is truly a matter of life and death.
$77,500 cash bail
What’s next:
Berczyk is being held in the Milwaukee County Jail on a combined total of $77,500 cash bail in seven Milwaukee County cases. He also faces three additional criminal cases in Waukesha County.
He’s due in court again July 10.
The Source: Information in this report is from the Greenfield Police Department, Milwaukee County Medical Examiner’s Office, Big Bend Police Department, Wauwatosa Police Department, Milwaukee Police Department, Waukesha County District Attorney’s Office, Wisconsin Circuit Court records, a review of police and surveillance video, an interview with Belle, and prior coverage of FOX6 Investigators reports on Berczyk.
Wisconsin
Who is Diane Hendricks, Wisconsin’s richest woman?
Watch: Billionaire Diane Hendricks delivers address at the RNC
Businesswoman Diane Hendricks, a longtime donor for Republicans, spoke at the Republican National Convention.
America’s richest self-made woman lives in Wisconsin. She’s also, unsurprisingly, the richest person in the state.
So who is Diane Hendricks? Hendricks is the co-founder of Beloit-based ABC Supply Co., which sells roofing and building supplies. In June, she was named the richest self-made woman in the nation for the ninth year in a row by Forbes. She was also ranked the wealthiest Wisconsinite in 2025, with a 2026 net worth of $22.3 billion.
In 2022, Forbes dubbed Hendricks “the most successful female entrepreneur in American history.”
Raised on a dairy farm in Osseo, Wisconsin, the 79 year-old Hendricks had her first child at 17. She left school and worked as a Playboy Bunny before co-founding the ABC empire with her second husband in 1982. When he passed away in 2007, she took over the company.
Since then, Hendricks has more than tripled her net worth, acquired large competitors, and expanded into other sectors. According to Forbes, ABC Supply had 900 locations and $20.2 billion in revenue in 2025. She is also the chair and founder of Hendricks Commercial Properties, a real estate development company, and Hendricks Holding Company, Inc., a private investment firm.
A 2016 Journal Sentinel investigation found that Hendricks had paid zero state income tax for three years. Another investigation found that her 8,500 square foot mansion in the Town of Rock had been taxed as a 1,663 square foot ranch house for years.
Hendricks is also a powerful force in conservative politics in the state and nationally. She has donated millions to the GOP over the years. In 2016, she was a vice chair of the Trump Victory fundraising committee. Months before being named the richest person in Wisconsin, Hendricks spoke at the 2024 Republican National Convention in Milwaukee as an “everyday American.”
Hendricks has also championed economic development efforts in Beloit, cohosting an A&E show with her daughter titled “Betting on Beloit.”
Wisconsin
Showers Return to Southern Wisconsin for Father’s Day
- Showers will be most likely for areas along and south of the I-94 corridor
- Dry and pleasant conditions for Monday and Tuesday
- Showers and thunderstorms will return Tuesday night and into the day Wednesday
MADISON, Wis. (WMTV) – We are starting the day with some sunshine, but high-level clouds will continue to move in out ahead of a weather system to the southwest. This area of low pressure will move eastward across Illinois and Indiana today, bringing an increase in cloud cover as well as the chance for rain in southern Wisconsin. There is still some uncertainty with exactly how far north the rain will extend, but there is a higher confidence in the presence and coverage of showers along and south of the I-94 corridor this afternoon and evening. Activity will likely be much more hit-or-miss in areas farther north, with some spots potentially not seeing any rain at all.
The cloud cover and rain combined will work to limit temperatures today, with highs only ranging from the upper 60s (in southern Wisconsin) to the low 70s (further north where the sun may linger longer, and it will be drier). We are not expecting a heavy rain, nor are we expecting storms. In areas closer to the state line, rainfall accumulations may be around a half inch. Tonight, rain will end as the system moves east.
What’s Coming Up…
Monday will be dry and pleasant with highs into the mid-70s and some sunshine. This trend continues Tuesday, with highs in the upper 70s. Rain and thunderstorms are then likely to return Tuesday night and Wednesday, with a chance for some stronger storms Wednesday afternoon. Additional showers may linger into Thursday.
Looking Ahead…
Friday looks mostly dry before more chances for showers and thunderstorms return next weekend as temperatures warm up a bit closer to normal for this time of the year.
Click here to download the WMTV15 News app or our WMTV15 First Alert weather app.
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