Judge rules Evers properly used partial veto authority

A Dane County judge ruled Tuesday Gov. Tony Evers appropriately used his partial veto authority when he cut parts from the reading bill, a move Republicans called unconstitutional. 

In the same ruling, Dane County Circuit Court Judge Stephen Elhke rejected a request by the state Department of Public Instruction to release $50 million to fund the sweeping reading legislation. 

Evers immediately filed a notice of appeal, saying he’s glad the court upheld the constitutional line-item veto, but he “wholeheartedly disagrees” with allowing Republican lawmakers to continue obstructing the release of the $50 million already approved. 

“With kids, families and educators returning back to school, our kids and schools desperately need these critical investments to help improve our kids reading and literacy outcomes,” Evers posted on X. 

The reading bill included spending $50 million to create a new literacy office, hire reading coaches and shift away from what has been known as “balanced literacy” to a “science of reading” approach.

Attorneys representing the GOP could not immediately be reached for comment. 

The bipartisan reading bill, known as Act 20, is scheduled to be implemented in the 2024-25 school year. 

Students will now be taught to read with an emphasis on phonics with the hope of addressing the state’s lagging reading scores.

Fewer than 40 percent of third graders were proficient in reading on the most recent Wisconsin Forward Exam. Wisconsin’s achievement gap between Black and white fourth grade students in reading has often been the worst in the nation.

The Wisconsin Legislature sued Evers and DPI in February over literacy legislation passed last summer. 

A February bill empowered the Joint Finance Committee to direct $50 million for specific early literacy programs. Those programs were included in a literacy bill approved by the Legislature last summer.

The lawsuit, filed in Dane County Circuit Court, argues partial vetoes to that bill issued by Evers on Feb. 29 were unconstitutional.

Evers’ partial veto, known as Act 100,  struck language allocating  money for school boards and charter school compliance in the early literacy program.

The lawsuit argues the changes “will allow DPI to treat any money directed to it as money that can be used by the Office of Literacy for any literacy program that office deems fit.”

On March 7, DPI submitted a request to the Legislature to release the funds set aside in the biennial budget in accordance with the partially vetoed version of Act 100.

GOP lawyers argued the Joint Finance Committee “can’t be assured the money will be specifically spent on literacy programs created in Act 20.” 

In his ruling, Elhke said DPI argued everyone understood in the negotiation process that the $50 million was intended to fund literacy programs but cited no authority to support the proposition. 

Regarding GOP’s claim that Evers’ partial veto was unconstitutional, Elhke called the Legislatures’ concern “overblown.”