Posted on 01/13/2012 6:20:57 PM PST by afraidfortherepublic
A group working to recall state Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald said Friday it has collected enough signatures to force the veteran Republican legislator into an election.
Lori Compas, a Fort Atkinson photographer who serves as the recall group's chairwoman, said it had collected more than the 16,742 signatures needed to trigger the election, although she declined to say exactly how many. She said volunteers would continue to gather signatures through Saturday, the last day they are allowed. The signatures must be turned in to the state Government Accountability Board by Tuesday.
"Over the last year we have watched Scott Fitzgerald change from a man who won re-election on a platform of jobs and economic development into a man who is more interested in lining up behind Gov. Walker than stand up for us," she said at a news conference at the Capitol. "We watched him abuse his power. We watched him betray our trust. We watched and we took action."
Fitzgerald spokesman Andrew Welhouse didn't immediately return messages.
Democrats and their allies are looking to punish Republicans for passing a contentious law last year that stripped most public workers of nearly all their union rights. The brainchild of Gov. Scott Walker, the proposal generated weeks of around-the-clock protests at the Capitol and drove the Senate's 14 Democrats to flee the state in a futile attempt to block a vote on the plan.
Fitzgerald and other Republican leaders in the Legislature finally broke the impasse by hastily calling a committee meeting to strip the fiscal components from the plan. The move enabled the Senate to vote without a full quorum and Walker ultimately signed the plan into law in March.
Democrats ousted two Republican senators from office in recall elections last summer, although four other Republican senators survived recall attempts, maintaining the GOP's control of the chamber by a single seat. The Democrats have spent the last two months working to gather enough signatures to force Walker, Lt. Gov. Rebecca Kleefisch, Fitzgerald and three other GOP senators into recall elections as well.
Few gave the Fitzgerald recall push much of a chance. The 48-year-old Juneau Republican looked invulnerable; his southeastern Wisconsin district just re-elected him to his fifth term in 2010.
Compas, though, said she was inspired after watching Fitzgerald ignore Assembly Democratic Minority Leader Peter Barca's shouts during the committee meeting that Republicans were violating the state's open meetings law. She ran the signature drive almost single-handedly at first, but by the beginning of January the group had gathered 12,000 signatures and it was clear its efforts were gaining momentum, she said.
"I realized no one else was going to do this," she said. "I met a lot of people who just didn't feel right (about Fitzgerald)."
On Thursday Fitzgerald filed a complaint with the GAB arguing Compas' group was given too much time to gather signatures. He said he believes the 60-day window for collection should end Friday at 5 p.m., and that any signatures gathered after that should be disqualified.
The board said at the outset of the recall effort on Nov. 15, however, that the clock didn't start ticking until the day after a recall group registers, which means signatures can be collected through Saturday.
Compas and her supporters blew off the complaint Friday.
"That's a kid who's not winning at Monopoly throwing the game up at the end," Sarah Hammer, a 38-year-old volunteer signature collector, said of the complaint after the news conference ended.
No candidates have emerged to challenge Fitzgerald in a recall election. Compas said Friday she doesn't plan to run.
Whoever goes up against Fitzgerald faces a tough task. He's a seasoned legislative veteran with almost 20 years of experience in Madison. He has an expansive network of connections and a mountain of money; according to the latest campaign finance reports, he had $280,269 in the bank.
"Strip workers of nearly all their rights?" Ridiculous. They still can negotiate salary with union representation. They just have to pay their dues directly, instead of having them automatically deducted from their pay checks. And this hurts the workers, how? No, this hurts the overpaid, fat, union hierarchy.
Campas is upset because Fitzgerald didn't interupt his meeting because Assemblyman Peter Barca was shouting at him. Absurd! Barca is in the Assembly. Fitzgerald was running a meeting of the Senate. Barca has no standing in the Senate.
Campas is totally illogical in her reasoning here.
Wisconsin Sen. Fitzgerald Recall Ping.
If you want your name on, or off, this Wisconsin interest ping list, just FReep Mail me and it shall be done.
This is the Dem’s latest tactic. They can’t win the election when eveyone’s watching so they try recall elections, not nearly the turnout and they have the advantage of being on it from conception.
I say the Tea Party starts recalling Dems. Turnabout is fair play.
The fact that the LIB/DIMs are moronic and judgement-impaired doesn’t cause them to reconsider any of their faulty and insane utterances and behaviors. Oh, how I wish the LIBs hadn’t succeeded in closing more state mental hospitals in the 70’s. That leaves without an appropriate place to spend their worthless lives.
I think these groups that want to force recall elections should have to post a bond of enough money to pay for the recall election costs. If they win the election, they get their money back. If they lose the election, they lose their money.
vaudinei
Great idea except most of the Tea Party would just pray. Prayer without works is dead. Quit the bull and Tea Party get busy.
I heard on the radio that one of the names on the recall list was “Donald Duck”. That name wasn’t questioned as legitimate. What is this world coming to?
I heard on the radio that one of the names on the recall list was “Donald Duck”. That name wasn’t questioned as legitimate. What is this world coming to?
I heard on the radio that one of the names on the recall list was “Donald Duck”. That name wasn’t questioned as legitimate. What is this world coming to?
Permanent chaos and political anarchy. See what that did for Weimar. Never ending campaigns, constantly changing alliances, etc. Who thought up this goofy ‘recall’ law?
Whenever I see conservatives pushing for some radical solution to our current crisis I wonder if they’ve forgotten that liberty is a low entropy system.
I’m just going to say it: “B*tch, Please!” LOL!
The LefTards in our state have lost it! If they have enough (legitimate) signatures to recall Governor Walker, then BRING IT!
WHO is the LEFT going to run against him in a recall election? LOL! Kathleen Falk? Bwaa-Haa-Haa!
There has been NO talk of anyone on the left even WANTING THE JOB with a Republican House AND Assembly. Sure. You can WIN it through cheating and the dead voting, but you’ll be a Lame Duck Governor and won’t get a THING passed into law! Gawd, they’re SO incredibly stupid and SO incredibly WHINY!
Yes, a few of our Republican Senators are also being recalled. Wisconsin Voters have ‘Recall Fatigue’ in this state; I don’t see the minor recalls being overturned...and then WHO are the LefTards going to run against the recalled Republican Senators?
It’s just SO ridiculous, any way you look at it - and I’m not even talking TAXPAYER DOLLARS here!
What-EV-er, Losers! *Rolleyes*
I don’t know who he is, but it has to be said: “F Scott Fitzgerald”.
Three times? Or on three radios?
;)
Steve
Since those things are one and the same, that's not a change.
I have to say, despite all of this - I’m sure for you in Wisconsin it is nice to see that you have REAL Republicans running things in everything they control - Governor, Senate, House. It’s proof they do in fact exist. Your state will be the better for it.
This is an abuse of the recall power.
I heard on Thursday they were just short of the 16,742 signatures they need. Even though they were given an extra day to gather signatures, I think they'll just barely meet the goal. Fitzgerald should be able to successfully challenge enough signatures to defeat the recall attempt.
Just want to correct for precision here in packerland. Governor Walker’s reforms reduced their ability to bargain on wages with a cap tied to CPI.
-——Act 10 limits increases to total base wages that may be bargained by local governments. This is because the bill ties negotiated base wages to the consumer price index (CPI).——
http://www.lwm-info.org/index.asp?Type=B_BASIC&SEC={AB3B89C9-E759-42A0-BBBC-B395FC9381C9}
Oh and the meeting where Barca was being an a(** was a joint assembly-senate conference. God forbid a loud, whiny little leftist dictator couldn’t stop the duly elected majority doing what the voters elected them to do.
Great to hear!!! Woo hoo!!! Thanks!!!
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