We're not talking about endowing a chair. We're talking about government or industry funding research by a particular scientist for a specific area. If this professor leaves then the money will follow her or else just be cancelled.
if it's "her" money, how does Wisconsin lose if she goes?
It loses the research dollars and the scientist who attracted it.
you might be one of those "conservatives" who gets excited by politicians who "bring in Federal money;" i'm not.
I'm more interested in the discoveries that come from the research.
Again, what does Wisconsin lose? Prestige, their cut of the pie, what? You state this as a given that the state of Wisconisin loses something of value if a fish scientist moves to another state. As for "discoveries," everything has a cost. Knowng some things about a perch may not be worth the cost. If all universities did was provide "discoveries," you might have a point, but that's a very simplistic way of looking at it.
ironically, research funding for hard sciences, absent any political agenda, is probably one of the less odious uses of tax money I can imagine. Sadly, the university system has been on the public money gravy tran for so long, it's facing a reckoning, either from Walker or from somene else.