Gov. Tony Evers signs the 2023-25 state budget in July 2023. A circuit judge ruled Tuesday that Evers' use of partial vetoes was proper on legislation enacted in February 2024 to fund Wisconsin's 2023 reading initiative. (Baylor Spears | Wisconsin Examiner)
Gov. Tony Evers’ partial veto that changed legislation funding a state reading education initiative was proper under Wisconsin law and the state constitution, a Dane County judge ruled Tuesday.
But the judge rejected the Evers administration’s claim that Republican lawmakers were wrongly holding back money appropriated for the program.
The reading initiative was created in Act 20 , legislation that lawmakers passed and Evers signed in June 2023.
The 2023-25 state budget included $50 million for the new program, and in February this year, lawmakers passed legislation creating a mechanism for deploying the money. Evers signed that bill, now Act 100, using his partial veto power to change some of the language.
Evers’ veto had the effect of consolidating the funds into a single appropriation, which the governor wrote in his veto message would allow the Department of Public Instruction (DPI) to administer it more effectively.
Republican leaders in the Legislature sued DPI and Evers, claiming that Act 100 wasn’t an appropriation bill and therefore not subject to the governor’s partial veto power.
On Tuesday, Dane County Circuit Judge Stephen Ehlke ruled on summary judgment that, based on previous rulings involving the partial veto, Act 100 was properly considered an appropriation bill and that Evers’ partial vetoes were therefore lawful.
The Legislature’s GOP-controlled Joint Finance Committee has, meanwhile, been holding back the $50 million budgeted for the literacy program — part of $250 million that the budget directed to the budget committee’s supplemental appropriation account.
As part of their response to the lawsuit over the partial vetoes, DPI and Evers asked the judge to direct the finance committee to release the $50 million, arguing that it was already budgeted by the Legislature for the reading program.
Ehlke, however, declined to do so. The budget as enacted clearly put the $250 million in the supplemental account, including the $50 million for the reading program, “for the purpose of JCF’s [the Joint Finance Committee] providing supplemental funding to governmental units,” the judge wrote.
The use of the supplemental appropriation process, giving the finance committee greater jurisdiction over how and when those funds are spent, is well established, Ehlke wrote.
“The Legislature thus clearly did not intend to give $50 million to DPI, but instead knowingly put funds into JCF’s supplemental account for JCF to use to supplement funding at its discretion,” he wrote. “Accordingly, I reject DPI’s request that the $50 million be transferred to its account based on the budget process…”
On the social media platform X, Evers praised the rulin g for upholding his partial veto authority but said he would appeal it over the release of the money, charging that the decision allowed “Republican lawmakers to continue obstructing the release of $50 million we already approved to improve kids’ reading across our state.”
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