The Dan O'Donnell Show -3-11-26

The Dan O'Donnell Show -3-11-26

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:04):
A truly shocking sex abuse scandal at a high school
in Wisconsin, in a small town community that you would
never expect. We will dive into that here on the
Wednesday edition of The Dan o'donald Show. Welcome to it.
If you would like to join the program, Our phone
lines are always open four one four seven nine nine
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(00:27):
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(00:47):
and everything we do. If you want to stand up
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Follow us, download episodes, listen to that podcast. We are
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(01:08):
would like to move up the charts. Best way to
show how valuable this show is to subscribe top stories
that we are following right now a shocking and I
mean truly federal, shocking federal lawsuit alleging teachers and coaches
grooming teenage girls at a high school in Wisconsin. Attorney

(01:29):
Larry Disparty at a news conference in Milwaukee this morning, as.

Speaker 2 (01:33):
Women are coming forward now not only to see justice
for the Harmdas caused to them, but also to expose
the institutional failures that allowed the abuse to continue and
to demand meaningful change.

Speaker 1 (01:45):
All the truly stunning details coming up in just a second.
President Trump on the road again today. He is scheduled
to speak in Kentucky after touring a scientific facility in Cincinnati.
The Daily Trump Day coming up at four o'clock then
at four fifteen. Why is Governor Evers so adamant about
not wanting to turn over voter role data or cooperate

(02:07):
with any sort of federal investigation into potential voter irregularities?
And why is he making bizarre claims like the FBI
will be able to see who you voted for. This
is a narrative being pushed by the Milwaukee Journal Center
for the past two days. It is completely and totally false.
We will debunk it. Coming up at four fifteen, and

(02:28):
it's a major anniversary here in Wisconsin fifteen years to
the day since Act ten passed. It saved taxpayers more
than thirty five billion dollars, So naturally Democrats are trying
to repeal it all. The latest done that coming up
right after the five o'clock news.

Speaker 2 (02:49):
Federal lawsuit federal civil rights lawsuit on behalf of three
brave young women who is students of Ocanto Falls High
School were groomed and sexually abused by teachers and coaches.

Speaker 1 (03:03):
Three young women stepping forward saying that they were all abused,
and not only that that the Oconto Falls School District
didn't just turn a blind eye, but also covered it up.
Attorney Cass Casper is the lead attorney on this case.
With the disparity law.

Speaker 3 (03:22):
These three brave young women have come forward with these
claims because they want to solve an institutional problem. They
want to stop the culture where sex abusers, groomers other
school staff who think it's okay to engage in sexualized

(03:42):
conduct and grooming towards students is allowed to flourish.

Speaker 1 (03:47):
And in fact, each one of the girls alleges that
she was groomed and then abused by someone who is
either a teacher or a coach at Oconto Falls High
School put in a position of trust, and that this
was well known by other members of the teaching and
administrative community at Oconto Falls High School, but that nothing

(04:07):
was ever done over a period of twenty five years.

Speaker 3 (04:12):
These three women are from Oconto Falls, Wisconsin. All three
of them endured sexual grooming and abuse by teachers and
coaches while they were miners enrolled in this district schools.

Speaker 1 (04:25):
Now, while all three of the girls are in fact
named in the civil complaint that was brought today against
the Oconto Falls School Board, we are not going to
name them in full. We are not going to use
their last names here on the Dan O'Donnell Show. In addition,
while the people who are accused of grooming them and

(04:45):
then engaging in child sexual assault are also named in
this civil complaint, since they are not specifically named as
defendants in this case, this is a civil rights case
against the Oconto Falls School District, we are not going
to be naming them here on the Dan O'Donnell Show.
I will also issue a very strong warning because I

(05:08):
know it's just after three o'clock Central time, and because
I know a lot of you are going to pick
up your kids from school, I'm going to give you
permission to change the channel. Listen to another one of
our great iHeartMedia stations. Go listen to Big ninety five
seven or what do we call it, ninety five seven
Big FM. Listen to some hits of the eighties, nineties

(05:30):
and two thousands. How about B ninety seven point three.
They're doing great stuff. Maybe check out the country station.
But I am going to be reading from the complaint,
and while it is not extremely graphic, this does outline
in great detail how these young women, as teenage girls,
were groomed at Oconto Falls High School. I do this

(05:52):
not to appeal to the prurient interest, but as a
public service because while child sex, assault and grooming has
been and of course in international news for months now
with the Jeffrey Epstein case, this is how grooming usually
does work. It is not some pedophile billionaire halfway around
the world trying to get girls to go to a

(06:14):
private island with him. It is someone who exploits a
relationship of trust with a vulnerable person and then attempts
or succeeds in engaging in sexual conduct. So if you
do have sensitive ears in the car, I would very
strongly suggest that you turn down the radio. We are

(06:35):
going to be going through this complaint because, folks, this
is an absolutely massive scandal. Not only do the girls
allege that they were in fact abused, during the course
of investigation into this lawsuit, into the discovery phase of
filing this lawsuit, it was found, or at least it's

(06:56):
been alleged that investigators found evident that there were at
least fourteen other victims who were abused or potentially groomed
by nine other staff members at Oconto Falls High School. Again,
this is potentially a massive, massive scandal and could be

(07:17):
the very first case that is tried under a brand
new law that Governor Evers just signed making child grooming
a crime. We will get into all of that pretty
much throughout the three o'clock hours. So if you do
have little ones in the car, fair warning, I'm giving
you permission to listen to B ninety seven point three

(07:37):
for the next forty five minutes or so, because we
are going to get into very heavy stuff. If, however,
you are a parent and you want to understand some
of the warning signs this I believe is a must listen.
This is something that every parent needs to understand about

(07:58):
how people in a position usition of trust, coaches, teachers,
anyone who is around kids can very easily abuse that relationship.
This is directly from this civil rights complaint. Plaintiff Amanda
was groomed and sexually abused by her Tech education teacher

(08:21):
while she was a student at Oconto Falls High School
from approximately twenty ten to twenty thirteen, when she was
between the ages of sixteen and eighteen. Plaintiff Brook was
groomed and sexually abused by an assistant volleyball coach while
Brooke was a fifteen year old sophomore at Oconto Falls
High School during the twenty thirteen and twenty fourteen school year,

(08:45):
Plaintiff Grace was groomed and sexually abused by a substitute
teacher who was also formally serving as that assistant volleyball
coach and also groomed and sexually abused Brook. This allegedly
happened when Grace was a seventeen year old junior at

(09:06):
O'conto Falls High School in February through April of twenty eighteen,
So already we have an eight year period of potential
grooming abuse and Oconto Falls School District covering this up.
The theory of plaintiff's case against the Board of Oconto
Falls School District is not simply that they were sexually abused,

(09:28):
but they were abused by teachers and coaches under circumstances
created by the board through its pervasive custom and policy
of knowing about teacher student sexual abuse and failing to act.
While plaintiffs were aware of their abuse, they had no
knowledge and no reason to know of the Board's unwritten policies, customs,
and practices tolerating sexual abuse and grooming across many teachers

(09:51):
and students, and the boards delivered indifference to such conduct
until fall twenty twenty five, when they learned of the
full scope of teacher students sexual abuse at Oconto Falls
High School and the boards decades long pattern of ignoring it. Amanda,
according to this complaint, started getting groomed as a sophomore

(10:13):
when she would go on long drives with this tech
education teacher. According to the complaint, during these drives, the
teacher discussed his sex life with Amanda, inquired about her
sexual history and experiences, and discussed his home life, his
marriage and his children. While alone with Amanda. Amanda was

(10:36):
a sophomore when these drives began. The teacher told Amanda
about his Christian upbringing and explained that he could take
good care of her as a Christian family man. He
told Amanda about his wife, including that his wife had
cheated on him, and described what life would be like
for him and Amanda after he left his wife. During drives,

(10:58):
he held Amanda's hand and made soft, intimate, and affectionate
physical contact with her. These acts caused Amanda to begin
perceiving herself as being in a romantic relationship with the teacher.
This all came to a head when the teacher accompanied
and chaperoned Amanda at a Skills USA competition in the

(11:21):
Wisconsin Dells. At some point during this conference, the teacher
quote attempted to engage Amanda in sexual activity. She was
able to leave her hotel room and return to the
common hallway. The teacher followed her into the hotel stairway.
In the stairway, the teacher coerced Amanda by asking her

(11:44):
if she was just to tease. Amanda, feeling defeated and cornered,
allowed the teacher to place her sitting on a window rail.
He inserted himself between her legs and began undressing her top.
With her top removed, the teacher groped her breasts and
kissed her repeatedly. He unbuttoned her belt and pulled her

(12:07):
pants down around her ankles. He stood between her legs
with his erection felt against her body. His own belt
was unbuckled and his pants were unzipped. He sexually assaulted
her during this incident. At the most escalated point, Amanda
found the courage to tell the teacher that what they
were doing was wrong because he was a married man.

(12:30):
She told him to stop and expressed that she was
not ready for sexual activity. He stopped, but not before
having repeatedly touched her, undressed, or kissed her multiple times,
and attempted to engage in further sexual activity. Now, this
is an allegation made by a named complainant. However, there
have not been any criminal charges filed against this tech

(12:54):
education teacher. He is named in this civil complaint. Again,
we are not naming him here on the same Dan
O'Donnell's show, But this does go to show how a
close relationship between teacher and student can very very quickly
blur the lines between what is appropriate maybe a mentor
mentee relationship, and something that is far more sinister and

(13:20):
dangerously criminal. They went on rides together. Now, why would
a teacher, Why would a male teacher, Why would any
teacher just sort of go on rides. It's not like
he was taking her to taking her home after a
Skills USA practice or something like that. They would just
go drive around together. That is completely inappropriate. Again, parents,

(13:45):
if you get wind of your child or a child
that you know, just kind of going on rides, just
sort of driver a just sort of hanging around, just
an adult and a student, this is suspicious behavior. There
is very rarely any reason for an adult to be
anywhere alone with a child who is not reten even

(14:07):
a child who is related to them. If there is
an adult and a child just alone together, and they
seem to be spending a whole lot of time alone
after school anything like that, that is a huge red flag.

Speaker 4 (14:18):
Now.

Speaker 1 (14:19):
The lawsuit further alleges that multiple teachers and administrators knew
about this very uncomfortable relationship between the teacher and the student,
but did absolutely nothing. Now, they might not have been
aware of this incident that took place in the Dells,
but they were certainly aware that there was an inappropriate relationship. Now,

(14:39):
according to the suit, Amanda in twenty twenty five realized
that this was wrong and that there was a long
standing pattern of abuse. According to the suit, Amanda learned
that the board's pattern of knowledge of teacher student abuse
and failing to act spanned at least twenty years, involved
at least nine different teachers and affected at least fourteen

(15:02):
identified victims. Now all of these victims are identified by
their initials in this civil complaint. Prior to twenty twenty five,
Amanda did not know that the board had a pervasive
problem with other teachers engaging in abuse in grooming and
failed to act, or that the board's systemic failures had
created a culture in which teachers like the teacher who

(15:24):
allegedly abused her, could abuse students without consequence. Amanda did
not learn that the board injured her through its own
institutional conduct until twenty twenty five. Now, the reason to
include this is to avoid any statute of limitations concerns.
Because this allegedly occurred between twenty ten and twenty thirteen,

(15:45):
there would be the potential for a statute of limitations
to have run, that there would be a timeliness complaint
and that the Oconto Full School Board would say, look,
this young woman unfortunately did not file this lawsuit quickly
enough after the alleged incidents. When we come back here
on the Dan o'donald Show, we will get into the

(16:05):
allegations of the other two young women as we continue
to cover one of the worst instances of what appears
to be a widespread sexual abuse and child grooming scandal
in the history of Wisconsin. It is a massive story
and you'll likely hear it only here on the Dan
o'donald Show. Alleged victims, eleven alleged perpetrators. A new lawsuit

(16:35):
filed today in the Eastern District of Wisconsin against the
Oconto Falls School Board. This is up near Green Bay,
just may outline the single worst child sex abuse scandal
in the history of Wisconsin. That is no overstatement. There

(16:56):
lead attorney for the three named plaintiffs, cass Casper.

Speaker 3 (17:01):
Through our investigation over the past approximately eight months, we
have identified at least nine teachers, at least and staff
members who engaged in sexual abuse, grooming, or severe sexualized
misconduct with other students at Oconto Falls. Of those other students,

(17:21):
we have identified at least fourteen known victims over an
approximate twenty year period from twenty oh five to twenty
twenty five. Twenty years. Folks that children sat in these classrooms,
trusted the adults around them, and were failed by every
single person in a position to protect them while at

(17:43):
that school.

Speaker 1 (17:44):
Now, in addition to those other fourteen victims and nine
potential perpetrators, there were the three named young women who
today appeared at that press conference along with their attorney.
They are identified here on the Dan O'Donnell show only
by their first name, Amanda, Brook and Grace. In the

(18:04):
last segment, we outlined what happened to Amanda. Now, Brooke
was allegedly groomed by a volleyball coach. So the varsity
volleyball coach was a health education teacher and the head
varsity coach, her daughter was an assistant coach. It is

(18:25):
alleged that the assistant coach began sending snapchat messages to Brook,
often late at night. She began sending Brook photographs of
her naked body and asking Brooke to reciprocate this. According
to the civil complaint. Brooke had just turned fifteen years
old and felt uncertain, confused, and pressured because the woman

(18:47):
was one of her volleyball coaches. The woman quickly escalated
the grooming by asking Brook to go out. Their first
meeting took place at Panera in Green Bay, after which
they drove to a target parking lot. The woman had
an SUV with a full down back seat. At their
first meeting, she asked Brooke to get into the back
seat and then engage Brook in sexual activity. Brooke had

(19:10):
just turned fifteen years old and was a student on
the women's volleyball team. Brooke did not know what sex
between women was and was not interested in sexual activity
with women, but she felt obligated to comply because of
the power differential between her and the assistant coach, and
because of her youth and inexperience. Around the same time,

(19:33):
the coach told Brooks she could turn her into a
college athlete. The woman also began attempting to separate Brook
from her family by telling her that family did not
come to enough games and did not care about her,
but that Brooke could always rely on the assistant coach.
That fall twenty thirteen, the assistant coach began asking Brooke

(19:53):
to come to her house. Brooke would oblige and end
up staying the night. The assistant coach had Brooke sleep
in her bed, where she would sleep nude and engage
or attempt to engage Brook in sexual acts. The woman
also played pornography on her television when Brook stayed overnight.

(20:15):
The assistant coach's mother, remember the health education teacher, the
head volleyball coach, and a mandated reporter, was present in
the home and aware of Brook's presence in the home.
This is a massive deal. The mother observed Brooke and
the daughter snuggling on the couch and had to have

(20:37):
been aware that they were sleeping in the same bed.
The daughter the assistant coach is grooming and sexual abuse
of Brooke continued throughout Brook's sophomore year until police intervened.
In or around May or June of twenty fourteen. During
a police investigation, an officer threatened to put Brook in
handcuffs unless she cooperated, placing Brook in a state of terror.

(21:01):
Brooke was taken to a child protective services agency called
Willow Tree in Green Bay, where she denied that anything
was happening with the assistant coach because she was terrified
and confused, and because she was still fifteen years old.
Despite the police investigation, nothing was done to stop the
assistant coach's contact with Brook. She subsequently showed up at

(21:23):
Brook's mother's workplace, sent Brook flowers, and continued engaging with
her online. That summer twenty fourteen, the woman engaged Brook
in sexual activity again when she asked Brooke to help
her move. In fall twenty fourteen, Brook transferred out of
Oconto Falls High School because other students were calling her

(21:44):
a lesbian and making her life miserable as a result
of the assistant coaches grooming and abuse. Now, the police
report here does document that Brooke talked with the Oconto
Fulls Athletic director, So this means other employees, in fact,
someone the athletic director who has a position of authority
directly over the volleyball coach, and the assistant volleyball coach

(22:06):
who knew about the abuse about the inappropriate relationship but
did nothing. This was going on in the same time
frame as the abuse suffered by Amanda, the first alleged
victim that we told you about in the opening segment
of this show. The final named victim who was at
the press conference this morning is named Grace. She was

(22:30):
a junior at Oconto Falls High School during the twenty
seventeen to twenty eighteen school year and had just turned
seventeen years old. The same assistant volleyball coach who allegedly
was grooming and sexually abusing the second girl, Brooke, also
then turned her attention to Grace. She had returned as

(22:51):
a substitute teacher for physical education and other various classes
during this time period. Now, she was known as a
popular sub All the kids loved her honor. About February
twenty eighteen, the woman added Grace on Snapchat. Grace accepted
because she knew the woman was adding popular students. The

(23:12):
woman was aware Grace had come out as bisexual. All
of Grace's friends communicated with the woman, and the woman
initiated contact with Grace, eventually telling Grace that she had
feelings for her. She told Grace that she loved her
and wanted to leave her girlfriend for Grace. She began
sending flowers to Grace in class and started substituting into

(23:34):
Grace's classes. Once again, we are seeing the classic signs
of an inappropriate relationship. If all of a sudden, there
is a Snapchat conversation that's going back and forth between
an adult and a child, especially an adult that has
an unusual amount of access with that child, that is

(23:54):
a sure sign that there may be I'm not saying
there is definitely, but it's a sure sign that there
may be an inappropriate, potentially sexual relationship, or that the
adult is attempting to groom the child to begin a
sexual relationship. The woman the complaint alleges invited Grace to
her house along with other students. When Grace went to

(24:18):
the house, the woman asked Grace to come into the
bedroom with her and began making out with Grace in
her room. Grace tried to stop it so she could
leave peacefully. After the bedroom incident, Grace told her mother
what had happened. Grace's mother wanted to go to the police,
but Grace did not want to because she was scared
of being bullied or harassed by other students. Grace eventually

(24:40):
disclosed the abuse to her friend TF, who went to
the school resource officer and reported it. The school resource
officer spoke with Grace and had her explain what happened.
Grace believes the school principal and guidance counselor were also notified.
Despite these reports, the board conducted no formal investigation, and

(25:00):
Grace was never formally interviewed by school officials. Grace was
not given any emotional support, counseling, or other supportive measures.
Students began blaming Grace for both the daughter the substitute
teacher slash assistant volleyball coach, and the head of varsity
volleyball coach, who were subsequently I believe forced to leave

(25:23):
the school As a result of this, Grace's story was
not taken seriously by school officials and for no one
really cared. Years later, after Grace graduated, she saw an
anonymous post from Brook stating that the woman had abused
her as well. Grace said it felt like a pattern
and like this woman was very strategic about it. Brooke

(25:45):
reached out to Grace through Facebook messenger in twenty twenty five.
Grace's abuse by the woman in twenty eighteen occurred because
the board had previously received reports about the women's abuse
of Brooke in twenty thirteen to twenty fourteen, and it
failed to properly report, flag or discipline the woman, thereby
allowing her to obtain a position at another school district

(26:06):
and later returned to Oconto Falls with access to students.
So Grace then did further investigation and discovered this pattern
of covering up abuse. Although she, according to the complaint,
always remembered the women's abuse, she did not know until
twenty twenty five that the board had received prior reports
about the women abusing Brook and had failed to act

(26:28):
on those reports, thereby enabling the woman's abuse of Grace.
Grace did not learn until twenty twenty five that the
board had received complaints and reports about the woman's abuse
of Brook in twenty thirteen twenty fourteen, and had failed
to act in response. Through Brooks contact and subsequent investigation,
in twenty twenty five, Grace learned for the first time

(26:51):
that the athletic director had received complaints in twenty thirteen
about seeing their abuser in Brooke together, but he had
merely quote, had a discussion with the woman about boundaries
and failed to take protective action. Multiple school staff and
at this point they were named. We are not going

(27:12):
to name these school staff members because they are not
parties to this litigation and they have not been charged,
but multiple school staff members observed or had knowledge of
the woman's conduct with Brooke in twenty thirteen and twenty fourteen,
but failed to intervene. According to this lawsuit, at least

(27:37):
nine teachers or staff members, in addition to these, engaged
in sexual abuse, grooming, harassment, or severe misconduct with students
at Oconto Falls High School. Multiple victims have been identified.
The abuse spans from at least two thousand and five
through twenty twenty five, a period of at least twenty

(28:00):
decontinuous years of teacher student sexual abuse at Oconto Falls
High School. It is, in my opinion, the worst case
of alleged teacher student child sexual abuse, and it is
the worst cover up of set abuse in the history

(28:20):
of Wisconsin, at least the recent history. I can think
of no direct parallel, but it does come just a
couple of months after a massive sexual abuse reporting scandal
was brought to the attention of the Department of Public Instruction.
DPI tried its best to sweep this under the rug

(28:42):
and to suggest that the story that was first broken
by The Cap Times, a digital news publication in Madison,
was somehow politically motivated, or that partisan political actors were
attempting to take down DPI. This lawsuit immediate brings that
back to the forefront. We will discuss that aspect of

(29:05):
this and what exactly DPI and other school districts are
doing to protect students. You're listening to the Dan o'donald
Show Saint Patrick's Day Bumper music rotation as we are
counting down the days to Saint Patrick's Day with a
little Celtic punkin. Yes, I am aware that the Dropkick

(29:28):
Murphy's are a whole bunch of liberal goons who probably
hate my guts, but I can't help it. I'm still
a fan. You can check out the Dan o'donald Show
Saint Patrick's Day Bumper Music playlist on Spotify. Just give
it a search. We have all of the music that
you are going to hear over the next week here

(29:48):
on the Dan o'donald Show. Welcome back to it. A
new lawsuit filed this morning in the Eastern District of Wisconsin.
It is a federal civil rights suit brought on behalf
of three different young women, all of whom alleged that
they were groomed and sexually abused by either a teacher
or a volleyball coach at Oconto Falls High School. During

(30:12):
the research and investigation into presenting and bringing this lawsuit,
attorneys found multiple other potential victims and multiple other alleged perpetrators,
making this potentially the single biggest teacher sexual abuse case
in the history of Wisconsin. And this is putting the
spotlight right back on the Department of Public Instruction. You

(30:36):
might remember that back in November, the cap Times released
this series entitled Dismissed Educator, Sexual Misconduct and Grooming in Wisconsin,
which revealed that the Department of Public Instruction or DPI,
investigated at least two hundred four cases of sexual misconduct
or grooming behaviors involving teachers, teachers, aids, subs, school administrators

(30:59):
from twenty eight eighteen to twenty twenty three. They just
picked a five year period that interestingly is likely to
be after when the alleged grooming in Oconto Falls took place. Now,
those cases represented at least forty four percent of the
more than four hundred and fifty teacher license investigations that

(31:20):
DPI handled during that time, and what the Captimes investigation
found was that these probes into teacher misconduct often ended
without any sort of public accountability. More than eighty of
the teachers or school staff members surrendered their license in
that five year period in order to halt a deeper investigation,

(31:42):
in order to potentially get the police involved. In fact,
in many instances, teachers just resigned from districts and kept
their licenses after DPI cited insufficient evidence such as inconsistent
witness statements. Now, this sparked a public outcry, and it
led to immediate state legislative hearings for DPI State Superintendent

(32:07):
doctor Jill Underley. Now you might remember Underly in a
news conference right before her public testimony before the state
legislature saying that this was somehow a political.

Speaker 5 (32:17):
Hist It's been deeply disappointing to see attempts to turn
this serious issue into yet another partisan political side show.
Our kids deserve better than that with sounds and families deserve.

Speaker 6 (32:30):
Better than that.

Speaker 5 (32:31):
But we won't be distracted or deterred, and our focus
remains exactly where it belongs on protecting kids and not
playing politics.

Speaker 1 (32:42):
Were these girls who filed the lawsuit today playing politics,
Doctor Underley? Were any of the other alleged victims who
were molested or groomed from twenty eighteen to twenty twenty three,
and the teachers got off scott free by simply surrendering
their licenses so they wouldn't face a deeper investigation. Were

(33:06):
they playing politics? Thank heavens, someone finally finally stepped in
to do something and to close a bit of a
loophole in state law. Up until just about a week
and a half ago, grooming was not a crime under
Wisconsin's statutes. State Representative Amanda Edwsky, a very very good

(33:29):
Republican rep introduced legislation that overwhelmingly passed the state Assembly
I believe unanimously passed the state Senate. I say overwhelmingly
because you actually had the socialist caucus in the Wisconsin Assembly,
including Francesco Hong, who is currently the leading candidate for
governor in this state, actually vote against a bill criminalizing

(33:51):
child grooming. Had this law been in effect in twenty
thirteen or in twenty eighteen, the three high school girls
who were clearly being groomed by either a tech ed
teacher or an assistant volleyball coach might have had some
legal recourse. Now, all three are alleging that they were

(34:13):
actually sexually assaulted already criminal behavior. But let's say there
was another case in which it was just an inappropriate
relationship that did in fact rise to the level of
child grooming. Up until about a week ago, there would
not have been any legal recourse. Sure, there could have
been a civil lawsuit like what was filed today, but

(34:34):
these teachers, these adults, would have not faced any criminal accountability.
Make no mistake, what the girls, what the young women
are alleging in their lawsuit today is criminal activity. And
I believe it is a criminal cover up by people
in the school district Docanto Falls, who were mandatory reporters

(34:56):
and who had an absolute duty to step in, to
do something about this, and to go to police. And
this is critical the fact that there was not police
involvement in two out of these three cases. And here's
another thing that is deeply disturbing. In the third case,
alleged by the third plaintiff, Grace, the one who had

(35:19):
the latest sexual abuse account with this assistant volleyball coach,
says she went to a school resource officer. Now, a
school resource officer is someone who's usually with the local
police department. Why did this not advance beyond any sort
of just okay, okay, we'll talk to the teacher, we'll
talk to the sub we'll talk to the volleyball coach,

(35:40):
and we'll make sure that this doesn't happen again. This
is why there was a civil rights suit filed against
Oconto Falls today, because this is a massive systemic failure,
and I fear that this is not limited to a random,
smaller school district in the Green Bay area, that this

(36:00):
may well be far more rapid.

Speaker 6 (36:02):
Now.

Speaker 1 (36:02):
I'm not saying there is a grooming scandal in every
high school, but I'm saying there are clearly other schools
in this state where there are inappropriate relationships between teachers
and coaches and students. And that is why ladies and gentlemen,
I made such a point to outline exactly and read

(36:23):
exactly what it was that's being alleged here, so you
will have some better knowledge of some of these grooming behaviors,
some of the techniques used by predatory adults to gain
the trust and to isolate students so that they're more
vulnerable for child sexual abuse. You are listening to the
Dan O'Donnell show. We'll be back in just a couple
of minutes. It's a tour de force of truth, and

(36:46):
we'll be right back to it. His mouthpieces over at
the Milwaukee Journal Centinel have been fear mongering, panic mongering, really,
with a decidedly partisan take on an FBI's potential investigation
into the twenty twenty election here in Wisconsin. Even though

(37:07):
nobody has even suggested that the FBI would ever look
at ballots from twenty twenty here in Wisconsin. The Journal
Sentinel has run now two days worth of stories, and
Governor Evers has put out a press release and tweeted
that the federal government will be able to see who
you voted for because of a Wisconsin law that makes

(37:28):
Wisconsin unique from say, other states where there are investigations
like in Arizona. It is a lie. It is a
lie that either Evers and the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel are
too stupid and legally inept to realize is a lie
or what I am very strongly suspecting they know it's

(37:50):
a lie, but they are going with it anyway. We
will debunk it as only we can here on the
Dan O'Donnell show coming up in just a second. First, though,
it is time for your Daily Trump Day.

Speaker 6 (38:04):
We're gonna win so much you may even get tired
of winning.

Speaker 1 (38:07):
Trump just keeps winning. It is a win for the administration.

Speaker 3 (38:11):
It's also a big win for the United States.

Speaker 1 (38:14):
We have to keep winning.

Speaker 2 (38:15):
We have to win more.

Speaker 1 (38:17):
We're gonna win more. The president right now holding a
big rally in hebron Kentucky ahead of this fall's midterms
to tout his economic successes. Earlier today, he toured the Thermo
Fisher scientific facility in nearby Cincinnati and gave an update
on Iran.

Speaker 6 (38:36):
The military is unbelievable. The job there, dary I would say,
to put it mildly, way ahead of schedule. We've knocked
out their navy, their military and all forms. We've knocked
at just about everything there is, including their leadership twice.
We knocked out twice their leadership. And now they have

(38:57):
a new group coming up. Let's see what happens to them.
But forty seven bad years we suffered with them, not
only as the rest of the world. We're doing our job,
so I had to take an excursion. But it's doing well.
The market's holding up well. I figured it would be
hit a little bit, but we were hit probably less
than I thought. And we'll be back on track in

(39:19):
a pretty short while. Prices are coming down very substantially.
Oil will be coming down. It's a it's just a
matter of war that happens very You could almost predict it.

Speaker 1 (39:33):
Fox News reporter Peter Doucy noted that the President used
the word excursion when talking about what's going on in
Iran and not the word war, and he asked whether
this was in fact an excursion and not a war.

Speaker 2 (39:46):
You just said it is a little excursion, and you
said it is a war.

Speaker 7 (39:50):
So which one is, Well, it's both.

Speaker 6 (39:53):
It's both. It's an excursion that will keep us out
of a war, and the war is going to be
I mean for them, it's a war for us. It's
could have to be easier than we thought. But think
of it. They had thousands of missiles, seven eight thousand missiles.
We got many of them before they got to lunch.

(40:14):
They have drones all over the place. We got many.
Now we're knocking out the drone plants. As you know,
we're going fast. They started talking about mind so we
hit twenty eight mind shifts as of this moment, twenty
eight like using the same weapon, the exact same weapon
that we use against the drug dealers.

Speaker 1 (40:33):
Meanwhile, here at home, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reporting
today consumer Price Index rose just zero point three percent
in February on a seasonally adjusted basis, annual inflation rate
unchanged at two point four percent. Now, core CPI, which
excludes the more volatile food and energy prices, increased zero

(40:53):
point two percent for the month. That is the lowest
reading in five years, since March of twenty twenty one,
and not coincidentally, that was the last month where we
had normal inflation before the hyperinflation of President Biden that
took effect in April, the exact same month that his
stimulus went into effect. How So, Oversight Committee Chairman James

(41:16):
Comer says, Jeffrey Epstein's accountant testified today behind closed doors
that he never witnessed a transaction between President Trump and Epstein.
This is now the fifth witness to testify under oath
that Trump did absolutely nothing wrong as it pertains to
Jeffrey Epstein. If you'd like to join the Dan O'donalds

(41:37):
show this hour or any hour, give us a call
forour one four seven nine to nine eleven thirty, or
shoot us a text on our advent nos dot com
talk and text line four one fourth seven nine to
nine eleven thirty. You can also reach us toll free
one eight hundred and eighty three eight nine four seven six.
Email me do od at iHeartMedia dot com at Dan
o'donalds Show on x Facebook dot com slash dan O'donald's Show.

(42:01):
We are also on Instagram. We are streaming live across
social media and on our YouTube channel. Like and subscribe
as the kids say, Smash that like button and be
sure to subscribe, follow like thumbs up, heart the Dan
O'donnald's Show podcast on iHeartRadio or wherever you listen to podcasts.

(42:22):
For two straight days now, Governor Evers and the Milwaukee
Journal Sentinel have coordinated on messaging against a proposed effort
that nobody is actually proposing for the FBI to gain
access to ballots that were cast in twenty twenty in
Wisconsin's presidential election. Now, those ballots have not been destroyed

(42:45):
even six years later, because they are the subject of
potential litigation. So all of the ballots are still sort
of sitting there, absentee ballots. And what the Journal Sentinel
is now on its second day of erroneously explaining is
that there is a Wisconsin law that would actually identify you,

(43:06):
as in you John Smith listening to me right now,
as having cast a ballot for say, Donald Trump. There
is all sorts of panic again, even though the FBI
has given no indication that it would ever look into
any of Wisconsin's ballots. In Milwaukee, these would be the
ballots that are at issue here, and this is a

(43:28):
direct result of what's been going on in Maricopa County
really for the last six years, the investigations and audits
into what happened in Arizona. Wisconsin, of course, is the
perennial swing state, so there's always concern about what it
is that goes on here because we have an outsize
impact here in Wisconsin on picking the president every single
four year cycle. But nobody is suggesting that the FBI

(43:54):
would ever go into Milwaukee, ever open up the ballot boxes,
ever sees the ballots, or ever investigate. In other words,
this is panic mongering without any discernible reason to This
reminds me of about a month month and a half
ago when you had that ridiculous uh oh. Was she

(44:14):
an obgyn slash liberal talk radio host who without any
evidence posted on x there are a hundred rooms being
booked at the downtown Milwaukee Hilton for ICE agents to
come in. They're gonna do a big ICE surge in Wisconsin.
I checked with every source. I had no there was

(44:34):
no ICE surge coming. Of course, no ICE surge ever happened.
There were never any ICE agents who booked any hotel rooms,
the DHS, Department of Homeland Security never happened. It was
panic mongering. And now Molly Becker, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel,
and Governor Evers and his comms team are pushing the
exact same panic about Milwaukee's ballance. They claim that there

(44:56):
is a law on the books in Wisconsin which basically
would allow the fence to see who it is that
you vote for. Well, the actual law says nothing of
the sort. It is Wisconsin Statute seven point five two.
The Board of Absentee Ballot Canvassers shall mark the poll

(45:16):
list number of each elector who casts an absentee ballot
on the back of the elector's ballot. Now what this
does It allows and actually requires poll workers while they're
processing absentee ballots to assign numbers start at one, and
you just keep going to absentee voters that are accepted,

(45:39):
and then they write the number on the back of
the physical ballot, so your name corresponds to a number.
Let's say your ballot just happens to be it's the
Dan O'Donnell ballot just happens to be the first one
picked that would get number one. Let's say the second
ballot that's counted and put into the box, put into

(45:59):
the tabulat or whatever is the number for it's Eric
Paulson's ballot. So Eric Paulson would be assigned number two,
and so on and so on and so on. They
then record that number next to the voter's name on
a duplicate poll list. Now, the reason for this is
it helped locate and cancel out a specific absentee ballot

(46:22):
if the voter later tried to spoil it. Now, what
spoiling was was if you would go and then say
I don't want my mail in ballot to count, I'm
going to vote in person. Now the court said, okay,
we're not going to allow ballot spoiling. You got the
ballot in done boom. So this idea of putting the

(46:44):
number next to the name, it's essentially obsolete. But here's
the thing. The only thing that the FBI would get
if again they were ever actually going to go in Milwaukee,
there's no indication that they are. The only the thing
they would get is the ballot. Only the number appears

(47:05):
on the ballot. The ballot is never actually unfolded or
examined by workers before it's tabulated, so nobody at any
point ever knows who it is that is casting a vote.
So in a subpoena, let's say the FBI wants to

(47:27):
get ballot images, there's no voter name, there's no direct
identifier that would connect Dan O'Donnell to ballot number one.
So what tabulators do is they scan the ballots and
they create a digital image for recordkeeping or a recount.
The poll list number is actually handwritten on the back

(47:49):
of the physical ballot. The images that the FEDS would
get usually only show the front of the ballot. Why
because most ballots only have one side that's actually printed on. Now,
even if the back image is included, let's say there's
a whole lot of stuff. Sometimes there's voting, you have

(48:10):
to fill out the bubbles on the back of the
ballot as well as the front of the ballot. It's
just a number. There's no name attached to it whatsoever.
The poll list, which includes the names and the numbers,
that's separate, that's not attached to the ballot at all.
And guess what. The poll lists are public records. They

(48:33):
show who voted. That's already a public that's public knowledge.
If you want a list of Dan O'Donnell voting in
let's say the Spring primary, which I didn't you know,
I skipped it, trick question. There was no Spring primary
where I live. I vote in every election. In fact,
I can think of just one in the last probably decade,

(48:56):
Spring primary for all primary everything. I vote in everything,
And you can see that it's public record. You can
actually see dan O'donnald voting where Daniel would what the
polling place was. You can't see who I voted for,
but you can see that I did vote. If let's
say you wanted to match that poll list showing Dan

(49:18):
O'donnald ballot number one, Eric Paulson ballot number two. Let's
say Jason Gotch ballot number three, Ben Yaut ballot number four,
Greg John ballot number five, Dave Michael's ballot number six.
You would actually have to get access to both all
of the ballots, and you would have to have images

(49:38):
that show both side of the ballot with the handwritten
number as well as the filled in ballot, and then
you would have to manually cross reference every single numbered
ballot to the poll list. That's potentially hundreds of thousands
of records. Now, the ballots are process totally anonymously. They're

(50:01):
thoroughly mixed. After they're numbered, they go into a ballot box,
they're mixed up, they're tabulated by a machine without any
human review of the marks on them, and then they're
stored while sealed up. There is no evidence whatsoever that
this has ever enabled revealing votes in practice. Now, the

(50:27):
Journal Sentinel says, okay, if you get both the poll
list and you get the ballot images, which might or
might not have the corresponding numbers to them, and you
want to spend years and years and years cross referencing those,
theoretically you could see who voted for who. But the

(50:50):
story immediately jumps to and I quote, federal authorities will
be able to figure out how tens of thousands of
residents vote without ever explaining that this for all intensive
purposes is an impossibility. This is actually kind of ridiculous.

(51:16):
How badly do these people not want to see any
sort of oversight, any sort of investigation into any sort
of election irregularity that they're actually making up a that
the Feds are closing in on Milwaukee and they're gonna
see who you voted for, and I don't know they're
gonna put you in some sort of re education cap

(51:36):
if they find out you voted for Biden in twenty twenty.
There's no indication that's going to happen. And even if
it did, which again it is not. Even if it did,
there's no practical way that the Feds would ever actually
be able to see who it is you vote for.
But this is well in line with what Governor Evers

(51:59):
has been doing for months now, and that's stonewalling an
investigation into not who it is you voted for, but
rather the voter rolls themselves again a public record again,
something that should be and legally must be turned over
to the federal government, but Ebers and the Wisconsin Elections
Commission are refusing to do so again because they don't

(52:22):
want any oversight or investigation. We'll dive into that in
just three minutes here on the Dan o'donald Show. Welcome
back to the Dan o'donald Show. It is conservative thought,
not just talk. We go deeper, much deeper on the
issues that matter to you. Governor Evers and the Wisconsin

(52:44):
Elections Commission are still fighting to avoid turning over voter
role data to the federal government. The Trump administration's Department
of Justice in early December sent WEK a confidential memorandum
of understanding demanding full unredacted voter rules, names, addresses, dates

(53:05):
of birth, driver's license numbers, and partial social security numbers.
Usually it's the last four for all three point seven
million active registered voters in Wisconsin. This was the second
request that the DOJ made in twenty twenty five. The
DOJ says this is an investigation to cross check against

(53:27):
federal databases to verify that people who are on Wisconsin's
voter roles are actually US citizens. They also want to
detect whether there are any non citizens on the roles
ensure compliance with JAVA, the Help America Vote Act VRA,
the National Voter Registration Act, also known as Motor Voter.

(53:48):
In other words, the FEDS are looking into every state
or at least as many states as they can to
try to find out if there are people who are
illegally registered to vote. It is not lawful for non
citizens to vote in federal elections. This is a crime,
and actually a rather serious one. Tony Evers and Whack

(54:13):
have fought tooth and nail for four months now to
try to keep the voter roles a secret. This is
in direct violation of federal law. The Department of Justice
is citing Title three of the Civil Rights Act, which
requires states to retain and preserve quote all records and

(54:35):
papers relating to any application, registration, payment of poll tax,
or other act requisite to voting in a federal election.
In other words, a voter role. You obviously don't have
to pay a poll tax. That's insanely illegal, But that's
sort of what the Civil Rights Act of nineteen sixty
was aiming to stop. If there was any sort of

(54:56):
record that one of the Democrat controlled states in the
Deep South was trying to keep black people from voting,
which they totally did by enacting any sort of pull tax,
the Feds wanted to know about it, and the states
were thus required to preserve all documentation of it well
This also extends to voter role data, application and registration

(55:18):
requisite to voting in a federal election. States have to
keep this record for twenty two months. The Attorney General,
under the Civil Rights Act of nineteen sixty is also
authorized to demand in writing quote the records and papers
described in the previous statute upon a simple statement of

(55:40):
the basis and purpose for the request. So all the
DOJ has to do, All Attorney General Pambondi has to
do is say, all right, here's the basis for our
request of your voter roles. We want to make sure
that there are no non citizens on the rules, that
everybody who's registered to vote is actually legally allowed to vote.
That is a valid per that is a valid investigation. Rather,

(56:04):
obviously a full statewide voter registration list qualifies as a
record and paper. JAVA Help America Vote Act requires states
to maintain a computerized list, a digital list that includes
name data, birth address, driver's license number, last four digits

(56:26):
at the social Security number. What WEK is claiming, and
it should be noted that WEK voted five to one
to obstruct the federal government, violating both state and federal law,
and the one member of WEC. The one guy who said, yes,
we absolutely do have to comply. Take a while, guest,

(56:50):
the one WECK commissioner who is worth a damn Bob Spindel.
He said, no, we got to comply with state law.
WECK is claiming that a Wisconsin statute on voter privacy,
it is a privacy statute Wisconsin Statute six point three six,

(57:12):
related to privacy provisions of public records. They say that
this statute prohibits releasing an unredacted list to the federal
government because it contains so much identifying information. The federal
government absolutely does not have the legal right to get

(57:36):
this because it would violate state law. We can't violate
state law. Here's the problem in that statute, Wisconsin's Statute
six point three six. There is an exception for law
enforcement purposes within the statute itself quote, the commission or

(58:02):
any municipal clerk or board of election commissioners may transfer
any information in the registration list to which access is
restricted to a law enforcement agency to be used for
law enforcement purposes. Now, is the Department of Justice a

(58:22):
law enforcement agency? Yes, it is. Is cross checking a
voter registration list against citizenship information to ensure that only
lawful citizens, only legal citizens are casting ballots, that only
lawful ballots are being cast, and that there aren't people

(58:42):
who should not be on our voter rolls. Is that
a law enforcement purpose? You'd better believe it is. So
WEK is just sort of ignoring one part of the law.
Governor Evers, who has sided with Weck repeatedly over the
past several months and said, no, we're not going to
turn over our voter registration roles. No, no, no, it

(59:06):
would violate state privacy laws. He's just sort of ignoring
the relevant part of the statue that absolutely allows the
Department of Justice to go in and take a look
at the roles. Naturally, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, the Wisconsin
State Journal, every other mainstream news outlet that has been
reporting on this has just sort of ignored this. Why

(59:30):
Why Because nobody wants anybody associated with the Trump administration
to figure out that there probably are a whole ton
of people who should not be on Wisconsin's voter roles
but are anyway. Not only that, can a state law
like privacy protection for wisconsinights, can that ever trump federal law?

Speaker 5 (59:55):
No?

Speaker 1 (59:56):
I feel like I've been talking about the supremacy clause
that the Constitution an awful because this is one that
just does not seem to get through the heads of Democrats.
Under the supremacy clause of the Constitution, federal law trump's
state law. When there is a conflict between two laws,
like there is here, Title three of the Civil Rights

(01:00:17):
Act says you have to turn over all relevant records
and papers relating to the application registration requisite to voting
in a federal election. This means a voter registration list,
a voter role. And there's conflict between that federal law
and state law. And the state law says, well, you

(01:00:37):
can't turn that over because privacy and such. Guess which
law wins. The federal law supremacy clause one oh one.
This is con law one one, ladies and gentlemen. But
not only that, state law itself absolutely allows for law

(01:00:58):
enforcement to have access to this. There's nothing in state
law that prohibits a law enforcement agency like the Department
of Justice, like say the FBI, which would be investigating
this or any other DOJ entity. Because the Department of
Justice is tasked with enforcing America's laws. Ergo, it is

(01:01:20):
a law enforcement agency. There is a carve out specifically
in that statute that Evers and the libs on Weck
keeps citing, no, no, no, no, no, we can't turn
over our voter role data. Well, they're looking for reasons
not to want to turn over Wisconsin's voter role data.
They're just sort of ignoring a relevant portion of the
statute that says, yeah, you actually do have to turn

(01:01:41):
over that data to law enforcement agencies, all because they
don't want to do so. It's the exact same reason
that Dems at the federal level don't want the Save
America Act past, because they know that there are all
manner of people voting right now who aren't supposed to
be voting now. Both the leaders of the House and

(01:02:01):
the Senate for Democrats are saying the same bizarre thing
that ice agents will stop people from voting, you mean,
illegal aliens from voting. That's next here on the Dan
o'donald Show, all Celtic punk from now until Saint Patrick's
Day next Tuesday. Here on the Dan o'donald Show us

(01:02:22):
a fun little tradition that we do every year to
honor your humble hosts Irish Roots. At the tail end
of yesterday's show we played as something that was frankly
just bizarre. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said that we
can't pass the Save America Act, which would require citizenship

(01:02:44):
proof in order to register to vote, because it would
result in ICE agents at the polls and ICE keeping
people from voting.

Speaker 8 (01:02:54):
About voter registration. It makes it. It allows ICE to
kick tens of billions of people off the rolls, off
the rolls, and they don't tell them until election day,
and you show up and you say, you're not registered anymore,
you're not registered here, you're not on the rolls, And

(01:03:16):
they say, I didn't know that. This is a bill
that destroys the country.

Speaker 1 (01:03:20):
And it is not.

Speaker 8 (01:03:20):
About showing ID when you show up to vote. It's
about the voter registration rolls, destroying them, purging them, not
letting people know, and taking the rights in a algorithm
put together by ICE, put together by Doge and Musk.
It's an outrage and that's why so many people don't

(01:03:41):
want to pass it.

Speaker 1 (01:03:41):
Okay, what exactly does ICE have anything to do with this?
I thought the whole point was that there are no
illegal aliens on the voter rolls. There are no illegal
aliens voting. Why would have would ice have anything to
do with this whatsoever? Now I thought this was really weird,
But maybe you know, Chuck schumeris he's getting a little oldie,

(01:04:04):
might be getting a little Seennile, might be going the
way of old uncle Joe Biden. But then House Minority
Leader Jakim Jeffries today on his little podcast said the
same thing. We want to keep ice away from polling places.

Speaker 7 (01:04:21):
One of those demands is keep ice out of sensitive locations,
and we've defined that as schools, houses of worship, hospitals,
and polling sites. We want an explicit prohibition that ice
can go nowhere near any polling sites in the United

(01:04:42):
States of America. It's one of our demands. We're not
going to bend on it.

Speaker 1 (01:04:45):
Oh kay, let's break this down logically. It's kind of
what we do here on the Dan O'Donnell show. Ice
investigates illegal aliens, correct ergo Ice would be in a
place where illegal aliens are likely to be correct. Ice

(01:05:06):
would be therefore at polling places. Why what possible reason
would there be for an ICE agent to be at
a polling place unless there was some sort of reasonable
belief that there was going to be some sort of
presence of illegal aliens at said polling place. You see

(01:05:32):
where conservatives keep sort of saying, Okay, you're sort of saying,
with your paranoid delusions about ICE agents behind every polling booth,
you sort of are admitting that, Okay, maybe there are
some deportable people who are going to show up at
polling places on election day. Now, why would there be

(01:05:56):
deportable people, not deplorable people. You know, there are tons
of deplorable people. They tend to vote Republican, according to
Hillary Clinton. Deportable people people who are able to be
deported by ICE agents. So logically, if the fear is
that ICE is going to be showing up at polling

(01:06:18):
places and that ICE is going to have control of
the voter rolls, then it must logically follow that ICE
is investigating a the presence of illegal aliens on the
voter rolls, and ICE is showing up where illegal aliens
may be going to cast ballots illegally again at those

(01:06:42):
polling places. This is precisely why we need the Save
America Vote Act. The latest on that, by the way,
embattled Senate Majority Leader John Thune is saying that he
is going to bring this for a vote without doing
anything to the filibuster. He is going to require a

(01:07:02):
sixty vote threshold in order to invoke clotures. So what's
going to happen is the Save America Act, which again
requires photo ID at all federal elections. This is just
common sense. This is something supported by nearly ninety percent
of Americans, including I believe the number is seventy six

(01:07:24):
percent of Democrats. Democrats do believe, hey, yeah, we should
totally have voter ID. It is a tiny percentage of people,
and even a majority of Democrats say yes, we should
have proof of citizenship. You should have to prove that
you're a citizen of this country in order to cast
a ballot in this country's elections. It is a small
minority of Democrats, the Democrats who happened to be in charge,

(01:07:44):
like Hakim Jeffreys and Chuck Schumer, who are saying no, no, no,
no no, you can't prove your citizenship because we don't
want Ice agents all over the place to stop those
poor illegals and just deport them for the crime of,
you know, voting illegally. What's going to happen is that
vote is going to take place. The bill is going

(01:08:06):
to be introduced, it's going to be immediately filibustered. There
is not going to be an actual filibuster where someone
stands up all of mister Smith and goes to Washington
and just talks for days at a time. There's going
to be a zombie filibuster, as every filibuster since the
nineteen seventies has been. And then there's going to be
a vote on cloture. The vote on cloture, I guess,

(01:08:27):
is going to be designed to show people which senators
want election integrity, which want the Save America Act pasta,
which don't. I frankly don't care. I could tell you
right now. I could probably do a whip count of
my own and tell you which ones want the Save
America Act and which ones don't. Usual suspects, I guess.
Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, can we just get this woman

(01:08:49):
out of the Republican caucus already? It's acidine that she's
allowed to run as a Republican. The only reason she
runs as a Republican is because Alaska is like a
Trump lost twenty state. Now it's an overwhelmingly Republican state.
She'd have no chance running as a Democrat, even though
her name is Murkowski. She's of course come out against

(01:09:11):
the Save America Act using the exact same logic as
the Democrats. Susan Collins is running for reelection. She's most
likely going to face the guy with the Nazi tattoo
on his chest, Gram Platner, So she's not going to
support this. Mitch McConnell, who used to be my homie
Cocaine Mitch and has gotten insanely liberal in his advanced

(01:09:35):
extreme old age. He's not on board with this. I
believe Tom Tillis is not on board. I'm not sure
about Rand Paul. But it's the usual suspect in the Senate.
It is unconscionable to me that we have allowed for
fifty years now something that the Framers never intended, something

(01:09:57):
that the fathers of this country never intended. A zombie filibuster.
You want to filibuster a bill, that's all well and good.
You stop debate, all debate in the Senate stops, and
then once the filibuster is over, once you yield the floor,
we go back to business and the bill passes. It
was never intended to be a de facto sixty vote

(01:10:20):
threshold to get anything passed in the Senate. But that's
what we've had for a half century. Look, I would
even be in favor of keeping the zombie filibuster. I
actually think this is probably the best compromise that we're
going to get. Keep the zombie filibuster. But right now
we have what's known as a two track system of legislation.
So let's say the Save America Act and every other

(01:10:42):
bill that is up next on the Senate's docket is
like a train car, right you can imagine like a
train station. Well, how do you get cars in a
different order? Well, there are multiple different tracks. So if
the track that the Save America Act car is on
stops because of a filibuster, right now, every other bill

(01:11:06):
behind it just goes on to a different track. And
while the Save America Act is stopped, other bills get
voted on. It's known as the two track system of legislation.
All you need to do is to go back to
the single track system of legislation, where if a bill
is filibustered, no other Senate business can take place, no

(01:11:27):
other votes can happen because there's a philibuster. Even though
somebody is not required to physically be on the floor
of the Senate and to continue talking for hours or
days at a time. It is like somebody is It's
sort of like you ever play wiffle ball or kickball
when you didn't have enough players when you were a kid,
you'd have a ghost runner on first. That's what we have.

(01:11:48):
We sort of have like a ghost filibuster er on
the floor of the Senate. There can still be that
ghost filibuster er, but they're just can't be any business
that goes on any other votes so long as that
ghost filibuster er is still doing his zombie phantom ghost philibuster.

(01:12:11):
Eliminate the two track system of legislation almost immediately. You
eliminate the non stop philibusters and the philibuster abuse of
the Democrat Party. We name the Unsung Hero of the
Day coming up next here on the Dan O'Donnell's show.

(01:12:31):
So I know a lot of people were listening to
that Chuck Schumer soundbiten and saying he said tens of
billions of people will be taken off the rolls. I
think he said millions. I listened to that a number
of times after it was going viral on social media.
Earlier today, he said tens of billions of people will
be thrown off the voter roles if the Save America

(01:12:55):
Act passes. I heard tens of millions. I don't know
who knows who knows. What I do know is that
right now here on the Dan o'donald Jodi is time
to name the unsung hero of the day. Today's unsung

(01:13:20):
hero of the day is Michigan State Representative Karen Witsett.
She's announced that she is not going to seek reelection
because she's leaving the Democratic Party. She says she's doing
so because Democrats no longer align with Christian values, writing,

(01:13:41):
in the end, I have to answer to God. It's
impossible to be a faithful follower of Jesus Christ while
remaining a member of the Democratic Party as it exists today.
I have compromised my relationship with Jesus for too long now.
Witset is an African American woman. To publicly leave the

(01:14:02):
Democrat Party like that, that is an act of courage,
and for that we salute her as the unsung hero
of the day. Coming up in the five o'clock hour
here on the Dan o'donald Show, did you know Act
ten has been the law of the land for fifteen

(01:14:22):
years now, legal challenges, capital chaos, protests, Democrats in the
State Senate literally fleeing the state to try to prevent
a vote. It's also saved Wisconsin taxpayers thirty five plus
billion with a B dollars. Our friends at the MacIvor

(01:14:45):
Institute crunched the numbers and found that the effects of
Act ten have been generational and they have been significant. Naturally,
of course, Democrats have sued to end Act ten, and
it seems almost inevitable that the liberal State Supreme Court
is going to overturn it. We discussed coming up after

(01:15:05):
the news the fifteenth anniversary of Act ten. We crunched
the numbers as to how much money it's saved and
what the likelihood is that ultimately the Wisconsin Supreme Court's
liberal majority could strike it down. Plus, could the nil

(01:15:29):
bill in the Wisconsin State Senate have just hit a
major snag. It certainly looks like it. We'll get to
that and much more this hour here on the Dan
O'Donnell Show Top Stories. We are following what may be
the single biggest child sex abuse scandal in the history
of the Wisconsin school system. A federal lawsuit filed in

(01:15:51):
the Eastern District of Wisconsin today alleges a twenty five
year pattern of cover ups in the Oconto School District
Ocanto Falls School District. We spent much of the three
o'clock hour on that attorney Larry Disparsit case.

Speaker 2 (01:16:09):
It's not just about the individual abusers, It's about a
school district that allowed these activities to go on, even
though there was multiple years of reporting and the warning signs,
and yet they failed to act.

Speaker 1 (01:16:22):
President Trump, taking his economic message to Kentucky today, addressing
a throng of fans after he stopped in Cincinnati as well,
gave an update on the progress of the war or
is it an excursion in Iran, saying that Iran is
thoroughly decimated and that American soldiers are well ahead of schedule.

(01:16:45):
Those are the top stories that we are following right
now four one, four, seven, nine, nine, eleven thirty. If
you'd like to get in touch with the Dan o'donald
Show anytime on our advent noos dot com, talk and
text line, email medod at iHeartMedia dot com. Follow the
show on social media at Dan O'donaldshow on x Facebook
dot com, slash Dan o'donald Show, or at Dan o'donald

(01:17:06):
Show on Instagram as well, watch the show streaming live
via our YouTube channel. And please, please please, as a
favor to me, subscribe to the Dan o'donald Show podcast
on iHeartRadio or wherever you listen to podcasts, but especially
on iHeartRadio to show the powers that be how much

(01:17:26):
you love the dodal. All right, we are following some
developing news out of the Wisconsin Senate, and this is
a story that we were following relatively closely here on
The Dan o'donald Show. Three members of the Joint Finance Committee,
Republicans all have now voted against legislation that would give

(01:17:47):
UW Madison about fourteen point six million dollars per year
to cover the cost of athletic facilities. That would free
up the money to pay athletes. So essentially, we would
be taking your tax money to pay a hot shot
transfer quarterback from BYU I just made up that school.

(01:18:13):
I have no idea where the bat. The Badger's better
do something because last year was an unmitigated disaster in football. Now,
the bill did clear committee eight to five, but the
opposition of GOP Senator is Julian Bradley, Rob Staffsolt, and
Pat Testin leave the bill. Leaves the bill short of

(01:18:35):
this seventeen Republican votes, it would need to clear the
Senate next week without Democrats support. Now, this is critical.
This from wispolitics dot com. By the way, a spokesperson
for Senator Devin Lemahu, a lead co author of AB
ten thirty four, didn' immediately respond to a request for
comment on whether the majority leader would still put the

(01:18:58):
bill on the floor. Now, ad Lea, Staff, Shoult, and
Testant all set after the vote. They had concerns over
using taxpayer dollars to ultimately pay athletes. Here's where this
is critical. Now, there is a long standing rule in
the Wisconsin Senate. I believe it's technically unformal, unformal. Yes,

(01:19:22):
I am a professional broadcaster. An unformal rule informal. It
is technically informal, but it is followed and it has
been followed by both parties, especially Republicans. They follow the
rule of seventeen. There are thirty three state senators right,

(01:19:43):
there are ninety nine members of the Wisconsin Assembly. Quick
little civics lesson for those of you who may be
new to Wisconsin or who don't quite understand how our
state legislature works. Lower house is known as the State Assembly.
There are ninety nine Assembly districts. For each three Assembly districts,
there is one state Senate district. That means there are

(01:20:06):
thirty three state senators. In order to get a majority
in the state Senate, you need to have seventeen votes.
The rule of seventeen says that a party will not
bring a bill to the floor for a full vote
unless there are seventeen members, in other words, a majority

(01:20:26):
of the entire Senate of the party who support the bill.
Because clearly there are not there are three Republican Senators
who don't support this bill. The rule of seventeen is
not in effect. The rule of seventeen is not cleared.
This means that in order to get his own bill passed, Lemaheu,

(01:20:48):
who is the Senate majority leader, so he would be
able to decide whether or not this bill actually comes
up when the Senate is back in session, when the
full Senate is back in we believe do we have
a date. I think there's going to be one more day,
maybe two more days of a full session I've told
it's going to be this month, possibly in April. I
have not seen the full calendar. I'm sure there's somebody

(01:21:10):
who knows. But there's going to be a whole lot
of action on that day because there were obviously a
whole lot of bills that the State Assembly passed on
its final day of the session. Yes, it's still somewhat
unbelievable that our state legislature is done about three months
into the year, but that's because it's an election year,
it's not a budget year. Wisconsin sort of has a

(01:21:33):
relatively unique way of doing policy and of doing government.
We put a whole lot of policy in the state budget,
which means there is a ton of work in odd
numbered years on the state budget. So the state Legislature
will be in session pretty much the entire year, and
about six months of that year typically, yeah, maybe not

(01:21:55):
that much. Four or five months is typically devoted to
work on the budget, which is where we get the
vast majority of policy here in Wisconsin. In even numbered years,
you of course have every single State Assembly member up
for reelection. You've got roughly half of the State Senate
up for reelection. There is a whole lot of work

(01:22:18):
that's done. The members go back to their districts, they
do political work, they do constituent work, and frankly, I'm
cool with that because the libertarian in me doesn't like
a whole lot of legislation being passed every single day here,
though Lena Hugh has it's a bit of an ethical dilemma, now,

(01:22:39):
isn't it. He clearly wants this past. Now I'm not
a huge fan of it because quite frankly, UW Madison
has been thumbing its nose at the authority of the
Republicans in the state legislature ever since they tried to
put any sort of reasonable limit on de programs. At

(01:23:01):
UW Madison. You might remember they put a hiring freeze
on the UW system. The UW Board of Regions agreed, Okay,
we're gonna endna, we're gonna stop the DEI stuff, and
then at the last second they voted no, no, no,
we love our DEI too much. Big embarrassment, big middle
finger to the Republican legislature. Eventually they did work out

(01:23:23):
a deal, but UW Madison has sort of been notorious
even though they had the worst DEI program in the
entire state. You might remember they were spending hundreds and
hundreds of thousands of dollars on furniture, on luxurious trips
to all of these unnecessary conferences. It was easily the

(01:23:47):
most overbudgeted department in the entire system. They spent more
on furniture, if memory sirs, I'm going back a couple
of years. They spent more on furniture than the library department.
And the library department has chairs that like thousands of
people sit on in a given year. Maybe it was

(01:24:08):
the only department that spent more on furniture was the
library department? Is something like that. The point is that
they spent an insane amount of money on furniture. This
department existed solely so that you could have race hustlers
giving themselves luxurious salaries and benefits and apparently really really

(01:24:29):
nice office chairs. Now we're going to reward UW. Madison. Why, seriously,
why why shouldn't repairs for facilities maintenance have to come
out of their operating budget? Why do they just get
a fifteen million dollar gift. Ultimately, this money is going

(01:24:53):
to go into the pockets of like what essentially amounts
to a free agent running back, and I get it, folks.
I'm one of the few people who said I say
this not to say I told you so, but I
was arguing against paying college athletes for twenty some years.

(01:25:13):
And I'm not even kidding about that. I wrote a
high school paper. I to write a persuasive essay when
I was in high school. I still remember this because
I had so much fun writing it. And this was
back in the nineteen nineties. We were debating. I think
it was like ninety seven, ninety eight. I don't even know.
This was well before Ed O'Bannon filed his lawsuit Obanon

(01:25:35):
NCUBA was the suit that actually led to nil payments. Hell,
I think Ed O'Bannon was still at UCLA and still
playing basketball. Loved that team. By the way, nineteen ninety five,
USC ed and Charles O'Bannon tyus Edney a great, fun,
fun team won the nc DOUBLEA tournament. I wrote a

(01:25:55):
paper saying, now, I didn't make the same arguments about
what's happening now, but I did say, look, if we
pay college athletes, you're going to have the haves and
have nots. You are just going to have the gap
between schools that can pay the most and schools that
won't be able to pay the most are just it's
going to be insane and you're just not going to

(01:26:17):
have fair competition. Not only that these athletes are getting
compensated in terms of a free education. Oh well, damn
they're not. Actually they're going to go to school. Well
maybe they should be, because it's something like one percent
of college basketball and college football players ever make it
to the pros. I think it's even less than one percent.
And professional careers last a grand total on average, about

(01:26:39):
three to four years. So you probably should get a
college degree and make sure you're equipped to do something
productive in society after your playing career ends. I don't
think anybody could have predicted how name, image and likeness
or nil payments are going today. But the idea that

(01:27:03):
my tax dollars should be going to make the football
team more competitive by directly paying for a player like
a high school recruit or a transfer. This would sort
of be like you know, all the Green Bay Packers.
Every few years they sell stock, And yes I am

(01:27:25):
an owner of the Green Bay Packers. I'm very proud
of that. Yes I have the worthless piece of paper.
My in law's got it for me the last time. Boy,
when when was the last stock sale they did? And
I'll admit I am such a dork and you can, folks,
you can laugh at me. You can send me hateful emails.
Heaven knows some of you have already. I actually got

(01:27:46):
emotional when I got that stupid piece of paper. I'm yeah,
it would have been February. Wait, February twenty well they
got me it would have been Christmas twenty twenty two.
That it was a few years back. The nice frame
and everything, I said, Daniel O'Donnell, owner of the Green
Bay Packers or whatever. I'll admit I got a motion.
I was like tearing up. I'm like, oh my gosh,

(01:28:08):
I've always wanted this, this is like, what a nice,
thoughtful gift. Yes, I know it's you know, they basically
donated two hundred and fifty bucks or whatever it was
to the packers, but let's assume instead of voluntarily paying
for the worthless piece of paper that still made Dan
cry and Grammy Grampy thank you. From the bottom of

(01:28:28):
my heart. I still think it's one of the coolest
gifts I ever got. God help me, I'm a nerd.
For the packers I'm sorry. I am even when they
were doing all the woke stuff a few years ago.
It's sort of like, ha, I'll always come back to you.
Green Bay Packers. Same thing with the Bucks. The Bucks
are like one of the wokest franchises in sports, at

(01:28:50):
least they were when Lazar owned them. I still love them.
I love the Brewers. I'm a die hard, But Brewers,
I don't know if I want to say this. The
Brewers are one of the more conservative franchises in professional sports.
I don't know if they want me saying that they're great.

(01:29:12):
Organ is that Packers are too. Actually, and the Bucks,
I I think Haslam's a big Republican, one of the
big uh, one of the new owners. In any event,
this would be like if instead of selling the Packers stock,
the state legislature came in and said, Okay, Packers really

(01:29:33):
need to do something. In free agency, we lost Rashaan Gary,
we lost Romeo Dobbs, we lost kway Walker. We signed
sky More. Sky More. This guy's name sounds like he's
one of the American Gladiators. The one free agent signing
is sky More. We need to get some more free
agent sign Maybe we should Chip in and put together

(01:29:57):
a package. We should get some money together and try
to put together pack so we can trade for Max
Crosby and then back out of the deal like two
days later, like the Baltimore Ravens, a huge scandal in
the NFL. By the way, leagu year didn't open until today.
Ravens and Raiders had an agreement in principle trade two
first round picks to Las Vegas. The Ravens were gonna

(01:30:18):
get Max Crosby got hot shot but injured edge rusher,
one of the best in the game. Ravens said, yeah, thanks,
but no thanks, We're out. Trade's not official. Sorry, guys.
Watch Crosby ends up going to the Bears and just
tick everybody off. But let's say, Republicans in the legislature said, well,

(01:30:42):
we all love the Packers, right, Dan, you love the Packers.
I love the Packers. Why don't we give fifty million
dollars in free agent money? Call it the Max Crosby Fund,
or who's another big free agent that the Packers might want.
I don't even know. There have been so many moves,
I don't even know who's still on the market. And frankly,

(01:31:04):
I've been busy to day, I've and been watching all
the free agent moves. Would that fly? It's not as
though this money is ultimately going to classroom improvements or
it's going to research and develop. It's going to millionaire players.

(01:31:24):
The players that the Badgers would give nil deals to
are likely the ones. You got to go through the
transfer portal to get the top players, and in order
to do so, you've essentially got to pay them like
free agents. You need to give some of the best
players a million, two million for quarterbacks, six seven million
dollars in order to go to your school. So if

(01:31:47):
it's not cool for the green Bay Packers to take
tax money, and remember it's kind of the same packers
are owned by the city of green Bay. If it's
not cool for them to take tax money to pay
for players, why is the UW getting money to pay

(01:32:11):
for players? And hey, wait a second, there are a
couple of other D one schools in Wisconsin in the
UW system, UWM D one, let's see baseball, basketball, soccer.
Do they get any of that sweet, sweet state money,
because I'm sure UWM could make it go a whole

(01:32:33):
lot further to get some hot shot soccer transfer from
Brazil how about Doug gottlieb up at UW Green Bay.
That's a D one program. He had a pretty good
turnaround this year. They won all of what two games
last year? Now they're above five hundred, big turnaround. They're exciting,
fun team to watch. Does Doug get any of that

(01:32:56):
sweet sweet nil money? Look, I'm with ten staff, Sult
and Bradley. I don't want my tax money going to
as much as I love UW Badger's football, and I do.
I'm an alum, proud UW law school class of two
thousand and six. Oh my goodness, twenty years. Oh, I

(01:33:18):
just every day, it seems like every day for the
past several weeks, I am just reminded of how old
I've gotten. Tearing your ACL and your meniscus while playing
basketball with your son, Yeah, that'll tend to do that,
But twenty years since I graduated from law school. Look,
I am a fan, I am an alum, I am
a supporter. I cannot condone tax dollars going to pay athletes.

(01:33:44):
You're listening to the Dan o'donald Show. We will be
right back Act ten turns fifteen. That's next show. O'donald Show,
five point six billion dollars nine million billion. That's the

(01:34:11):
amount that Act ten has saved Wisconsin taxpayers in the
fifteen years since it was enacted fifteen years ago. Today,
March eleventh, twenty eleven, Act ten became law, and according
to our good friends at the MacIvor Institute, which has
been tracking the savings ever since, twenty twelve, total savings

(01:34:33):
in direct costs thirty five point six billion dollars. According
to McIvor. Of that, twenty one point eight billion dollars
is in health insurance savings. Employees of the state of
Wisconsin now contribute twelve point six percent of their health

(01:34:55):
insurance premiums before it was zero. Do you find me
any sort of job today where you don't have to
contribute a single thing towards your health insurance premium. The savings,
according to MacIvor, are calculated using the Milwaukee method by

(01:35:16):
projecting what those costs would have been if pre Act
ten trends had continued twenty one point eight billion dollars.
In addition to that, pension contribution savings have totaled thirteen
point eight billion dollars. Public employees now pay half of
the actuarially required contributions to the Wisconsin retirement system. Who

(01:35:42):
do you suppose previously covered the entire amount? That's right,
you and me, John Q. Tech payer. That comes directly
from the Wisconsin Department of Employee Trust funds. So that
number is hard and fast. Thirteen point eight billion dollars
in the past fifteen years, twenty one point eight billion

(01:36:04):
dollars from health insurance premium contributions. That's sort of a projection,
but using what's known as the Milwaukee method, you can
pretty accurately gauge the total is thirty five point six
billion dollars. Not only that, it is brought back countless
school districts and countless local governments from the brink of

(01:36:25):
financial ruin because they have needed to or would have
needed to, come up with a whole lot of money
for overly generous benefits for employees who just didn't pay
a single thing. And we look back at it fifteen
years later and we say, how ridiculous is it? Do

(01:36:46):
you remember the capital chaos protests? This state was totally united.
We were talking about the Green Bay Packers in the
last segment. It's been fifteen years since the Packers last
won a Super Bowl twenty ten season, twenty one eleven
Super Bowl, they got the victory over the Pittsburgh Steelers.
It was like the next week the Capital chaos protest start.

(01:37:07):
We were united for a grand total of about a week.
But then when Governor Walker introduced his budget repair bill,
the lefties in this state absolutely freaked the freak out.
They descended on the Capitol, and of course MSNBC, The
Journal Sentinel, local and state and national publications. They all

(01:37:31):
made it seem as though what Walker was doing was
beyond draconian and unfair. Most normal people said, hey, uh so,
wait a second, Wait a second, you're telling me that
these people paid absolutely nothing for their health insurance and

(01:37:52):
absolutely nothing to their health or to their pensions, And
all we're requiring is for them to pay twelve point
six percent of their health insurance and half of their
pension contributions. Even back in twenty eleven, most people were saying, Hey,
I don't have a pension. Do you know anybody who's
got a pension?

Speaker 6 (01:38:12):
No.

Speaker 1 (01:38:15):
Naturally, Democrats immediately tried to overturn Act ten. They sued
multiple times, every single time in federal and state court.
Act ten was upheld seventh Circuit Court of Appeals twenty thirteen,
then again in January of twenty fourteen. Later on in

(01:38:39):
twenty fourteen five to two decision by the Wisconsin Supreme
Court upheld AT ten. April of twenty fourteen Court of Appeals,
Seventh Circuit follow up ruling from an earlier case, and
then the District Court the Federal District Court in twenty nineteen.
That was the operating Engineer's case. So five different times

(01:39:04):
in both state court and in federal court, AT ten
has been overturned. Guess what liberals are still trying. In
twenty twenty three, AFSME local unions, the SEIU, and a
number of other unions filed another lawsuit against that ten.

(01:39:27):
Now why would they try again? The Wisconsin Supreme Court
already definitively ruled like a decade earlier AT ten is constitutional.
Why would they wait until twenty twenty three? I believe
the suit was filed in November of twenty twenty three.
Now this date is important. Why would they file specifically

(01:39:48):
after August of twenty twenty three? Big hint there, because
in August of twenty twenty three, Janet Protocewitz was sworn
in as the fourth liberal member of the Court. So
of course liberals and their union allies were going to
get another kick at the can, hoping counting on the
fact that proto Sewitz, who said throughout the campaign in

(01:40:11):
twenty twenty three that she was going to overturn Act ten,
would vote to overturn Act ten. So they invented a
new theory that somehow Act ten violates the Equal Protection Clause,
which it very clearly does not. And right before the
fourth of July of twenty twenty four, Dane County Circuit
Court judge denied the state's motion to dismiss, saying, look,

(01:40:35):
there is no actionable legal theory. December two, twenty twenty four,
he grants summary judgment to the plaintiffs and strikes down
much of Act ten. The core provisions of Act ten
all struck down. However, the decision has never taken a

(01:40:59):
far because it was immediately stayed pending the inevitable appeal.
Now the Wisconsin Supreme Court has been petitioned to take
it up on what's known as direct appeals. So how
it works, we have three levels of courts in Wisconsin's
Circuit Court, Appellate Court, and then the Supreme Court. Since

(01:41:23):
this went from Dane County Circuit Court, of course, it
would then go to the Appeals Court. The appeals Court
would rule, and then if there's another appeal of that ruling,
the Wisconsin Supreme Court gets to decide whether or not
it's going to take up the Act ten ruling. And
in fact, on February twelfth, the Wisconsin Supreme Court said,
now we're not going to take this up on direct appeal.

(01:41:45):
Why because they don't want this to be an election
issue before the state Supreme Court race on April seventh, Sure,
but certainly not before the governor's race in November. Could
you imagine if Act ten was overturned, if Wisconsin taxpayers

(01:42:06):
all of a sudden had to pay all the pension
costs and all the health insurance premiums and had a
massive bill come due because Act ten was no more.
Could you imagine what that would do for Tom Tiffany's
gubernatorial campaign. He would say, Look, if I'm elected, I'm

(01:42:26):
going to restore Act ten. Look at what deliberate. First,
they absolutely destroyed you on property taxes thanks to Governor
Evers four hundred year veto. Then they absolutely destroyed you
on utility costs, and we'll try to get into that
coming up in just a second. Here Mandela Barnes wants

(01:42:47):
a utility price freeze. Oh that's rich, Mandela, my brother
in Christ, you were in the administration that is responsible
for all of the massive utility rate increases. So utility
price increases, your heating bill, your electricity bill, your property

(01:43:07):
tax bill, and then your property tax bill just goes
to the stratosphere because Act ten is gone. That would
be a disaster for Democrats. The court knows it. If
nothing else. These are political creatures in black robes. They
know dog gone well. That overturning Act ten would be
political suicide. Come on, you gotta have the Lord of

(01:43:34):
the dance in here in the Dan O'Donnells show, Saint
Patrick's Day bumper music rotation, Welcome back to the show.
It's classical conservatism and contemporary style. We do it every
single day. One of the leading candidates for governor of Wisconsin,
Mandela Barnes, former lieutenant governor and Senate candidate, came out

(01:43:56):
this week and supported a price freeze or a rate
freeze for utility rates.

Speaker 4 (01:44:03):
Here in Wisconsin, utility companies have rigged the system to
boost their own profits and salaries for wealthy executives, while
people in the state of Wisconsin have seen their utility
costs fight over three hundred dollars a month. People are
cutting back on essentials like food and medicine just to
keep the heat on. So instead of leaving Wisconsin nights
on the toe, we are going to freeze the rates
and we're going to take all monopolies like we energies

(01:44:25):
who continue to exploit Wisconsin knights just to line their
old pocket.

Speaker 1 (01:44:29):
Oh yeah, got to give credit where credits due. Mandela
is an idiot and a terrible politician. That beat that
he had behind his SoundBite there that absolutely slapped. I
got to figure out what beat that is, because we're
going to totally use that for the Dan O'Donnell show.
I like that beat. He said, what were the central
claims that utility companies are monopolies and they unfairly hike

(01:44:55):
rates on innocent taxpayers and then their core rupt executives
just go and make money for themselves. Right, those were
his central claims, and as a result, wisconsinites have to
choose between food and paying their heating bill. Does Mandela
Barnes just kind of forget that he was Lieutenant governor

(01:45:19):
in the same Evers administration that authorized the massive rate increases.
Here's how it works in Wisconsin, the Public Service Commission,
because we do have monopolies. These are legal monopolies for utilities.
It just is not practical to have multiple utility companies
operating in a given region. You would just have way

(01:45:41):
too many wires. It just so we grant legal monopoly
status to say we energies in southeast Wisconsin in exchange
for that. Though, for the monopoly status, the utility companies
need to go to the Public Service Commission and ask
them for permission to raise rates for heat electricity bills

(01:46:01):
for their consumers. The Public Service Commission is made up
of people picked by the governor. Under Governor Evers, PSC
nominees who took a majority control, and they serve for
a set period of time. I believe it's three years.
Don't quote me on that, but Evers had Ebs's picks

(01:46:21):
had a majority of the PSC Commission posts starting in
the spring of twenty twenty. Since then, they have approved
two point two billion dollars in total rate increases out
of three point one billion that were requested by the utilities,
so they have approved about seventy one percent of all

(01:46:44):
of the rate increases, totaling two point two billion. Now,
compare that with former Governor Scott Walker's PSC nominees who
assumed majority control of the commission in July of twenty eleven.
They approved three hundred million in rate increases out of
one point two billion dollars requested by the utilities, meaning

(01:47:07):
they approved just twenty five percent of the rate increases
that those evil monopolistic utility companies were requesting. Evers's PSC
commissioners were, in other words, the reason that the rate
hikes happened. Evers Era approvals were more than seven times

(01:47:32):
higher than Walker's commissioner's approvals of rate hikes. Actual bills
for most customers are now about on average twenty five
dollars higher per month than they were in late twenty
twenty four. This is having a real impact on people's
bottom lines. On that I will actually agree with Mandela Barnes.

(01:47:56):
Here's the thing though, under Scott Walker, according to information
from the US Energy Information Administration EIA, average monthly electric
bill under Scott Walker eight years of Scott Walker ninety
four dollars and sixty seven cents. Your average electricity bill

(01:48:16):
under Evers one hundred and ten dollars and eighty seven cents.
They've gone up sixteen percent because of all those rate increases. Now,
how about how about those greedy executives who are just
making money for themselves. Let me tell you this story

(01:48:37):
of one of Evers PSC commission nominees, Rebecca Valk. She
served for like thirty years as an energy attorney. She
represented wi Energies. She was like the in house regulatory
lawyer there. She then went to Quarrels and Brady became
partner and she represented we Energies. February twenty nineteen, she's

(01:49:01):
appointed by Evers not just to be a commissioner on
the PSC, she's appointed to be the chairwoman. She serves
for five years, steps down in February of twenty twenty four.
Six months later, she joins Alliant Energy as the assistant
vice president of Regulatory Affairs. This past December, Alliant announces

(01:49:26):
that she is going to become president of Alliance Wisconsin
Utility business, the Wisconsin Power and Light company. It serves
central and southern Wisconsin. She officially started in this role
January fifth. Now what's her salary. It's not been publicly reported,
but guess what. Her successor, David de Leone, made one

(01:49:49):
point three seven million dollars in twenty twenty four. So
Rebecca Valk goes from we energies representing energy companies to
the which is supposed to regulate the energy companies. Then
she goes right back to another energy company after approving
a whole ton of rate hikes with the PSC, and

(01:50:10):
she gets rewarded with what we can only presume to
be a million dollar plus salary. Nice work, if you
can get it. If I gave you a list of
eighty three NBA players most likely to score eighty three
points in an NBA game, would Bam Autobio of the

(01:50:32):
Miami Heat be on your list? Probably not, but he
did just that last night, breaking Kobe Bryant's all time
record for points in a game that we know definitively
actually happened. It is a long standing rumor that Wilt

(01:50:53):
Chamberlain's famous one hundred point game in Hershey, Pennsylvania, back
in the nineteen sixties, fifties, sixties sixties. I believe like
sixty two, sixty three somewhere in there that it never
actually happened. There's no video of that game. It's almost
impossible to believe. But there is no video of Wilt
Chamberlain's hundred point game. So conspiracy theorists have said for

(01:51:16):
years it didn't actually happen, and that twenty years ago
when Kobe Bryant scored eighty one points, that that is
actually the NBA's all time points record. It isn't. It
is second all time, at least it was until last night.
Autobio shot a record all time forty two free throws.

(01:51:43):
He made thirty six of them, also an NBA record. Now,
I don't know if it's because people are mad that
the late great Kobe Bryant is eclipsed forever in the
record books. By I mean, Autubio is a good player,
a very very good player, but he's sort of your

(01:52:04):
classic twenty to ten guy. I mean, he's always kind
of at that borderline all star level, but he's not
a surefire Hall of Fame or all time great. But
people are criticizing the way that the Miami Heat, and
they beat the Washington Wizards last night by about twenty
five points. They were intentionally fouling. Now, Washington is clearly

(01:52:26):
trying to tech. They traded for Trey Young from the
Atlanta Hawks and just decided to sit him down. They
just said, Okay, Trey, you're not going to play this
year because we're definitely trying to get one of the
top three picks in the NBA draft. The Heat were
just intentionally fouling pretty much throughout the entire fourth quarter

(01:52:47):
to get more time, to get more possessions, to just
feed the ball to Bam to try to get as
many points as he possibly can. And admittedly it wasn't
the prettiest eighty three point explosion that I've ever seen, butankly,
eighty three points is eighty three points. It's an incredible accomplishment.
Back tomorrow for the Thursday edition of The Dan O'donald