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Joel Brennan: “For 15 years, the state of Wisconsin just kind of stopped…”

Featuring: Joel Brennan, Democratic | Candidate, Governor of Wisconsin

Can executive experience make the difference in Wisconsin's next governor's race?

Published June 19, 2026 | Video Starts at 32:00

… Milwaukee, they need resources from the state in order to make sure that we're able to pay for fire, police, you know, all the basic services that we have. And For 15 years, the state of Wisconsin just kind of stopped paying any more money to local units of government. How do you change that? Well, we did. We changed some of it two years ago. I worked with the mayor, I worked with the county executive executive. (32:00–32:08)

CLAIM

Claims Wisconsin stopped increasing financial support to local governments for 15 years.

This is an excerpt from a raw transcript. The assertions have not been audited or verified. Tap the video to view the source footage and understand the context.

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Joel Brennan

“In the state of Wisconsin, we have 72 counties; at any given time, there's probably 26 counties that don't have a practicing OBGYN in them.”
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“If you're a black mother, you know, giving birth, you're three times more likely to die in childbirth than, you know, than a white woman.”
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“Many other states, 40 other states expanded Medicaid since Obamacare was passed. Wisconsin never did that.”
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“The statistics say that maybe a quarter of daycares around the state of Wisconsin could close in the next six months to a year.”
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“There's about a billion and a half dollars in productivity that sits on the sideline year, mainly women in Wisconsin because they can't find…”
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“In Minnesota state, that's same size, same population, same crime rate. They have about 8,000 people incarcerated in state prisons.”
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“We got more people working in the department, Department of Corrections, that they have in state prisons in Minnesota.”
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“Responsible for human resources for 35,000 people in state government [as Secretary of Administration for Wisconsin].”
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“Responsible for putting together the state budget [as Secretary of Administration for Wisconsin].”
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“Responsible for procurement, all the facilities and real estate [as Secretary of Administration for Wisconsin].”
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“Responsible for negotiating the compacts and regulating Indian gaming in the state of Wisconsin.”
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“During COVID, had the additional responsibility for how to spend money with people, farmers, small businesses, renters, and homeowners.”
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“Took over [Discovery World] in a time where it was absolutely struggling and danger of potentially shutting down.”
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“Built about a $15 million expansion [at Discovery World].”
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“Helped Tony Evers run the executive branch and repair damage that Scott Walker and the right-wing legislature had done between 2010 and…”
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“Taken a leave of absence from the job that I've had for the last four years running the Greater Milwaukee Committee.”
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“There's still about 5% of kids in the state of Wisconsin that don't have any coverage.”
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“We're forcing all these referendums down to the local level, and people are deciding, do I want to tax myself where I'm in danger of being…”
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“Getting rid of the state funding formula that we've had over the last 30 years, that hasn't worked.”
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“The Legislative Fiscal Bureau... said that if they did all the things that were in this surplus package, that we would go into the next…”
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“It's expected that we're going to have a $2.5 billion surplus.”
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“About 30% of the people in the state of Wisconsin weren't going to get these $300 or $600 tax credits or checks.”
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“The state of Wisconsin was one of the last states to actually start spending state money on early childhood education, on daycares.”
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“Last year, for the first time, we put in money to help prop up what is generally failing system [of early childhood education and daycares].”
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“It's about $110 million. It runs out on June 30 and on July 1.”
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“It would cost us $110 million to at least prop up the system that we have now for the next year.”
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“We were responsible for procurement and we're responsible for some of the diversity efforts at the state level.”
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“There are rules that happen at the local level. There are rules that happen at the state level.”
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“I have the same perspective on this that the governor, the Democratic governor of Colorado has.”
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“At the federal level, they are undoing the Department of Education.”
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“There are democratic proposals that have gone through like 12 drafts on putting some guardrails up related to data centers.”
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“I want to make sure that Wisconsin union labor is building all of these things.”
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“The legislature did not put any guardrails in [when Wisconsin got into the data center game].”
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“I think it's reasonable to put a pause on the approval of new data centers until we have these guardrails in place.”
Can executive experience make the difference in Wisconsin's next governor's race? | Uploaded June 19, 2026 | 28:58-29:08
“We went and ensured Milwaukee could get a 2% sales tax in the city.”
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“The City of Milwaukee had pretty much cut everything that it could cut. They didn't have a spending problem, they had a revenue problem.”
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“We were in a position where the city was not going to be able to meet very basic needs around law enforcement, around fire protection…”
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“The city needs the resources to be able to do the basic functions and make sure that we can do it.”
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“I don't find a lot of people who say that there are too many police in their neighborhoods.”
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“We gotta make sure that there is an appropriate law enforcement presence.”
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“Wisconsin finish[ed], like, out of 38 states that they measured how to do, how are you recovering in Math? We finished 33rd.”
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“When it comes to reading, there were 35 states. We finished 30th.”
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“In places like the city of Milwaukee, we're operating. We're doing worse than almost any other city in lots of ways.”
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“50,000 kids who are now going to either charter schools or private schools.”
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“There's like 11,000 people who work in the Department of Corrections out of 35,000 people in state government.”
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“We got, like, 23,000 in Milwaukee.”
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“Have red states done things that have significantly reduced what they're spending on prisons and maybe spend that money at the front end in…”
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