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Joel Brennan: “We went and ensured Milwaukee could get a 2% sales tax in…”

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 32:13

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. We went and ensured Milwaukee could get a 2% sales tax in the city. Were you for that? Oh, absolutely. My organization was part of the ones that drove that. So why for that? (32:13–32:18)

CLAIM

Claims involvement in securing a 2% sales tax for Milwaukee.

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.”
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“For 15 years, the state of Wisconsin just kind of stopped paying any more money to local units of government.”
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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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