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John Leiber: “Wisconsin used to be a leader on education.”

Featuring: John Leiber, Republican | Wisconsin Treasurer

Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25

Published December 8, 2025 | Video Starts at 51:44

That wasn't in there at all. So I would very much like to undo that so that we can actually have some education reform in this state experiment. Because Wisconsin used to be a leader on education. It used to be, pardon the word, progressive about education and implementing new ways and new systems and was very fond of borrowing from other states and taking what worked and getting rid of what didn't. (51:44–51:47)

CLAIM

Asserts that Wisconsin was previously a leader in education.

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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John Leiber

“I am on the board of the bcpl, the Board of Commissioners of Public Lands. And we invest $1.6 billion of a common school fund.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 05:59-06:09
“We have to give everything we make to school districts. So this last year, we gave over $70 million to various school districts.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 06:18-06:26
“The only investments we could make until about 2015 were in U.S. treasury bonds.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 09:12-09:20
“We have not had a state treasurer reelected in Wisconsin since 2002.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 27:39-27:44
“The state treasurer used to maintain the deposits of all the state funds and do the investments in accounting that was taken away.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 05:06-05:15
“The state treasurer's office used to do auditing for the government for the state government that was taken away back in the 60s.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 05:18-05:26
“State treasurer used to do local government investment poll, like taking all the, the money from the municipalities and stick it in one…”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 05:26-05:38
“The last thing that the treasurer did that was taken away was the unclaimed property program. And that was taken away in 2014, 2015.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 05:47-05:57
“The board [BCPL] was created in the state constitution back in 1848.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 05:59-07:17
“What's left is about 70,000 acres [of state land].”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 07:57-08:01
“We've made about a million dollars last year selling timber rights.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 08:11-08:15
“We are now investing in commercial loans and real estate and equities of all types.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 09:58-10:05
“I didn't vote to make Sarah the chair of the board, but I lost that one. Two to one.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 12:33-12:40
“I voted no to give that town a loan because...our loans are secured basically by land that can be taxed.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 12:53-13:10
“The tax base was shrinking because...when they bought it, it became tax exempt again.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 13:31-13:47
“Every other loan we've done in this program has been 100% guaranteed.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 14:36-14:41
“Our BCPL meetings are actually broadcast live online.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 17:36-17:41
“We also post the minutes on the BCBL website with the audio recording and the written minute.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 17:43-17:50
“The first step is to be a government entity.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 18:41-18:44
“It's a very competitive interest rate, like basically in line with what you can get, you know what the federal rate is.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 18:56-19:01
“There's no prepayment penalties.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 19:08-19:11
“All the interest we make, we send right back out to the districts around the state.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 19:17-19:22
“It's not limited on what you can use for, it's for any public purpose.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 20:01-20:05
“There's what, 1800 different municipalities in the state.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 20:33-20:37
“By state law, they [municipalities] can only go up to a certain amount [of debt].”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 21:59-22:01
“In my entire time here, we haven't voted down a loan.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 22:15-22:19
“We have money, we have a bunch of money to lend out.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 22:49-22:54
“Two of them [state treasurers] ran for reelection as an incumbent and then lost.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 25:37-25:45
“Eric Wilson ran for Congress in the third district in 24 and finished in third place out of three with 8% of the vote.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 28:41-28:53
“There are still split ticket voters in Wisconsin.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 31:56-32:00
“There weren't any treasurer debates last time, probably not this time.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 33:27-33:31
“RPW is basically hands off. You guys look into whatever you want. We'll give you whatever information you want.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 35:14-35:21
“They actually have an opposition researcher now and they had one on a temporary basis once in a while.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 36:26-36:33
“We should be looking to raise money from around the country just like the Democrats do because Wisconsin is a battleground state.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 37:29-37:37
“If we can just get back to equal, we'd be in a much better position.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 38:29-38:33
“The earlier the money comes in, the better and the more useful it is.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 40:40-40:44
“You can give unlimited amounts to the Republican Party, Wisconsin, and then RPW can turn around and give unlimited amounts to candidates.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 43:09-43:17
“The Democrats are doing it that way, is my understanding. They have. They raise money for their eventual nominee and then give it all over.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 43:30-43:37
“A lot of the Schimmel's money came from third party groups.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 44:21-44:25
“The cost of ads are much higher for third party.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 44:39-44:43
“RPW has been working on that. I believe they have. They've actually said that we're working on the stuff in the report that we can do.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 45:51-45:58
“The Supreme Court decided [in Thompson v. Craney] that we can never reform education because the state superintendent must always be in…”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 50:21-50:39
“Unless we amend the Constitution, we really can't create any sort of new oversight of our state education.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 51:02-51:10
“The state superintendent has to be supreme over education.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 51:10-51:14
“We've kind of been frozen ever since then because we're not allowed to innovate anymore because the Supreme Court made a bad decision.”
Ep.32 - Candidate Spotlight: John Leiber for Treasurer | 12/8/25 | Uploaded December 8, 2025 | 51:59-52:07