The Wisconsin Supreme Court will hear a lawsuit seeking to overturn Act 10 in the state, a move that is estimated to cost taxpayers $2 billion annually if it is fully enacted.
The order did not give reasoning for the Supreme Court’s decision. Dane County Judge Jacob Frost previously ruled to overturn the law in late 2024 before that ruling was reversed by the Wisconsin Court of Appeals.
Frost’s ruling said the law was unconstitutional under the state’s equal protection clause. The Wisconsin Supreme Court currently has five liberal and two conservative judges.
The law was initially signed by then-Gov. Scott Walker in 2011. Act 10 limits most public sector union contract negotiations to salaries only and capped those salary increases to the rate of inflation.
Democratic lawmakers have made their intentions clear that they plan to overturn the bill, with Gov.-elect David Crowley saying as much during the campaign and new Assembly Speaker Greta Neubauer saying the same on Tuesday.
The Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty has estimated that overturning the law would cost taxpayers a combined $2 billion annually, with $1.5 billion to the state’s schools and nearly $500 million to municipalities.
Crowley said last weekend that he wasn’t concerned about WILL’s cost estimates.
“I’m not worried about what WILL is putting out there as it relates to analysis,” Crowley said on WISN’s Up Front. “What we need to be focusing on is what that long-term fiscal sustainability looks like for the state of Wisconsin. So we’re going to couple all of this with a blue ribbon commission bringing Democrats, Republicans, tax experts, local units of government, business leaders as well as labor unions to the table to focus on that long-term fix.”
New Republican senate minority leader Julian Bradley told The Center Square that the Democrats’ plan is clear and will be costly to taxpayers.
“We have a radical court and a new radical left trifecta that supposedly ran on affordability that’s racing with the court to raise taxes on everybody by $2 billion,” Bradley said. “They can’t wait to do this. This was always part of their plan. They ran on affordability and here they are, right out of the gate, they just can’t wait to raise taxes. And they’re not telling anybody how it’s going to be covered, how it’s going to be paid for.”
Rep. Shae Sortwell, R-Two Rivers, recently told The Center Square that the county board he serves on in Manitowoc County is concerned over the estimated $5 million in additional costs they could incur if Act 10 ends, a total that is above the county’s levy increase limit.
“They are who we thought they were,” Bradley said, quoting former Arizona Cardinals coach Dennis Green.