Horse racing polls in Wisconsin months away from the Aug. 9 primary election show few surprises — but perhaps incongruously — voter enthusiasm in 2022 is highest among those least confident about in the 2020 election, according to April responses to the Marquette University Law School survey. COVID-19 cases have tripled in the past month across the state, and Milwaukee is experiencing its own spike, though hospitalizations and deaths aren’t rising at the same rate, Milwaukee’s health commissioner said. , Kirsten Johnson. A pandemic-caused backlog in felony cases is forcing courts across the state to dig, but an infusion of federal money offers hope, Milwaukee County Courts Chief Judge Mary Triggiano explained. . A report by Pew Charitable Trusts showed that Wisconsin is one of seven states that has no cap on interest rates for payday loans – Melody Harvey, consumer science professor at UW-Madison , described what happens when a borrower defaults on these loans.
Charles Franklin
Director, Marquette Law School Poll
- Republicans least confident in the accuracy of the 2020 election are more enthusiastic about voting in 2022, while those most confident in the election outcome are less enthusiastic about voting, according to a poll published on April 27.
- Franklin: “It’s within the Republican Party, and it has real implications for the primary and possibly the overall. The least confident are about 20 points more enthusiastic about voting than Republicans who are confident in the election outcome. Well, that probably means primary voters are going to be more heavily tilted towards those who are skeptical of the election. And you see candidates who have to deal with that in their campaigns. But it also means that maybe Republicans who don’t agree the election was stolen can’t be so enthusiastic about backing an election-skeptical candidate who carries this all the way to the election. So that’s something worth watching on how this split in the party is going, and about a third of Republicans are pretty confident again. Does it hurt them in the fall? , even if does this mean that in primary school the skeptics have the upper hand?
Kristen Johnson
Health Commissioner, City of Milwaukee
- As is happening in Wisconsin, COVID-19 cases are rising again in Milwaukee, which has seen “significant increases over the past two weeks.”
- Johnson: “I think the most important thing to realize is that covid is here with us, that there is a risk, that you have to assess your own risk, but also compare that to what we we lived in December and January. And that’s nothing compared to what we saw in the middle of the wave… But I think the message is that we know how to live with it. We learned a lot during the two years. We know that if you are more at risk, you have to be more careful. We know that people and people know their own level of risk and their comfort with risk. We know that there are children who were not eligible for [a] vaccine that we anticipate will arrive during the summer. But I think it’s really about identifying your level of risk, as an individual, to your family, and then measuring that against the activities that you engage in and knowing again that there’s there are many things we can do. I can put on a mask. We can distance ourselves socially. You can test before meeting with friends or family for a large gathering. So we have tools that we didn’t have before.
Marie Triggiano
Chief Justice, Milwaukee County Circuit Court
- Wisconsin has a criminal case backlog of more than 17,000 court cases as of April 25, 2022, including more than 1,600 in Milwaukee. The pandemic closed courthouses and delayed the hearing of cases, and they continued to pile up even as conditions eased. Wisconsin is using more than $30 million in federal pandemic relief funds to help hire attorneys, clerks and court reporters to catch up on these cases. In Milwaukee, more than $14.5 million will go towards staffing five new courts, including a night court. The Chief Justice said the money was welcome.
- Triggiano: “I think that gives some hope. I mean, everyone knows that we want to deliver justice that is fair, just and fast. And the backlog is weighing quite heavily on everyone. The judges work as hard as they These cases are moving, and prosecutors, district attorneys, public defenders, court reporters, and assistant clerks are all stepping up to try to find a way to get cases moving as quickly as possible, so this investment gives us an opportunity to restore some balance, I think, to our justice system so that we can move justice forward at a pace that we all think is reasonable. I think everyone has really high hopes for this coming money.
Melody Harvey
Professor, UW-Madison Dept. of Consumer Science
- An April 2022 policy brief from Pew Charitable Trusts found that Wisconsin is one of seven states that does not cap interest rates on payday loans. Pew showed that Wisconsin residents pay an average of $395 in fees when paying off a $500 loan over four months, an interest rate of 338%.
- Harvey: “Payday loans are designed to be short-term, as payday loans between pay periods suggest – and the general fact that these are generally small loans, and are therefore available for a few hundred dollars as opposed to, say, thousands of dollars, that one made through a personal loan or at a bank or credit union. And so, given the small dollar amounts, we would like believe that one would be able to repay those in But given income volatility as well, there are many other shocks that can occur including potential payday delays that cause that loan to be renewed… So if you renew a payday loan, you’re actually borrowing not only for that initial principal, but also the interest of those fees that have accrued from that initial borrowing of the loan.”
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