>> The following program is a PBS Wisconsin original
production. >> Tough times for soybean
farmers with no solution in sight. An update on dairy
workers and ICE and our U.S. senators trade barbs
and blame for the government shutdown.
[MUSIC] I'm Frederica Freyberg
tonight on "Here& Now". The government shutdown causes
political chaos. New candidates enter the races
for state Supreme Court and governor a Buffalo County
farmer discusses how immigration laws leave
dairy workers behind, and Zac Schultz reports on the
dire situation facing soybean farmers in the
state. It's "Here& Now" for October 3rd.
>> Funding for "Here& Now" is provided by the Focus
Fund for Journalism and Friends of PBS Wisconsin.
>> The federal government shutdown likely rolls into
next week after competing funding bills failed in the
U.S. Senate Friday afternoon. Some 18,000
federal employees in Wisconsin go without pay
during a shutdown. Most essential services and
benefit payments continue. The shutdown went into
effect at midnight on October 1st, after the
Senate failed to pass a short term funding bill,
falling short of the 60 votes needed. All but two
Democratic senators opposed the bill, including
Wisconsin U.S. Senator Tammy Baldwin. Democrats
wanted an extension of expiring Affordable Care
Act subsidies, and a reversal of about $1
trillion in Medicaid cuts. Even as the shutdown
started, Wisconsin Republican U.S. Senator Ron
Johnson proposed a bill called Eliminate Shutdowns
Act. He's here to explain. Senator, thanks for being
here. >> Well, Frederica, how are
you doing? >> Good. So you've had it
with shutdowns. What does your bill do?
>> Well, first of all, I will ask you. I think it's
pretty obvious. You and your listeners. I mean,
aren't you getting sick and tired of this? I've been
sick and tired of this for a long time. And all it
does is if you don't appropriate money for
government prior to the beginning of the fiscal
doesn't shut down, government doesn't shut
down those departments, just establishes a rolling,
14 day continuing appropriation. So then the
appropriators have time to pass an appropriation bill.
Again, it's just it's modeled really is modeled
after what Wisconsin did in the 50s. They're the same
thing. It doesn't decrease. It doesn't increase
at last year's levels until you pass appropriation. I
was disappointed that every Democrat voted against that
when we voted on it Monday. But we also had 12
appropriators. Republican appropriators vote against
it because they said it would undercut the
let me just describe that process. That's be undercut.
I've been here 15 years. 15 appropriation cycles. That
means 180 appropriation bills should have been
passed before the end of the fiscal year on time.
You know how many have been passed? Six. But that's a
96.7% failure rate. That that's apparently what the
Alleviate Shutdown Act would undermine or undercut.
Again, it's absurd. I'm not. Listen, I would love to see
an appropriation process work. It doesn't. It's
obvious. It doesn't. So let's at a minimum, stop
playing partisan politics with people's lives. I mean,
this is highly disruptive there's no reason for it
whatsoever. The House has passed a continuing
resolution. All Democrats have to do is do the same
thing to end the Schumer shutdown.
>> So in this shutdown, again, as you've just
expressed, you blame Democrats, but why not
negotiate it out before it gets to this point?
>> Well, that's what I try to do. Just let let's
prevent this. Just pass the Eliminate Shutdowns Act and
then we can negotiate whatever wants, whatever
needs to be negotiated. Individual appropriation
bills. You know, there is agreement on many things.
For example, the Senate did pass what we call a minibus.
The main part of that was Veterans affairs and
military construction that passed the Senate. I'm not
sure what happened in the House. We didn't conference
those. It hasn't been signed into law, but there
should be plenty of areas of agreement. The problem
is, as dysfunctional as this seems. Frederica, this
actually is a very well-honed process on the
part of the uniparty where you don't pass
appropriation bills, you put yourself into the
shutdown mode. You create deadlines like right before
Thanksgiving or right before Christmas. You know,
members want to go home. The appropriators or
leadership basically writes a 2000 page plus omnibus
spending bill, drops it on her desk and say, vote for
you can't go home. That's one of the reasons we've
gone from 14 trillion to over $37 trillion in debt
since I arrived here in Democrats are seeking, and
that is an extension of the enhanced tax credits in the
Affordable Care Act. You've long opposed the Affordable
Care Act. I trust you would never vote in favor of
extending those enhanced credits.
>> Well, remember, these were temporary enhanced
credits for the pandemic, but there's all kinds of
pandemic relief funding that has expired that we're
not continuing. Why do we continue these?
you see Republicans backing down on any of the
provisions in the big, beautiful bill, including
additional requirements around eligibility that
critics argue would result in people losing coverage?
>> Well, first of all, what we did was actually minimal.
We're not cutting Medicaid funding we're trying to do
is eliminate the fraud. We're trying to eliminate
Medicaid being used by people in this country
illegally. Quite honestly, we didn't go far enough.
>> What is your response to President Trump seeming to
use the shutdown as a predicate to put to cut
agency budgets and personnel?
>> Well, first of all, in the private sector, when
your company goes bankrupt, you know, unfortunately
people lose their jobs and they have to go find
employment elsewhere. You know, except for the fact
that the federal government our labors and taxation.
This will bankrupt entity. And so I don't see why
public service, public sector employees should be
immune to what we all have to experience in the
private sector. It's unfortunate. It doesn't
have to be. Again, Democrats could end this
today in about an hour when we vote on the House
continuing resolution, we could reopen government. So
there's no sense them wailing about the fact that
maybe President Trump will utilize this opportunity to
shrink down the size of government, which by and
large, I'd be all for. I mean, the federal
government is massive. Spent $7 trillion this year,
2019, before the pandemic. We're spending 4.4 $37
trillion in debt. You got sometime.
>> We leave it there. very much, Vigue. For her
part, Democratic U.S. Senator Tammy Baldwin was
expected to join us, but her office told us the
senator had a last minute scheduling change. Earlier,
she said, quote, Republicans who control the
white House, the Senate and the House have not only
refused to listen to families who need some
breathing room, but they also have abandoned working
with Democrats to do right by the American people. In
agriculture. Market news, soybeans are trading at
$10.26 a bushel today, according to Wisconsin
farmers. At that price, they're losing money. Here
and now, senior political reporter Zac Schultz tells
us this is the fallout from the Trump administration's
tariffs on China, putting Wisconsin farmers in the
middle of an international trade war.
>> Combines are rolling all across Wisconsin, bringing
in what looks to be a good soybean harvest.
>> I think it's going to be a real good year for us on
our yields. of the Wisconsin Soybean
Association. Along with his brothers. He farms 4200
acres of corn and soybeans in Rock County. And while
his bushels per acre look good, the price per bushel
has crashed over the last two years.
>> The prices that were being offered right now
aren't covering the cost that it costs us to put it
in the ground. >> The decline in soybean
markets started last year, but it bottomed out this
spring after Donald Trump announced tariffs on China,
and China retaliated by refusing to buy U.S.
soybeans. >> Historically, China has
bought more soybeans from the US than the rest of the
world combined. And so when China doesn't buy from us,
that's a huge impact to us. >> Reboots semi holds a
thousand bushels of beans, and the minute he drives it
off the field, those beans have now entered the
international market, competing with growers in
Argentina and Brazil. >> They're growing more and
more soybeans every year. They're clearing
able to provide that to China.
marketplace. Our beans are cheaper than Brazil's. So
in the absence of tariffs, we're ultra competitive.
>> Andy Benson farms 3800 acres in Barron County. He
says most farmers don't have capacity to store
soybeans on the farm and have few options in this
environment. >> Those farmers are going
to harvest the beans. They're going to load them
in the truck. If they have a bin, they're going to put
them in. If they don't, they're going to take them
to the elevator. And when they get to the elevator,
they have a couple choices. Take what's offered or put
them in the commercial storage and begin to pay a
storage premium, which is so much a month.
>> But there's no guarantee prices will be higher next
spring. Benson says there's a very narrow window for
the Trump administration to fix this trade war.
>> We're running out of time. Brazil's planting
their beans. They'll be ready for harvest next
winter. And when they start making a new crop, if we
don't have ours marketed, guess what? We're going to
have a lot of beans. >> Ribaut says farmers that
were already overleveraged will likely go under.
>> Some farmers are going to go under. There are some
farms that you know are not going to be able to make,
and that's very sad. >> Benson serves on the
Wisconsin Soybean Marketing Board.
other markets. And I think the biofuels thing is, is a
perfect example of that. >> The federal government
sets the amount of biofuels the nation's fuel mix, and
an increase could create domestic demand for
soybeans. That would lead to a new soybean crushing
facility being built in. Evansville has already
purchased land and has permitting in place to
build an $800 million facility that could process
70 million bushels of soybeans a year for their
oil. here that would help our
prices, because all those transportation costs are
will a lot of them would be eliminated.
>> Jason Sargeant is the Evansville city
administrator. He says they have a signed contract with
chess to start construction next summer. They're just
waiting for chess to confirm it will happen.
>> We have those dates in our contract, and they're
just obligated to kind of tell us when they've gotten
to that next milestone post. >> In a statement, a
spokesperson said chess is further analyzing the
market and biofuel policies to make sure the right
mechanisms are in place to support executing further
on the investment. Even if chess goes forward, the
plant wouldn't come online for a few years, leaving
Wisconsin farmers with 100 million bushels of beans
this fall and no good place to sell them.
>> You know, you leave your farm to your children, and
before I came along, they'd go out. They'd have to
borrow money. >> Even though Trump
started this trade war, Benson did rebound. Aren't
sure if this will change how farmers think about him.
>> By and large, Trump is a free market person. However,
he's become a little bit protectionist with this
this tariff approach. And I think I think we're
concerned I think we're very concerned because it's
affecting our livelihoods. >> You go talk to farmers.
There are some farmers that love him, some farmers that
hate him, some farmers that are a little less
optimistic. Now. >> Combining soybeans is a
dusty business. But when the dust settles from this
harvest, Wisconsin farmers will be on the losing end
of an international trade war, and the impact will be
felt all across the state. >> So to think that it's
just the farmers problem is shortsighted. Agriculture
is still the basis of our economy in so many ways,
especially here in Wisconsin.
us, it's impacting our local communities. Because
like I said, when we have those bad years and we're
not spending that money, that the local businesses
aren't getting the money. >> Reporting from Rock
County. I'm Zac Schultz for "Here& Now".
>> This week, the US Immigration and Customs
Enforcement Agency confirmed the arrest of 24
undocumented immigrants in Manitowoc County, one of
whom was arrested for sexual assault of a child
in May, according to authorities. A few others
have convictions for traffic offenses, including
drunk driving and equipment, immigrant
advocates said some of those detained were dairy
workers swept up in the raid. Is ice coming for
immigrant farm workers who supply upwards of 80% of
the labor milking cows on Wisconsin dairy farms, we
turn to longtime dairy farmer, who employs workers
from Mexico on his western Wisconsin operation. John
Rosenow, who joins us from Buffalo County. And thanks
very much for being here. >> Glad to be here.
>> So have you seen or heard about immigration
enforcement on farms in Wisconsin?
>> No. So far there hasn't been any. And knock on wood,
there's been one in Vermont and one in New Mexico in
the United States since the election.
>> How dependent on immigrant labor are
Wisconsin dairy farms? >> Any farm that employs
anybody is going to have immigrants, any dairy farm.
And we estimate I sat down with a CEO of a large dairy
co-op a number of years ago, and at that point we
determined based on everything that we know,
that at least 80% and I would guess 90% of the milk
harvested every day in Wisconsin is harvested by
immigrants. >> And so are these workers
in the US legally. >> Well, there is no no
visa available for immigrants to get to work
on dairy farms. The H-2a visas for for short term
employment ten months and dairy is 24 hours a day,
seven days a week, 365 days a year. So there is no
legal way for them to get here.
>> And so the answer would be that most of these
people are not legally in the US.
>> That would be my guess. What each employer has to
do, whether you're dairy farmer or you're a steel
mill, is you have to fill out an I-9 and a W-4 within
three days of employment. And you look at the
documents and if you're a reasonable person,
according to the directions from the IRS, if if you
look at the documents and they appear genuine, you
accept them. And that's what we do. And all of our
employees have green cards. >> So the latest version of
the Farm Workforce Modernization Act of 2025
would make those H-2a visas year round and allow for a
path to permanent residency for dairy workers. What do
you think about this legislation and where might
that go? >> Well, it's not going to
go anywhere because none of them do. And we've had
probably for the last 25 years that I've been
involved in this. I think every year somebody
introduces something and of the time it's political
posturing. People introduce a bill and then they tell
their constituents that they're doing something
about it, but it never gets out of committee. Nobody
wants to touch it. And so I have no hope. Like I told
somebody, I think it'd be better off rather than
reading the bill. It'd be walked my dog.
>> So you're cynical about this. And in the meantime,
dairy farmers need to do the work.
>> We have to get those cows milked every day. I've
been to Washington and I've talked to the Republicans
and Republicans say as soon as we get the border secure,
then we'll do something and then talk to the Democrats
and they say, well, we got no power, so I can't do
anything. And meantime, we have to get the cows milked.
And that's what farmers do. If the if Congress isn't
going to do their work, we still have to milk the cows.
We still have to produce the milk. We still have to
deliver calves. We can't just sit and wait for some
political posturing and reelection things and
everything else. So we get things done, and that's
what we need to do. >> What are your own 13
immigrant workers saying? In the midst of the current
climate on immigration enforcement?
>> When the current president was elected last
time, there was a lot more concern and not a lot
happened to them or their friends or neighbors or
people they knew. So this time they're going with,
it's going to be the same as last time. So they're
probably less concerned last time.
even in the midst of this kind of heightened ICE
activity, that there is a recognition that farmers,
particularly dairy farmers, need this labor?
>> Yes, I, I've involved in a few calls with leadership
in the administration conference calls, and what
I can gather from that is that there are two factions.
One faction led by Steven Miller thinks all
immigrants are bad, doesn't make any difference who or
where you are. They all got to go. And then the other
side is people from like Secretary of Agriculture,
Secretary of Labor and Secretary of Homeland
Security are on the other side, that there are
immigrants that are really helping the country. And I
think this is the battle that's happening within the
administration. I hope common sense prevails.
>> We leave it there. John Rosenow, thanks very much.
>> Thank you. >> In the 2026 race for
governor, Democrat Missy Hughes announced her run
this week. Hughes was most recently the CEO of the
Wisconsin Economic She joins six other
Democrats and two Republicans lining up in
the primary election, and a conservative candidate
entered the race for Wisconsin Supreme Court
this week. A state appeals court judge, Maria Lazar,
is running to replace Justice Rebecca Bradley,
who chose not to run for reelection. She will face
Liberal appeals court Judge Chris Taylor. The court
currently has a 4 to 3 Liberal majority. The world
is an increasingly scary place. Political
assassinations, mass shootings at schools,
churches and on the street. Even though some of the
violence is close to home, the sense is it won't
happen to me. But that's what survivors often say.
And how are people to make their way in the face of it?
We ask Sidney Timmer-Murillo, assistant
professor at the Medical College of Wisconsin and
psychologist treating trauma and traumatic injury.
And thanks for being here. >> Thank you.
>> So is there such a thing as collective trauma, where
people generally feel a sense of foreboding in the
current climate? >> Yeah, absolutely. I
think especially with the frequency that we're seeing
violence and such highly broadcasted events of
violence, we can absolutely, as humans feel the weight
of so much profound trauma. >> So watching the the
deadly mayhem of the fire and church shooting in
Michigan was so much. And then it's on endless loop
in social media. How much does that endless loop wear
on people? >> Yeah, we know that the
frequency of how much you see trauma or experience
trauma, so that repetition of violence really can
impact somebody quite significantly. And it's
normal for them to then start to experience anxiety
or fear or really a threat to their sense of safety.
Even if it wasn't you who experienced the violence
per se. >> How injurious is this
exposure in people's day to day lives, perhaps
especially children and young adults, things they
>> Yeah. >> So, you know, everybody
is different. We can see a range of different
reactions from an understandable spike in
your emotion when you first see that violent event, but
it can grow and really build a cascade into mental
health concerns or mental health diagnoses. And so an
individual, you know, especially kids and
children and adults, when they're trying to make
sense of it, it can really start to shape your
worldview. And whether or not you feel safe operating
in the world. So maybe you start to avoid certain
things that used to be normal for you. It might be
difficult for you to go to work or go to school.
>> And so the shock of assassinations and school
shootings is is obviously so deeply disturbing.
Should people not directly involved sit with that or
move along? >> Yeah, we would encourage
that. You know, you can't necessarily always escape
the bad things happening in life or, or media and you
want to be informed, but it's definitely important
to take breaks. I would argue that, you know,
taking those social media breaks and really making
sure you're engaged with your day to day life, your
loved ones and family can really keep you grounded
when navigating so much tension in this world.
>> How does trauma affect people who have experienced
it? >> What we know from the
research is that if you have a history of trauma
that puts you at greater risk of developing
psychopathology after any subsequent types of trauma.
And so if you, let's say, even we're in like a motor
vehicle collision, and then now you're dealing with new
exposures to violence, it does tend to put you at a
greater risk. Or it's something that I would be
looking out for when I'm trying to help treat
somebody for, let's say, post-traumatic stress
disorder or depression. >> So it really.
>> In what feels like a violent world and is is the
practice of trauma treatment a growing field?
>> Absolutely. Yeah. I think, you know, a majority
of people will experience at least one trauma in
their lifetime. But we know that a lot of people can
are at risk for more than just one traumatic
experience, or they live in communities with high rates
of violence. And so because of that, you know, I think
mental health providers really do need to be
prepared for addressing trauma in whatever they're
doing with their patients. But we are definitely
growing in terms of specializations as well,
that we need these providers to really be able
to hone in on the root of somebody's trauma reactions,
and that tends to need some pretty specialized
treatment to to be able to do that effectively.
>> What makes someone resilient to trauma?
>> Yeah. You know, I think it is
important to remember that there is resilience in the
face of trauma. And there are so many things that can
contribute to that. There can be individual factors.
So how you regulate your emotions in the face of
fear and threat to your safety. But I also think
social support is such a profoundly important
resilience factor, really connecting to your loved
ones. When you have been exposed to violence, it's
so critical for trying to move forward and cope with
the reactions. >> All right. Well, thank
you so much for your information. For more on
this and other issues facing Wisconsin, visit our
website at PBS Wisconsin and then click on the news
tab. That's our program for tonight I'm Frederica
Freyberg. Have a good weekend.
>> Funding for "Here& Now" is provided by the Focus
Fund for Journalism and
Friends of PBS Wisconsin.