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Good afternoon, everybody.
I'm Attorney General Josh Call, and I am proud to be joined today by State Senator
Calder-Royce, State Representative Lisa Subek, Dane County Sheriff, Calvin Barrett, Monique
Jenkins, the Executive Director of End Abuse, and thank you to everybody else who's joining
us here as well.
We are here today to announce proposed legislation to help keep Wisconsinites safe.
The background of this legislation is rooted in a court case from 2022 called do-back
versus call.
In that case, the State Supreme Court issued a decision that held that under applying federal
law to state law circumstances, individuals who were convicted of a disorderly conduct
case involving domestic violence were not prohibited from possessing a firearm in Wisconsin.
So as a result of that decision, individuals who've been convicted for a crime that involved
domestic violence are able to obtain firearms.
I believe, and I know the overwhelming majority of Wisconsinites believe, that individuals
who have committed domestic violence have been convicted based on their conduct should
not have access to firearms.
In fact, the data is clear that when domestic violence and access to firearms are linked,
the dangerousness of the situation increases dramatically.
In some instances, access to a firearm can make a difference between whether a domestic
violence case results in somebody's death or not.
So this is a critical proposal for public safety.
Nobody should have to fear for their safety at home.
They certainly shouldn't have to fear for their lives.
The legislation that we are proposing today will make very minor changes to two statutes.
The result of which will be to be clear when somebody is convicted that their disorderly
conduct conviction involved domestic violence when that happens.
By making clear that the crime that the person has been convicted of did involve domestic
violence, that will allow the courts to prohibit those individuals from possessing firearms.
Now, Justice Khorofsky issued a concurring opinion, in that case I mentioned, duvec
versus call.
In her concurrence, she was clear that this result was nonsensical and that it was dangerous,
but she made the point that we needed legislative action to fix this issue.
That's exactly what this proposal would do.
It would close the new loophole in Wisconsin law and ensure that individuals who have committed
domestic violence are prohibited from possessing firearms.
But we need legislative action.
The proposal we have here is very narrow in scope.
It would bring us to where Wisconsin law had been understood to be prior to that decision
in duvec.
So we're not asking the legislature to expand restrictions that are in place.
We're asking for us to go back to where we were prior to that decision in 2022.
By doing that, we can help keep survivors of domestic violence safe and we can help keep
our communities in Wisconsin safe.
So with that, I'm going to turn it over to State Senator Calle Royce.
Thank you.
We are very lucky in Wisconsin to have an attorney general who is not only a champion
for victims of crime, but specifically for victims of domestic violence.
I really appreciate his leadership on this issue.
In 2022, 96 Wisconsinites died from domestic violence.
That's one death less than every four days.
In fact, one in six domestic violence homicides in this country happen in Wisconsin.
The economic cost of domestic violence in Wisconsin is estimated at $657 million.
Homicide is the leading cause of death for pregnant women in this country.
And we know that a woman is five times more likely to be murdered if her partner has
access to a gun.
Now these are horrifying statistics.
They should stop you in your tracks.
But it's easy to cite statistics and have that obscure the reality that every single
individual who is a victim of domestic violence is a person whose life is a victim of domestic
violence is a person whose life was cut short, taken away because their abuser wanted to
keep access to their guns.
That person had hopes and dreams and struggles just like the rest of us, their life matters.
And that human being is one who leaves behind many other victims, their children, their
family, their community.
All of us are harmed when victims of domestic violence are not protected.
And the legislation today is simple and straightforward, but absolutely clear-eyed in the mission
to make sure that Wisconsin does not allow people who are victimized by domestic violence
to be victimized by a partner with a firearm that should have been taken away.
And with that, I'm going to turn it over to my assembly colleague, Representative Lisa
Suebeck.
Thank you.
Thank you, Senator Royce.
And thank you to Attorney General Powell for all of your work on this.
This is an incredibly important issue, one that we've talked about for a long time.
I had the pleasure of serving for a number of years on the Governor's Council on Domestic
Violence.
And as part of that council, every year we would hold a ceremony where we read out loud
one at a time the names of individuals were killed at the hands of a domestic abuser
here in Wisconsin.
And I can remember the first time I did that, I was astounded by the numbers, I had no idea.
And I was more astounded to think about how many of those deaths were preventable.
We know, as Senator Royce said, if an individual has accessed firearms in a domestically violent
situation, it is five times more likely to end a homicide.
It is vital that we get guns out of the hands of abusers.
The end domestic abuse you'll be hearing from shortly issues a report every year about homicides
by domestic violence.
In 2022, they told us that 88% of homicides by domestic violence were done with a firearm.
Imagine if those abusers didn't have access to firearms, how the results could have been
different to the lives that could have been saved.
The law that we propose as Attorney General Call said is quite simple.
It redefines domestic violence to include or defines domestic violence to include the
nature of the relationship.
And it separates violent conduct from other disorderly conduct under our law in order to
create a court record under which the federal law can be enforced.
It is already illegal for individuals who have been convicted of misdemeanor domestic
violence to possess a firearm.
But because our state law is not clear as we saw in Dubac versus Call, we are leaving
firearms in the hands of abusers.
And as a result, individuals are dying, women are dying at the hands of their abusers.
We can change this.
This is a really simple fix.
I'm pleased that we are introducing it today.
I am hopeful that we can spark interest among my colleagues in order to get this done.
This is the least that we can do to keep families in our community safe.
Thank you.
And with that, I would like to introduce Dane County Sheriff, Calvin Barrett.
Good afternoon.
I would first like to thank Attorney General Call, Senator Royce, and Representative Subek
for this legislation that gets to the root cause of the violence that we see in our communities.
So many times law enforcement agencies like the Dane County Sheriff's Office are forced
to respond after violence and after crimes have been committed.
But by taking these preventative steps with legislation, it gets to the root cause of
the issues that leads to less contact on the back end and less violence on the back end
when we get involved.
Public safety, accountability, and rehabilitation is the goal.
And that's what this legislation allows us to maintain because we have to have accountability.
Founded accountability is very difficult to have rehabilitation.
The root cause solutions to preventing future crimes and the leadership of our state and
the leadership of our representatives and senators proposing this legislation are playing
a huge role in keeping our communities safe.
Local data here in Dane County, from January 1st of 2023 to October 31st of 2023, we had
1,788 bookings on domestic related charges in Dane County alone.
Policies and practices that focus on disrupting access to firearms and times of crisis have
been proven to reduce tragedies from violence.
Two-thirds of women killed by an intimate partner are killed with a gun.
This legislation is imperative to interrupting the cycles of violence that negatively affect
victims, survivors, their children, and our overall community.
This legislation plays a significant role in law enforcement's ability to keep and maintain
the peace in our communities.
And I would like to thank Attorney General Call, Senator Royce, and Representative Seabed
for their proactive work on this legislation because it is helping keep our communities
safe.
Thank you.
Next, I would like to call Monique Minkins, the Executive Director of M. DeBees.
Good afternoon, everyone.
I'm Monique Belkins, the Executive Director of Gen Domestic Abuse Wisconsin.
For those of you who are familiar with our coalition, you know that advocacy related
to firearms is far from a new aspect of our work.
Domestic violence and firearms are a lethal combination.
Victims are five times more likely to be murdered when their abusers have access to
a gun.
Abusers often use guns to coerce, threaten, and terrorize partners, children, and pets.
Even without firing a single shot.
This crisis of DV homicide in our state is tied to the national crisis of gun violence.
There is an undeniable link between mass shootings and DV.
As a black woman, I stand here knowing that these issues deeply impact folks who look
like me.
Those who are black, indigenous, and other people of color face multiple forms of violence
at disproportionate rates.
While anyone can experience DV, it is often more lethal for women of color, particularly
when guns are involved.
We have advocated for common sense legislation that censures those most at risk of DV homicide
for many years.
In our public policy advocacy and via our annual DV homicide reports, we highlight deaths
by homicide and related trends.
We have offered consistent reliable data to back what harms us as advocates.
DV homicide is a public safety crisis in our state, exacerbated by abusers' access to
guns.
In our last report, we showed that 96 people in Wisconsin lost their lives to domestic
violence in 2022.
That's the highest total since we began releasing data in 2000.
Those lost were ages 1 to 92, and homicides occurred in 25 counties across the state.
63 of the homicides included a firearm.
This year, data shows the same pattern, firearms, and most common homicide methods.
Our action that addresses root causes of this crisis, Wisconsin, which is sixth in
the country concerning DV homicides, will continue to see lives lost at the hands of
DV homicide.
This bill is a step toward saving lives by ensuring that those who have been convicted
of a misdemeanor crime of DV does not have access to firearms.
No, I'd like to share with you today something that is not unrelated to my professional life,
but which I do not often share because of its personal nature in my own family's life.
In recounting it, I ask that all in this room with us today, regardless of political affiliation,
age, race, gender, or class, pause to remember what's most important.
That we are talking about people and preserving human life.
40 years ago, my sister was living in Illinois with her three children, trying to move on
with her life after failing for divorce.
He was after midnight when her estranged husband kicked in the door to her house.
My sister's daughters, two and three years old, and another niece, age three, witnessed
the incident.
My sister's husband shot her boyfriend who was sitting at the kitchen table.
He shot him three times.
With the gun in his hand and insinuating harm, he forced my sister and the four children
into the car.
He drove them to his mother's house, leaving my sister's boyfriend on the floor.
The boyfriend managed to get in his car and drove to our house to tell us what had happened.
My other sister drove the boyfriend to the hospital, and he thankfully survived the incident.
To this day, he still has one of the bullets in his body.
After that day, my parents went to where my sister and the children were to give them
to safety.
Only my one niece left the house with my parents.
My sister and her three children remained in the house with their abuser.
Though my sister assured us that his mother and sisters were also at the house, and while
we have always worried about her safety, nor he had a gun and leaving without her only
intensified our fears.
And even though the gun was not visible, their early morning events served as a warning to
obey for my sister.
Of course, when someone goes to the hospital with a gunshot, the police are contacted.
Later that afternoon, the police knocked on our door.
My parents sent them to the house where my sister was located.
They had hoped my brother-in-law would be arrested and that my sister and her children
would join us at home.
Instead, his family did not cooperate with the police, and they protected him.
So an hour later, our phone rang.
The other end was my sister's abuser yelling at my mama for sending a police to his mother's
house.
We were so afraid for the life of my sister and her children.
I am thankful to this day that everyone made it out of this horrific situation in life.
They were lucky in this respect, which is our decade of homicide reports show that's
not always the case, and it's for far too many victims, it's not the case.
As children who witnessed such violence, my nieces have been impacted.
What happens remains in the consciousness of my family and continues to drive my work
here at the state coalition.
And I got permission from my sister to share this story, and I thank her for trusting me
to share it with you all and to tell her story.
Those impacted by domestic violence, DV homicide, our relatives, our friends, our co-workers,
our neighbors, they are a whole three-dimensional people who face struggles, experience joys,
and have hopes for their and their children's futures.
What we decide in this capital building impacts whether people across Wisconsin will die
at the hands of abusers with guns.
We work for conditions that support survivors' hopes for futures where they and their children thrive.
We work for those in our communities, families, and homes where people deserve dignity, safety,
and lives free from all too often legal torment of domestic violence.
It is through legislation like this alongside broader work to address root causes of oppression
that we move our state towards a more just future.
And I turn it over to Attorney General Call.
Thank you so much Monique. Thank you also, Sheriff Barrett.
State Representative Subek and State Senator Royce.
This is a proactive step we can take to prevent violence from happening and keep our community
safer, and I hope that the legislature acts quickly to consider this legislation.
So with that, we're happy to open up to questions.
I haven't so far had conversations with Republicans, though if either the legislators have,
please jump in. Clearly, we will work with any Republican legislators who are willing to
consider taking this up. We will learn soon whether the legislature schedules a hearing,
so I think that will be a key first step. And I would add that I think this is a real
test for Republicans in the legislature because this is as simple and straightforward and common
sense a gun safety measure as you can imagine. This is about keeping firearms out of the hands of
violent offenders. So my hope is that the legislature will recognize that and
take common sense action. But obviously, there has not been a lot of progress on gun safety
legislation over the last several years, so hopefully that will change. Given there's been
a lot of Republican pushback against kind of similar legislation like red flag laws and such
a lot of Republicans have been very second amendment at work very much advocating for the
second amendment. Do you have any message for any of those who might push back against this bill?
Well, first, there is actually a court in front of the U.S. Supreme Court regarding
the second amendment's applicability to domestic violence offenses. And I think it's,
we don't have a ruling yet, but I believe the court will uphold those prohibitions and find
that they're consistent with the second amendment. And again, this is about people who have been
convicted of violent conduct and preventing them from having access to firearms. That's
something that Democrats and Republicans broadly agree upon, and I'm hopeful that we will see the
legislature take action based on that. And I will add to one other thing, Alana, this was what
everybody understood the law to be prior to a year ago. And, you know, under federal law
prohibits people convicted of misdemeanor domestic violence from possessing firearms. What these
statutory changes would do is make clear when the convictions are for that offense. So this is
about bringing clarity of the law and ensuring that federal law can be enforced.
All right. Thank you all for being here.