Thank you.
Stand by.
In more bombshell news, the State Assembly Thursday approved an Iowa-style redistricting
bill.
Quickly fashioned about face from majority Republican leaders, who have long opposed
nonpartisan map making, comes as the Wisconsin Democratic Party announced a $4 million ad
campaign to pressure Republicans to back down from talk of impeaching Liberal Justice Janet
Prud if she doesn't step aside from two lawsuits over the current maps.
Under the bill, the maps would be drawn by the Legislative Reference Bureau, nonpartisan
staff who work for the legislature.
Legislators would then vote up or down on the plan, and if passed, it would then go to
the governor for final approval.
A Republican state representative who has long championed the Iowa model is here.
Todd Novak joins us from Dodgeville, and thanks very much for being here.
I'm glad to be here.
So how surprising was it for you that suddenly the speaker moved to a redistricting process
similar to what you have long proposed?
It wasn't too surprising.
My colleague and I representative Trannell from the 49th, who is a neighboring district,
and I have been on this for years.
We first started him and I talking about this after the last election.
It's like, you know, after going through the last court case, even before the election,
and we started pushing it, and we actually met with the speaker before April, and he
said, you know, you might be right, talk to your colleagues.
Maybe if you can talk to some Democrats, and we need to really probably take a look
at this.
Now, this is before April.
So we've been working on it, and, you know, I will say it was talking to some of my colleagues
that have been opposed to this and into it, and why we need to do it, was not the easiest
task, but they listened.
And then finally we got to a point, I would have rather put it out in May or June.
And finally we got to a point where we had it, coalesced, we had it everything together,
and we went with that.
And so I will say this, in my career, this is one of the highlights of my legislative
career.
Does it matter to you that the about face on the issue comes in the midst of redistricting
lawsuits and talks of impeachment of Justice Prada Seiwitz, and this Democratic ad blitz
against that, and that it came so quickly like that?
I mean, from me looking on the inside, talking to my Democrat colleagues over the summer
and our working group, I know the optics look bad, but I mean, I'm usually considered one
of a pretty trustworthy guy in the legislature by both parties and in my words, gold, and
we didn't just throw this out in two or three days.
I know the optics may look bad, but I've been working hard.
We've been working four or five of us very hard on this for months.
And as far as impeachment issue, we have not even talked about impeachment of the
caucus.
I am one of the people that are being targeted by this, all this money, the Democrat money.
And you know, I really don't care about it.
I don't tie the two together.
I know the media may be in the Democrats, but in my mind, that's not why I did this.
I have looked at my record, I've been doing it for 10 years.
What about the lawsuits?
I mean, did that be the time here?
I have no, I'm not, that's not anything to do with me.
I don't even, you know, that's, I'm so used to, you know, you look back, we've been in
the courts for two years on redistricting, two or three years, the false start.
I mean, this is kind of what got my colleagues there.
It's like, the court could have essentially flipped in two years, and then we could be
back doing this.
I don't think anybody wants to do maps every two years.
And now we got a system in place where it's, we're thought of our hands.
How do you respond to democratic critics of the bill, including the governor, who calls
it bogus?
The same governor that stood in the assembly chamber podium demanding we do this in a state
of the state or budget address, put this in his budget, I believe, this exact plan and
now it's saying it's bogus.
I think yesterday was very telling to me, we have all the democratic caucus on record,
various statements supporting this exact same thing.
And now they were just yesterday, just totally flipped.
And oh no, and I want to say all of them secretly, but I in the scene, some said, I
really want this, but our leadership won't let us.
I want to get this question in.
What about the issue that earlier proposals for nonpartisan map making would require a
approval of at least three quarters of all members elected in each house, whereas this
proposal does not require that.
Now, we changed that to bipartisan and it has to be a bipartisan vote.
That was one of the, we put six amendments on last night that we had what the request
of some of our Democrat colleagues.
It's changed to bipartisan.
And the reason is simply 75%, you could have 10 Democrats, let's say, and 10 Republicans
that say selfishly say, I don't like what you did to my district, I'm not voting for
it.
And that 75% threshold isn't just getting another side on board, it's getting, you know, it
would just be unlocked impossible to get in certain situations.
I don't ever want that to happen.
It doesn't happen in Iowa, it's, you know, it's not in the Iowa model.
So only changes this bill from Iowa is what, what actually a reference bureau said we had
to change to match our constitution.
All right.
Representative Novak, we need to leave it there.
Thanks very much for your time.
Thank you.
I'm glad to talk to you.
Have a good day.
You too.
Yeah.
Bye.
Well, look at that.
We made it work, the magic of all technology.
Is that what you were looking for?
You were pretty easy on me.
I was going to get a hammer today, but I don't hammer, but I do have a question.
Do you think, is it your, yeah, well, yeah, just out of personal curiosity, you know,
the governor was so highly critical of this, but then it went through all of these amendments
and all of that.
Do you think he'll sign it?
I'm not so sure.
I, okay, this has to be completely after record.
So I don't know if you watched last night.
We were recessing and cocketing.
Right.
Yeah.
I was on the negotiating team.
We had a lot of Democrats that were going to, we dressed their concerns and they really,
really, really wanted to vote for this.
The governor's office and Greta Nubar, the majority leader, were hammering them so hard
and threatening them.
And I think, I think he's going to get some pressure from his own caucus.
Hmm.
Interesting.
Well, they must think they have a pretty good case in the high court.
Pardon?
They must think they have a pretty good case with a lot of such.
I will tell you, off the record, you can't count your chickens for the hat.
Yeah.
I judge Haggander and took Governor Evers' maps, remember?
Yeah.
Yeah.
I mean, so, you know, and that's kind of, I believe in the system.
I believe, unless they know it's something that we did, you know, I don't know, the Supreme
Court is a very tight lift and does not let us know anything.
So, I don't know.
It'll be interesting to play, but I'm just exhausted.
I bet.
I bet.
I bet.
So, with that, thank you so much for joining us.
It airs at 7.30 p.m. tonight on PBS Wisconsin.
Okay.
Yeah.
All right.
I will watch it, but I got to make sure my mother knows.
Of course.
Of course.