Caller gets Wisconsin governor’s strategy

Tells how he will deal with unions, get boycotting Democrats back to state

— Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, believing he was talking to prominent financial backer David Koch, revealed to a Buffalo, N.Y., blogger Tuesday his strategies to deal with public-sector unions and to lure Democrats boycotting the Senate back to Wisconsin.

In the 20-minute talk, the Republican governor also likened his stance on taking away most bargaining rights from public workers to former President Ronald Reagan successfully combating the air traffic controllers union three decades ago.

“That was the first crack in the Berlin Wall in the fall of communism because from that point forward the Soviets and the communists knew that Ronald Reagan wasn’t a pushover,” Walker said, according to the recording.

In a Wednesday news conference, Walker said his remarks to the caller jibed with his public remarks.

Critics seized on the remarks made by Walker in the call, saying they showed that his proposed rollback of publicworker bargaining rights was aimed at killing the unions.

Walker, however, said, “The bottom line is the things I’ve said are things I’ve said all along.”

The union cuts are about balancing the state budget, he said, and helping local officials balance their budgets when he proposes steep cuts in state aid over the next two years.

Walker also denied that a provision in the budget-repair bill that permits his administration to sell off 37 state power plants was aimed at Koch, the contributor whom Walker thought he was talking to in the call.

“Absolutely nothing to that - 100 percent wrong,” Walker said.

After Walker spoke, state Rep. Brett Hulsey, D-Madison, crashed the news conference. Walker’s staff opened the doors to the room, so chants and drumming by protesters poured into the room and nearly drowned out Hulsey.

“As you heard in the tape, the guy is a megalomaniac,” Hulsey said. “He’s comparing this to the PATCO [Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization] strike that Ronald Reagan used to break the backs of the national union movement?

“This dispute can go on forever. The senators have given us vital time to fight this tyrannical rule that we’re seeing here. It’s the tyranny of the majority.”

In the phone call, Walker also discussed a plan to get his bill on union rights passed without Democrats who have boycotted in the Senate. Separately, he said he talked to state Sen. Tim Cullen, D-Janesville, for 45 minutes Saturday, and he saw him as someone who could get the Democrats to return, even though “he’s not one of us.”

Walker also said he’d considered but rejected an idea toplant troublemakers amid the thousands of union protesters who have filled the Capitol for more than a week.

He told the caller that he feared that a “ruckus” would “scare the public into thinking maybe the governor has to settle to avoid this problem.”

Walker discussed ways Koch, a principal backer of the conservative group Americans for Prosperity, could help Republican legislators, presumably with TV and radio ads.

Action on the bill in the Senate has been stalled since Thursday, when all 14 Democrats left Wisconsin for Illinois.

Twenty senators must be present to pass bills that spend money, and the Republicans hold only 19 seats. They would need at least one Democratic senator to return to take a vote.

Walker’s bill would balance this year’s budget, repeal most union bargaining rights for public employees and give Walker’s administration broad powers to reshape state health programs for the poor. Unions have said they are willing to give as much as Walker is asking in concessions on health care and pensions, but have demanded that he not take away most bargaining rights.

The conversation with Walker was posted by the Buffalo Beast. Walker’s administration confirmed that the recording is legitimate, and Walker downplayed the significance of the conversation.

Koch is co-owner of Koch Industries.

Koch Industries’ political action committee was one of the biggest financial supporters of Walker’s gubernatorial campaign last fall, giving $43,000 to his political fund.

The editor of the Buffalo Beast is Ian Murphy, who claims on the Buffalo Beast’s website that he made the call.

The Huffington Post, a news website, reached Buffalo Beast Publisher Paul Fallon, who described how he reached Walker.

“Basically what happened was, yesterday morning [Murphy, the Buffalo Beast editor] was watching television about this Wisconsin stuff and he saw a report where he saw Walker say he wasn’t going to talk to anybody,” Fallon said to the Huffington Post.

Meanwhile, an Indiana deputy attorney general “is no longer employed” by the state after Mother Jones magazine reported he tweeted that police should use live ammunition against Wisconsin labor protesters, the attorney general’s office said Wednesday.

The magazine reported Wednesday that Jeffrey Cox responded “Use live ammunition” to a Saturday night posting on its Twitter account that said riot police could sweep protesters out of the Wisconsin Capitol.

Cox also referred to the protesters as “thugs physically threatening legally-elected state legislators & governor” and said “You’re damn right I advocate deadly force,” according to the magazine. He later told an Indianapolis televisionstation the comments were intended to be satirical.

Information for this article was contributed by Sharif Durhams, Lee Bergquist and Dan Bice of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and by Charles Wilson of The Associated Press.

Front Section, Pages 2 on 02/24/2011

Upcoming Events