Citizen Action Weekend ’26 Newsletter, Friday, November 6th
Join Citizen Action of Wisconsin today!
Sign up to speak to a Citizen Action organizer. We want to talk to you.
Attend Citizen Action’s New Member Orientation, Wednesday, November 11th, 6pm
Participants in Citizen Action’s New Member Orientation will learn about Citizen Action’s history, values, current work, and campaigns while getting grounded in the fundamentals of community organizing, how everyday people build relationships, develop leaders, identify shared interests, and build collective power.
We’ll also introduce our key issue areas, including healthcare and BadgerCare expansion, healthcare affordability and access, climate justice and the impact of data centers, utility rate caps, and movement politics.
Whether you’re new to Citizen Action or ready to deepen your involvement, this orientation will give you the foundation to take your next step as an engaged
Encourage a new member to join Citizen Action of Wisconsin.
Attend Media Event on 2027 state budget in Eau Claire, Monday, November 9th, 9am
Voters Did Their Job. Now Newly Elected Leaders Must Deliver for Wisconsin Families.
Western Wisconsin groups will thank local election workers for a smooth election and call on newly elected state leaders to work with regular people to deliver on data centers, public schools, healthcare, prison reform and other priorities
Members and leaders from Citizen Action of Wisconsin, GROWW (Grassroots Organizing Western Wisconsin), Wisconsin Public Education Network, and WISDOM and its local affiliate JONAH, will gather in front of the Eau Claire County Government Center Monday morning as county officials carry out the election certification process.
More than 2.6 million Wisconsinites cast their ballots by the time polls closed on Tuesday, November 3rd. Local leaders will thank election officials, poll workers, and volunteers who helped ensure voters across the state, from the Mississippi River to Milwaukee, could make their voices heard in a safe and orderly election, despite unprecedented threats of interference from the federal government.
But Election Day is not the finish line. It is a new beginning for the people of Wisconsin to demand the changes we need. Across Wisconsin, regular people are confronting the growing threat of hyperscale data centers, rising healthcare costs, underfunded public schools, and a political system where wealthy special interests wield more power and influence in Madison than the people who live here.
The groups will call on Wisconsin’s newly elected Governor and State Legislature to work with organized people across the state and take meaningful action on major priorities for Wisconsin people and families including:
- Fully Funding Wisconsin’s Public Schools so every child can receive a first-class education and communities can end the cycle of local funding referendums for basic operations.
- Dramatically expanding BadgerCare and opening it up to individuals and small employers as an accessible and affordable alternative to for-profit insurance.
- Ending Wisconsin’s state sales tax exemption for data centers so Wisconsin families aren’t forced to subsidize massive Big Tech corporations, and ensuring communities have meaningful protections and a real say before these projects move forward.
- Overhauling the prison system to improve public safety, close antiquated prisons, and invest in effective alternatives.
Local grassroots leaders will discuss the upcoming state budget process and the opportunity it gives Wisconsinites to organize around a fundamental question: Will our state government work for regular people, or will wealthy special interests continue to set the agenda?
The election gave Wisconsinites the power to choose who represents them. Now, residents will organize to make sure those leaders are accountable to the people who elected them and deliver the changes our communities need.
What: Press Conference on the smooth election and the next stage of the democratic process
Who: Citizen Action of Wisconsin, GROWW (Grassroots Organizing Western Wisconsin), Wisconsin Public Education Network, and WISDOM)When: Monday, November 9, 9 AM
Where: Outside Eau Claire County Government Center off Oxford Avenue. The address is: 721 Oxford Ave, Eau Claire, WI 54703
Enough is enough! PSC approves another outrageous rate hike to pay for data center energy.
On Thursday, Nov 5, the Public Service Commission approved a rate increase for We Energies customers. It’s the sixth increase since 2020.
The good news: pressure works. We Energies asked for about 14-15% more from residential customers over the next two years, roughly $13 more per month in 2027 and another $8-9 in 2028. The PSC approved less than that. It cut the utility’s profit rate and refused to make customers pay for We Energies’ board of directors expenses.
The bad news: bills are still going up in January. As Walnut Way put it, any increase hits hardest where families are already losing service. And WPS customers are still waiting on their own decision.
We can’t keep fighting these hikes one case at a time while utilities come back every two years for more. We need to change the rules.
That’s why Citizen Action of Wisconsin is calling for a 2% cap on utility rate increases. Families’ budgets have limits. Utility rate hikes should too.
👉 Sign on to support the 2% cap.
And if you or someone you know is struggling with bills, reach out. Utilities can’t disconnect residential heating service between Nov. 1 and April 15, and our organizers can help.
Read more:
WTMJ: “State regulators approve smaller rate hike for We Energies customers” (Nov. 6, 2026):
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: “Wisconsin regulators approve smaller We Energies electricity rate hike”:
Citizens Utility Board, “We Energies Rate Hike for 2027 and 2028.
Join union healthcare workers at protest of union-busting Rogers Behavioral Health, Thursday, November 12th, 5pm
Join healthcare workers for a protest outside of Rogers Behavioral Health’s annual ‘Celebrate the Light’ gala, Thursday, November 12th, 5pm. The Pfister Hotel, 424 East Wisconsin Ave, Milwaukee.
Workers at two Rogers Behavioral Health clinics in Wisconsin voted overwhelmingly to unionize earlier this year after management doubled their caseloads, stopped offering patients one-on-one therapy, and began using artificial intelligence to screen patients seeking care.
Instead of honoring the will of their employees, Rogers executives illegally fired six workers and are now refusing to begin contract negotiations, while trying to overturn the union election in West Allis, where workers voted 53-4 to unionize. The National Labor Relations Board has rejected every legal argument Rogers has put forward, yet Rogers executives continue to file appeals in an attempt to stall and break workers’ spirits.
Join Rogers workers, the Milwaukee Area Labor Council, and allies as we demonstrate outside Rogers’ annual gala to make it clear that Rogers needs to honor the will of its workers, who only want to deliver patients the care they deserve.
Learn more about the workers’ situation, listen to a recent Battleground Wisconsin Podcast, featuring fired RN, Kate Zolandz, who now is an organizer with the National Union of Healthcare Workers.
Attend Citizen Action’s Political Education on Our Issues Series: $20 Minimum Wage, Tuesday, November 17th, 6pm
There are 800,000 Wisconsin workers who make less than $20/hour, 30% of workers, and yet in every area of Wisconsin the living wage, the amount needed to afford the basics of life, is over $21 per hour for a single person!
Last September, Wisconsin State Legislators introduced a bill to raise the state’s minimum wage to $20/hour. The state bill would immediately start at $15 and raise to $20/hour by 2030, index to inflation, reduce the tip penalty and increase the tipped minimum wage, and restore local control on wage policy.
Learn more about the $20 Minimum Wage legislation and find out how you can get involved in our organizing to help pass the legislation in 2027.
Citizen Action in the News
Citizen Action’s Robert Kraig was on the Jeff Santos Show to debrief the aftermath of the blue wave nationally and here in Wisconsin.
Watch and Listen Here (@ 1 hour 35 minute mark of video).
The Jeff Santos show airs weekdays 2 to 5 PM statewide in Wisconsin on the Civic Media radio network.
Listen to“Populist wave drowns billionaire money” Battleground Wisconsin Podcast
We debrief this week’s historic blue wave that swept across the entire country and creates an unparalleled opportunity for progressive populist change that shifts power away from billionaires and the well-connected and produces real breakthroughs for everyday people. We cut through the media filter to get to the bottom of what the election really means for American democracy.
We discuss encouraging comments from Governor-elect David Crowley and Legislative leaders to immediately address pressing priorities like healthcare, including passing a BadgerCare Public Option in the state budget.
State Representative Angelina Cruz and union leader Peter Rickman, president of the MASH union, join us to talk about passing labor law reform and a $20 minimum wage in the first 6 months of a Crowley Administration to tangibly ease the affordability crisis by making work pay!
We discuss how progress will depend on average people getting off the sidelines and meaningfully participating in grassroots efforts to pass real substantive reforms opposed by the major lobbying interests who have dominated the Capitol for the last two decades.
Listen to the show!
Join our BadgerCare Public Option organizing, contact: Kristie.Tweed@citizenactionwi.org
Join our $20 minimum wage organizing, contact: Matt.Brusky@citizenactionwi.org
