Citizen Action Weekend ’26 Newsletter, Happy 4th of July
Happy July 4th Weekend!
Work for Citizen Action of Wisconsin
Join Citizen Action of Wisconsin
Citizen Action Statewide Healthcare Action Team Update.
Join Our Healthcare All Team Meeting – July 14 on Zoom
6:30–7:00 PM – BadgerCare Public Option Campaign Refresher
New to the campaign? A coalition partner? Or just looking for a refresher? Join us for a review of the BadgerCare Public Option Strategic Campaign and our next steps to win.
7:00 PM – 8 PM Phase 2 Deep Dive & Mass Listening Training
At 7:00 PM, everyone is invited to join us for a deeper dive into Phase 2 of our BadgerCare Public Option campaign. We’ll also kick off training for our Mass Listening Summer Program, which will help us have meaningful conversations with community members, listen to healthcare stories, and build the relationships and power we’ll need heading into the election season.
Whether you’ve been involved from the beginning or are just getting started, this meeting is a great opportunity to learn, connect with organizers from across Wisconsin, and help win the fight for affordable healthcare in WI.
Citizen Action Driftless Region Update
What a day at Viroqua Pride. We were thrilled to be joined at our table by State Representative Tara Johnson and former Viroqua City Council member Emma Hood, and we had the pleasure of meeting Amer, whose husband was an organizer for Citizen Action New York. The connections we make at events like this are exactly why we show up.
We also rolled out our listening tour, asking community members directly about the affordability issues hitting them hardest. The responses have been powerful and will shape our work in the weeks ahead.
Speaking of which, we are ramping up. In the coming weeks, we will be running door canvassing and phone banking events to reach more neighbors in the Driftless region and hear more of their stories. Stay tuned for dates and ways to get involved.
Finally, happy 250th Fourth of July to everyone across the Driftless. Be safe, enjoy the holiday, and we will see you out there soon.
To get in touch and discuss how you can get involved, contact: Aron.Newberry@citizenactionwi.org
Attend Progress for the People Town Hall in Racine, July 8th, 6pm
Next Wednesday, July 8, the Progress for the People Town Hall is coming to Racine.
Join U.S. Reps. Gwen Moore, Mark Pocan, Jim McGovern, Pramila Jayapal, and Delia Ramirez, for a conversation about how Republican policies are raising costs, cutting health care and food assistance, and handing tax breaks to billionaires and big corporations — and what we can do about it.
Doors: 5:15 PM | Program: 6:00 PM
Racine Memorial Hall
72 7th Street, Racine
ADA accessible | Spanish-English & ASL interpretation available | Family friendly
Citizen Action’s State Legislative Candidate endorsements for Fall Primary Election.
Wisconsin’s primary election is just around the corner – August 11th will be here faster than you think, and we want to make sure Wisconsinites know about the candidates that are on that primary ballot! We will have more endorsements for both the primary and the general in the coming months, but are especially excited about these five champions running for office.
Listen to “Organizing the democracy we need the next 250 years” Battleground Wisconsin Podcast
Robert gives us the 250th July 4th Tick Report, nature’s revenge for climate change. This week’s report includes a menacing headline from the Boston Globe, There’s a terrifying uptick in tick-borne illnesses. We educate our listeners on the dangerous and deadly tick-borne disease, the Powassan virus, which transmits in 15 minutes and can include fever, headache, vomiting and weakness. Severe cases can bring brain inflammation, loss of coordination, difficulty speaking, seizures or lasting neurological damage. Ticks and the current heat wave are climate change induced. We discuss new research saying Wisconsin is 2.9 degrees warmer than 1970.
We picked up on a story Battleground Wisconsin covered in June, that Democratic-lead states sued the Trump Regime on Medicaid “medically frail” exemption for work requirements. Now, many states and health policy experts say surprise Trump regime regulations are unworkable. Despite the outcry, crickets from Wisconsin’s Department of Health Services.
So-called “targeted enforcement” keeps the Trump/Miller assault on rights of immigrants out of national headlines (and politics) but continues under the radar. In recent weeks ICE has amped up operations in Milwaukee arresting many with no criminal records. Masked agents and violent arrests traumatize families in Milwaukee. ICE also is refusing to follow Milwaukee’s mask ban for all law enforcement officers.
We take a dive into the final Supreme Court decisions before the justices go on their long summer hiatus. While immigrants’ rights advocates celebrated the birthright citizenship ruling by the US Supreme Court, it is outrageous that it was a 6-3 decision (really, 5-4 on the constitutional question) and not 9-0. Also, SCOTUS further deregulated big campaign cash (modeled on Wisconsin’s law) further elevating the “rights” of the wealthy and well-connected over everyone else.
We are joined by Kate Zolandz, an organizer with the National Union of Healthcare Workers, who was fired by the sleazy Rogers Behavioral Health. She tells us about the workers successful organizing drive that has resulted in Rogers firing workers and targeting the licenses of staff fired after union vote. The union has started a new website with more details.
Listen to the show.
