Allies Have Doubts About Protesters in Wisconsin
By MONICA DAVEY
MADISON, Wis. — They wander the marble halls, day after day, hollering at passing lawmakers. They have turned up in committee meetings wearing peculiar masks. They are occasionally carried away by the police for filming official proceedings (not allowed in the chamber galleries) and for holding small signs (also barred in the galleries) quoting from documents like the Constitution. One is accused of pouring a beer over the head of a Republican leader, the co-chairman of the joint finance committee.
They are the hardy handful, the last remnants of the tens of thousands of protesters who packed the square around the Capitol here earlier this year, fuming at the state’s Republican leadership and its cuts to collective bargaining rights for public-sector unions. The rest went home long ago.
As Wisconsin braces for a new chapter in its political war — a major recall effort against Gov. Scott Walker, a Republican, will begin statewide on Tuesday — some leaders here, even Democrats, have come to wonder whether the lingering protesters at the Capitol are still helping the efforts or harming them.
“We certainly defend their First Amendment rights, but it does become counterproductive at some point,” said Graeme Zielinski, a spokesman for the state Democratic Party, who described some of the remaining protesters’ tactics as abhorrent. “Are there questions about what the administration has done to the Capitol? Of course. But there are ways to raise those without dumping beer. It starts to alienate the public at large.”
For weeks in February and March, the numbers swelled outside this Capitol. Tens of thousands of protesters — and protesters of the protesters — marched around Capitol Square and filled the building’s rotunda, chanting, shouting and singing in response to Mr. Walker’s plan to cut collective bargaining rights and workers’ benefits in order to help solve the state’s budget problems.
Madison, the home of the University of Wisconsin, had long been viewed as a liberal-leaning bastion of protester types, but these demonstrations drew people from all over Wisconsin and other states. Some have described the protests here as an early catalyst that, later in the year, helped inspire the Occupy movement.
Once the state’s Republican leaders, who took control of the Legislature in the 2010 election, approved Mr. Walker’s measures in March, many of the protesters left and the national spotlight seemed to turn away. A group — 50 to 150 people — still turn up for a daily “Solidarity Singalong” in the rotunda, in which homemade anti-Walker tunes (like “Roll Out the Recall”) have grown increasingly polished and layered with harmony as the singers this month surpassed their 200th day of performing.
But a smaller group of protesters has kept a more constant vigil at the Capitol, returning nearly every day that the lawmakers are in session.
Sometimes they break into chants in the halls: “Recall Walker! Recall Walker!” Other times, they spread out their laptops and files on the floor to confer about the next plan. They watch for passing officials, and call out to them.
“Can I ask you to consider leaving the Republican Party?” Miles Kristan, 26, called down on a recent afternoon from the rotunda’s overlook. “Hey! Will you leave the Republican Party?” (This lawmaker took care to not look up.)
Later, as David Prosser, a State Supreme Court justice walked by, another in the group shouted, “Choke me! Choke me!” alluding to an incident in which some of the justices, in discussions over the collective bargaining law, had a physical altercation with one another.
Republican leaders here — long the central targets of dissent — have become so familiar with the remaining protesters that they have devised nicknames for some.
“There are some still running around the Capitol that are, I guess, more agitators than anything,” said Scott Fitzgerald, the Republican leader in the State Senate who has been a strong advocate of Mr. Walker’s agenda. “It’s hurting them now. It’s kind of changed. And actually because some of them have developed their own profiles; it’s almost a joke.”
The protesters — some of whom have received citations accusing them of disorderly conduct, obstructing or resisting a law enforcement officer, or other prohibited conduct — see little humor in their cause. They say their goal is to remove Mr. Walker and others from office. They object to what they consider the absurd, arbitrary and unconstitutional inconsistencies of restrictions in the state building: Under a recently approved law, people can carry concealed weapons into the Capitol, but under the rules of the chambers, they cannot carry signs (even little ones taped to their shirts) into the galleries or silently shoot video from there.
“This is done out of passion,” said Jeremy Ryan, 23, often seen around the Capitol on a Segway, who added that he had probably received the most citations from the authorities.
And while some Democrats voiced strong support for the protesters and for relaxing some of the quirky rules of the chambers, tensions have clearly grown over many months. Some Democrats who once defended protesters in the Capitol now quietly shy away from them. Even within the ranks of the protesters, there have been disagreements about tactics: what is going too far and what is not? And among Democratic leaders, much of their focus has turned from the Capitol and toward the drive to recall Mr. Walker, an effort that will require gathering 540,000 signatures all over the state in 60 days. Other recall efforts — of as many as 17 state senators — are also possible, as partisan leaders try to gain control of that chamber, now held by Republicans by a 17-to-16 majority.
“The Democratic Party of Wisconsin has completely turned their backs on the protesters,” said Mr. Kristan, who faces a disorderly conduct citation stemming from a September incident in which a Miller High Life beer was poured over the head of State Representative Robin Vos in a Capitol Square bar. (Mr. Kristan said he would neither admit nor deny involvement; the case is to be heard in court next month.)
“They have done everything they can to move people’s focus away from protesting to voting,” Mr. Kristan said of the state Democratic Party. “They’re afraid that once we recall Walker, we might want to recall Democratic politicians too.”
C. J. Terrell, 23, who said he lost his job at a pizza parlor when the demonstrations began in February and now protests full time, said those whose interests were most aligned with the protesters had done little to support them. “Yes, we’re tired of Republicans,” he said. “But we’re also tired of Democrats. And the unions.”
“Senator!” one of the protesters called out to a passer-by. “Senator!”
Jim Holperin, a Senate Democrat from up north who in February had fled the state to try to bar a vote on the collective bargaining cuts and who then survived a recall effort by Republicans this summer, looked up, gestured a hello, and kept walking.
They are the hardy handful, the last remnants of the tens of thousands of protesters who packed the square around the Capitol here earlier this year, fuming at the state’s Republican leadership and its cuts to collective bargaining rights for public-sector unions. The rest went home long ago.
As Wisconsin braces for a new chapter in its political war — a major recall effort against Gov. Scott Walker, a Republican, will begin statewide on Tuesday — some leaders here, even Democrats, have come to wonder whether the lingering protesters at the Capitol are still helping the efforts or harming them.
“We certainly defend their First Amendment rights, but it does become counterproductive at some point,” said Graeme Zielinski, a spokesman for the state Democratic Party, who described some of the remaining protesters’ tactics as abhorrent. “Are there questions about what the administration has done to the Capitol? Of course. But there are ways to raise those without dumping beer. It starts to alienate the public at large.”
For weeks in February and March, the numbers swelled outside this Capitol. Tens of thousands of protesters — and protesters of the protesters — marched around Capitol Square and filled the building’s rotunda, chanting, shouting and singing in response to Mr. Walker’s plan to cut collective bargaining rights and workers’ benefits in order to help solve the state’s budget problems.
Madison, the home of the University of Wisconsin, had long been viewed as a liberal-leaning bastion of protester types, but these demonstrations drew people from all over Wisconsin and other states. Some have described the protests here as an early catalyst that, later in the year, helped inspire the Occupy movement.
Once the state’s Republican leaders, who took control of the Legislature in the 2010 election, approved Mr. Walker’s measures in March, many of the protesters left and the national spotlight seemed to turn away. A group — 50 to 150 people — still turn up for a daily “Solidarity Singalong” in the rotunda, in which homemade anti-Walker tunes (like “Roll Out the Recall”) have grown increasingly polished and layered with harmony as the singers this month surpassed their 200th day of performing.
But a smaller group of protesters has kept a more constant vigil at the Capitol, returning nearly every day that the lawmakers are in session.
Sometimes they break into chants in the halls: “Recall Walker! Recall Walker!” Other times, they spread out their laptops and files on the floor to confer about the next plan. They watch for passing officials, and call out to them.
“Can I ask you to consider leaving the Republican Party?” Miles Kristan, 26, called down on a recent afternoon from the rotunda’s overlook. “Hey! Will you leave the Republican Party?” (This lawmaker took care to not look up.)
Later, as David Prosser, a State Supreme Court justice walked by, another in the group shouted, “Choke me! Choke me!” alluding to an incident in which some of the justices, in discussions over the collective bargaining law, had a physical altercation with one another.
Republican leaders here — long the central targets of dissent — have become so familiar with the remaining protesters that they have devised nicknames for some.
“There are some still running around the Capitol that are, I guess, more agitators than anything,” said Scott Fitzgerald, the Republican leader in the State Senate who has been a strong advocate of Mr. Walker’s agenda. “It’s hurting them now. It’s kind of changed. And actually because some of them have developed their own profiles; it’s almost a joke.”
The protesters — some of whom have received citations accusing them of disorderly conduct, obstructing or resisting a law enforcement officer, or other prohibited conduct — see little humor in their cause. They say their goal is to remove Mr. Walker and others from office. They object to what they consider the absurd, arbitrary and unconstitutional inconsistencies of restrictions in the state building: Under a recently approved law, people can carry concealed weapons into the Capitol, but under the rules of the chambers, they cannot carry signs (even little ones taped to their shirts) into the galleries or silently shoot video from there.
“This is done out of passion,” said Jeremy Ryan, 23, often seen around the Capitol on a Segway, who added that he had probably received the most citations from the authorities.
And while some Democrats voiced strong support for the protesters and for relaxing some of the quirky rules of the chambers, tensions have clearly grown over many months. Some Democrats who once defended protesters in the Capitol now quietly shy away from them. Even within the ranks of the protesters, there have been disagreements about tactics: what is going too far and what is not? And among Democratic leaders, much of their focus has turned from the Capitol and toward the drive to recall Mr. Walker, an effort that will require gathering 540,000 signatures all over the state in 60 days. Other recall efforts — of as many as 17 state senators — are also possible, as partisan leaders try to gain control of that chamber, now held by Republicans by a 17-to-16 majority.
“The Democratic Party of Wisconsin has completely turned their backs on the protesters,” said Mr. Kristan, who faces a disorderly conduct citation stemming from a September incident in which a Miller High Life beer was poured over the head of State Representative Robin Vos in a Capitol Square bar. (Mr. Kristan said he would neither admit nor deny involvement; the case is to be heard in court next month.)
“They have done everything they can to move people’s focus away from protesting to voting,” Mr. Kristan said of the state Democratic Party. “They’re afraid that once we recall Walker, we might want to recall Democratic politicians too.”
C. J. Terrell, 23, who said he lost his job at a pizza parlor when the demonstrations began in February and now protests full time, said those whose interests were most aligned with the protesters had done little to support them. “Yes, we’re tired of Republicans,” he said. “But we’re also tired of Democrats. And the unions.”
“Senator!” one of the protesters called out to a passer-by. “Senator!”
Jim Holperin, a Senate Democrat from up north who in February had fled the state to try to bar a vote on the collective bargaining cuts and who then survived a recall effort by Republicans this summer, looked up, gestured a hello, and kept walking.
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