In The Spotlight Blog

In the News: Blog 09/19/2013
GOP: Unite against Obamacare
What can be done about Obamacare? For the majority of Americans opposed to Obamacare, it is a sad fact that as long as President Barack Obama is in the White House and Majority Leader Harry Reid's Democrats control the Senate, repealing or defunding this monstrosity is next to impossible. Elections have consequences. The 2008 election gave ideologically extreme Democrats the White House, a House majority and a filibuster-proof Senate, which allowed Reid to jam through Obamacare the morning of Christmas Eve 2009. In 2012, Obama won another term and Reid maintained an iron grip on the Senate. That is a reality that cannot be ignored as strategies are developed to prevent Obamacare from taking firm or permanent root.
In the News: Blog 08/13/2013
Watertown Daily Times
Senator speaks to business roundtable By: David Brazy U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson says he is a man on a mission. That mission brought him to the Watertown Municipal Airport Monday afternoon to spread his message about what he has learned about the federal budget and convey that information to voters. The Republican senator from Wisconsin said a major component of the nation's economic and budgetary problems is not enough people understand the depth and cause of the problem. "From my standpoint, the root cause of our cultural and economic problems, by the way I think our cultural problems are driving our economic problems, is truthfully the size, scope, all the rules, all the regulations and all of the government's intrusions into our lives and the resulting cost and debt," Johnson said.
In the News: Blog 08/12/2013
The Wall Street Journal
With traditional avenues for negotiating budget deals collapsing on Capitol Hill, the White House is reaching out to a band of Senate Republicans who are mostly newcomers to the worn trenches of fiscal warfare. The group of eight Republicans has been meeting regularly with senior White House officials to hash over major fiscal issues as fall deadlines rapidly approach, including four times in the two weeks before Congress began its August recess. The group runs the gamut from former presidential nominee Sen. John McCain (R., Ariz.) to a freshman tea-party ally, Sen. Ron Johnson (R., Wis.), but is notably lacking in top-ranking party officials and budget experts who have been regular fixtures of past fiscal confrontations.
In the News: Blog 08/5/2013
New CRS Memo Shows HHS Secretary is the IPAB-of-One
Victims of Government 05/29/2013
Victims of Government: Catherine's Story
In the News: Blog 05/8/2013
UK Mail Online: U.S. State Department's top Libya security adviser: Benghazi decisions were made at the highest levels
The former Regional Security Officer in Tripoli during the months before the Benghazi terror attack that killed the U.S. ambassador told a congressional panel on Wednesday that the State Department's internal review of the diplomatic disaster unfairly let senior political appointees off the hook. Choking back tears, Eric Allan Nordstrom said the investigation into the terror attack, continued Wednesday during a House Oversight and Government Reform Committee hearing, 'matters to me personally, and it matters to my colleagues at the department of state.' 'It matters to the American public for whom we serve, and most importantly, it matters to the friends and family of Ambassador Stevens, Sean Smith, Glen Doherty and Tyrone Woods, who were murdered on September 11, 2012.'
In the News: Blog 04/21/2013
Juneau County Star Tribune: Mauston attorney named to judicial nominating panel
Mauston attorney William T. Curran was one of six named this week to the Wisconsin Federal Nominating Commission, which is charged with moving federal nominations forward, including vacant federal judgeships in Wisconsin. Curran was one of three attorneys tapped for the commission by Republican U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson, who worked with Democratic Sen. Tammy Baldwin, who named the other three members, to create the commission. “No reservations,” Curran said about accepting the invitation from Johnson. “I’ve done it before, so I know the drill.” The commission is charged with naming candidates for the U.S. District Court for the Eastern and Western districts of Wisconsin, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit and federal attorneys for the state’s Eastern and Western districts.
In the News: Blog 04/18/2013
CBS 21: Pennsylvania Senator says personal stories show the harm of big government
How big is too big? It’s a question one U.S. Senator is asking about the very place that employs him, the federal government. The Senator has devoted quite a bit of time and resources to show how some tax-payer funded agencies are costing some Americans nearly everything. “Meet Stephen Athrop and his family.” It’s the story of an Illinois resident who’s been fighting federal regulators for decades, after buying a piece of property, an old dump, which had caused the area major flooding. “Steve obtained the necessary permits,” Senator Ron Johnson of Wisconsin explains. “He then invested $100,000 and converted the dump into a lake.” Steve is also the center of a new video series put together by the office of Wisconsin Senator Ron Johnson. A program he calls victims of government.
In the News: Blog 04/17/2013
The Oshkosh Northwestern: Baldwin, Johnson agree on judicial appointments panel
Sens. Tammy Baldwin and Ron Johnson have agreed to establish a six-member commission to recommend candidates for filling federal judicial vacancies in Wisconsin. The Wisconsin Federal Nominating Commission will be responsible for advising the senators on nominees to serve on the U.S. District Court and the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. The panel also will consider candidates to serve as U.S. attorney for the eastern and western districts of the state. The senators chose three members each from the Wisconsin State Bar to serve on the commission. Baldwin appointed Michelle Behnke, a past president of the state bar; Frederic Fleishauer, a former Portage County circuit judge; and Barbara Zack Quindel, a labor lawyer. Johnson named William Curran, with Curran, Hollenbeck; Orton, S.C.; Richard Esenberg, president and general counsel at the Wisconsin Institute for Law; Liberty; and Paul Swanson, a partner in the Oshkosh firm of Steinhilber, Swanson, Mares, Marone & McDermott. Baldwin, D-Madison, who last November became the first woman from Wisconsin and first openly gay person to be elected to the Senate, said filling judicial vacancies has been a top priority since she was sworn in in January.
In the News: Blog 04/17/2013
State Bar of Wisconsin: Senators Baldwin and Johnson Announce Agreement on Moving Federal Nominations Forward
U.S. Senators Ron Johnson and Tammy Baldwin announced Wednesday that they have agreed to establish a Wisconsin Federal Nominating Commission to move federal nominations forw?ard, including vacant federal judge positions in Wisconsin. In a joint news release this afternoon, the senators announced that the Wisconsin Federal Nominating Commission will advise them on the nomination of individuals to fill the following vacancies: The United States District Court for the Eastern District and the Western District of Wisconsin, or such other districts as may be established in Wisconsin; The United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, which are appropriately considered Wisconsin seats; United States Attorneys for the Eastern and Western District of Wisconsin, or such other districts as may be established in Wisconsin.