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Friday, Sep 4, 2026

Did fewer than 10 Democrat-authored bills get a hearing in the 2025-26 legislative session?

Hope Karnopp / Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Wisconsin Watch
yes

Nine out of 446 bills with a Democrat as the first author got a hearing in the Wisconsin Legislature in the 2025-26 session.

The nonpartisan Legislative Reference Bureau provided statistics that confirmed most of the numbers in a social media post about the fate of bills introduced by Democrats, who are in the minority.

Nine Democratic-led bills got a public hearing, one of the first steps to becoming law. Those included enhancing perimenopause and menopause education, grants for AEDs in child care centers and free state park access for veterans and Gold Star families.

The LRB confirmed that no bills with a Democrat as the first author became law. That doesn’t take into account three laws where the Assembly or Senate version of the text passed, but a Democrat led the companion bill in the other chamber, such as a bipartisan law that expanded the missing child alerts system. 

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