Vos: It'd be 'stupid' to nominate Trump for president; speaker also offers new thoughts on abortion, shared revenue
MILWAUKEE (CBS 58) -- Wisconsin's top Republican lawmaker slammed the idea of Donald Trump becoming the party's presidential nominee next summer.
While Assembly Speaker Robin Vos and Trump have been exchanging insults since last summer, Vos offered his harshest criticism yet of the former president during question-and-answer segment hosted by the Milwaukee Press Club Friday.
Vos said he believed any other Republican candidate would have a better chance of defeating President Joe Biden in 2024.
"I do not want to nominate losers, and that is exactly what I believe will occur if Donald Trump is the nominee," Vos said. "Why would Republicans pick the one person Joe Biden can beat? That is stupid."
The feud stems from Trump's call for Vos to try overturning the state's 2020 presidential election results, something the legislature's own lawyers said would've been illegal. Trump remained angry with Vos, even after the speaker spent more than $1 million in taxpayer money to investigate Trump's baseless claims of widespread election fraud.
That investigation ended with Vos' handpicked investigator, former state Supreme Court Justice Michael Gableman, siding with Trump and endorsing Vos' primary opponent, Adam Steen, last summer. After Vos won that Assembly primary race, he fired Gableman.
During Friday's event, Vos said he regretted hiring Gableman.
"Why would Republicans pick the one person Joe Biden can beat? That is stupid."
— A.J. Bayatpour (@AJBayatpour) May 5, 2023
Here's the full @SpeakerVos answer to a question about Donald Trump possibly being nominated again as the GOP presidential candidate next summer in Milwaukee. pic.twitter.com/0UoxIEN7gI
Looking ahead to next year's presidential race, Vos named Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin, former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis as better Republican options than Trump.
"Which one is the most articulate spokesperson to take on Joe Biden?" Vos said. "And we don't somehow discount all those people because one very loud person wants another chance to lose."
Call for abortion compromise
Vos said he wanted to revisit the state's 1849 law banning abortion, which only makes exceptions for cases when a mother's life is at risk. Democratic Attorney General Josh Kaul has filed a lawsuit arguing the ban can no longer be enforced; arguments in that case began this week in Madison.
Vos called for Democrats to work with GOP legislative leaders on drafting a new abortion ban bill. He accused Democrats and Governor Tony Evers of instead banking on the state supreme court, with a new liberal majority, overturning the ban.
"It takes people on both sides wanting to do it," Vos said. "The Democrats don't even want to engage, at all, because they are so convinced they can just get a court decision that fixes it for them."
State Sen. Kelda Roys (D-Madison) said if the result of any bipartisan talks was a bill criminalizing abortion, then there could be no compromise.
"Because I don't think abortion should be banned," Roys said. "I think it should be legal and available to anyone who needs it."
Vos said he personally supported a "heartbeat bill." According to the Mayo Clinic, during the fifth week of a pregnancy, the heart and circulatory system begin to form in an embryo that consists of three layers of cells.
Vos acknowledged such a bill would never be signed by Evers. He suggested instead pursuing a 12-14 abortion ban. Under former Governor Scott Walker, Republicans enacted a 20-week abortion ban in 2015, when federal abortion rights were largely protected under Roe v. Wade.
Arrest quotas out of shared revenue bill, but Vos not budging on final sales tax vote
Vos accused Evers of acting in "bad form" Thursday when the governor released a video saying he will veto the current Republican bill revamping the state's system for funding local governments.
Evers said the bill needed to include more money than the $527 million increase currently proposed. He also called on Republicans to remove a number of policy requirements cities and counties -- especially Milwaukee -- would have to meet in order to access the additional dollars.
Vos blasted Evers for not offering more specifics about which provisions he wanted out of the bill. Vos said he was disappointed by Evers' statement because the governor's staff met Wednesday with staff members for Vos and Senate Majority Leader Devin LeMahieu. Evers' spokesperson did not respond to questions Friday afternoon.
"You come out and put this blanket statement out with no details," Vos said. "Having just negotiated, or at least tried to do it to say, 'here's our concerns,' I don't know where we are on a lot of these things."
Vos said he was willing to take out the language in one part of the bill; it included police arrest and ticket quotas as one way local governments could avoid a 15% funding cut.
CBS 58 first reported Wednesday local officials had concerns about the quotas being listed among acceptable criteria for proving they maintained police and fire support.
The other options were maintaining the amount of money spent on police and fire or maintaining staffing levels in those departments. Under the bill, communities had to reach two of those four options.
"If we take [arrests and tickets] out to say you only have to do one of these two things [staffing or funding], that's fine," Vos said.
Vos, however, stood by the bill's requirement for Milwaukee and Milwaukee County to get voters' blessings in order to impose new local sales taxes. Those dollars would be limited to paying off pension debt and public safety measures.
Milwaukee Mayor Cavalier Johnson, as well as the region's chamber of commerce, have called on Republicans to instead give those votes to the Milwaukee Common Council and Milwaukee County Board.
Vos said he disagreed with the idea it was hypocritical of him to support voters having the final say on a Milwaukee sales tax while opposing efforts to hold a statewide referendum on the state's abortion ban.
"If you want to enact a brand new tax that's never been done before, I can't imagine not doing it in a referendum," Vos said.