Wisconsin state Senate Republicans yesterday turned up the heat on runaway Democrats, authorizing a $100 fine for every day they stay out of the state to block a vote on an anti-union budget bill.
Republicans approved the measure with none of the senate’s 14 Democrats present. The missing lawmakers left the state nearly two weeks ago to stall a bill that would sharply reduce the collective-bargaining power of Wisconsin’s municipal unions.
Republicans have already stopped direct deposits on the Democrats’ paychecks, and denied their staffs access to copy machines.
A day earlier, the standoff grew tense when angry protesters, locked outside the Capitol, surrounded Republican state Sen. Glenn Grothman, one of the bill’s most vocal backers.
They finally cleared a path when a Democratic House member came to his rescue and quieted the crowd.