Vos and Fitz throw garbage on unemployment to damage Evers, help corporates

As unemployment claims continue to pile up in Wisconsin (both paid and unpaid), Assembly Speaker Robbin' Vos and Senate GOP Leader Scott Fitzgerald sent a letter to Governor Evers asking that the state's employers not have to pay higher taxes for unemployment benefits before they have to.

Act 185, signed into law on April 15, included a provision that required UI claims specifically related to the COVID-19 emergency not be charged to a contribution employer’s UI account for the remainder of 2020. Instead, the law required that these claims be charged to the balancing account, which is supported by interest on the UI Trust Fund and the solvency tax paid by employers. The purpose of this provision was to attempt to mitigate the huge tax increases that employers most impacted by the COVID-19 crisis would see as a result of the normal June 30 calculation. The employers who would see the largest tax hikes are the same employers whose businesses have been severely impacted and may struggle to keep their doors open even as the state begins reopening.

I don't have a lot of sympathy for the "hard-pressed" Wisconsin corporations who have been given tax break after tax break from Vos and Fitz for the last 9 years, but let's go to the summary of Act 185 (aka Wisconsin's "how Wisconsin chose to deal with CARES money and other COVID relief") and see what they're talking about.

Provide that if a claim or plan is related to a [Public Health Emergency], regular benefits for that claim for weeks occurring after March 12, 2020, and before December 31, 2020, not be charged to an employer as normally provided. Instead, under the provision, UI benefits for those weeks would be charged to either: (a) the balancing account of the UI trust fund, for claims attributable to contribution employers subject to regular unemployment payroll taxes; or (b) DWD's existing interest and penalties account,for claims attributable to reimbursable employers that are not subject to contribution requirements...

Require the Secretary of DWD, to the extent permitted under federal law, to seek advances to the state's UI trust fund from the federal government so as to allow Schedule D, the lowest unemployment tax rate schedule, to remain in effect through the end of calendar year 2021.

Under current law, some UI benefit payments are not charged to a specific employer but are instead charged to the balancing account. The state's UI balancing account is supported by the solvency tax paid by contribution employers and any interest earned on the state's UI trust fund balance. There are seven basic categories of benefit payments charged to the balancing account: 10% write-offs, quits, misconduct, substantial fault, continued employment, approved training, and second benefit year. In the past, there have been other benefit programs that have been charged to the balancing account, including in 2002 when state temporary supplemental benefits were charged to the account.

Reimbursable employers, including almost all governmental units and certain nonprofit organizations, finance unemployment claims on a reimbursement basis as they are filed by employees. The provision would make payment for such claims from a separate appropriation under DWD funded by certain UI interest and penalty revenues, if claims are determined to be related to the public health emergency.

Gee, now I know what else Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce was lobbying about beyond trying to keep first responders from getting workers comp if they caught COVID-19. Trying to move money around to allow their low tax rate for unemployment to last for another year, using interest gained from a UI fund balance that was inflated due to previous Walker/WisGOP moves to keep people from getting their benefits.

Walker instituted a series of changes that made it harder to apply for benefits, similar to Florida, by making the application process unnecessarily cumbersome, including longer applications and online applications that didn't functional well 3/ pic.twitter.com/aOzGpD8bmC

— Pam Herd (@pamela_herd) May 23, 2020

But it was this part of Vos and Fitz's "letter" that got me boiling.

It is our understanding that the Department of Workforce Development (DWD) has chosen not to follow these provisions of Act 185. To date, the Department has not submitted rules or even a scope statement for rules to address these changes in the law. As a result of DWD’s decision not to follow the law, impacted employers will now face the huge tax increase the legislation sought to avoid when the June 30 calculation is made.

So Vos and Fitz are giving the "some are saying" routine, claiming that DWD is not following this law without offering any documented proof that they are failing to do so. Fellow State Rep/Tub of Goo Scott Krug was pulling the same "people are telling me" routine today.

Businesses started calling last week about DWD charging their unemployment accts for claims related to the shutdown. Their future rates are also increasing. @GovEvers signed the bill, needs to enforce it. It’s ridiculous to hold employers responsible for a gov’t ordered shutdown. https://t.co/MjUNqWJj5q

— Scott Krug (@skrug75) May 28, 2020

Name the names of these companies, and show me the documents where DWD is giving this guidance. Or am I going to assume these WisGOPs are lying. I know the GOP is growing desperate as Trump falls further and further behind, but I wasn't counting on them going to the "outright lying" part of the campaign in late May.

Their statements should be viewed as talking points for GOP spokespeople to repeat on AM radio, in the hopes that "legitimate" Wisconsin media will then amplify their lie as they chase down the (non-)story (I see Fox 6 in Milwaukee has already fallen for it). It's right out of the Trump/Fox News playbook.

Let's be clear where we're at these days. The GOP president caused the mass unemployment by botching the response to COVID-19, leading to large-scale sickness, deaths, and business shutdowns. The WisGOP Legislature and the race-baiting GOP ex-Governor Walker put these barriers to receiving unemployment in place.

The deflection game and constant whining of WisGOP on unemployment has to be smashed back against, and I am fucking tired of these cynical, small-time grifters who clearly have no plan beyond complaining, and refuse to take any responsibility to clean up the problems they caused.