On March 16th, several of the most conservative Wisconsin legislators are traveling to Washington, D.C., where they will be feted and celebrated for their roles in stripping the collective bargaining rights of Wisconsin state workers, not to mention their backward-thinking cuts to education, the arts, safe drinking water programs, environmental protections, and Medicaid for the needy, elderly, and disabled of our state.
Apparently, someone thinks that these folks all deserve some money for their hard work destroying the working class, so the BGR Group is holding a fundraiser for them. The BGR Group describes itself as a bipartisan group that handles "lobbying, crisis management, and media relations." It was originally founded in part by Haley Barbour, so you might be able to guess at which way it tends to lean. The minimum donation for the event is $1000, but people willing to pay $2500 can be "sponsors", and a cool $5000 will earn you a title of "host". More details about the fundraiser and its sponsor are available at TPM.
So far the confirmed guests include Wisconsin Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald, his brother Assembly Leader Jeff Fitzgerald, State Senator Glenn Grothman (best known recently for calling all of the Wisconsin protestors "slobs"), State Senator and Joint Finance Committee co-chair Alberta Darling, Representative Robin Vos, and Representative Scott Suder. Every one of these Republicans voted to strip collective bargaining rights from Wisconsin workers, in spite of an overwhelming majority of Wisconsinites opposing the measure.
The event is at BGR Group Headquarters, 601 13th St., NW Washington, DC, from 5:00 P.M. to 9:00 P.M. on Wednesday, March 16, with protests planned from 5:00 to 7:30. I did find a Facebook page for this event that has further info. So far, 133 people have said they will be attending.
To anyone in the D.C. area who can get out there and protest, let's try to deter some potential Republicans donors from participating in this event and let these legislators know that we are all angry! We stand and fight as one in this battle.