Taxpayers have paid $100,000 for lawmakers’ travel

Vos took the most trips, spent $22,000 alone

MADISON - Taxpayers have spent six figures to send Assembly lawmakers on trips out of state since 2015, newly released records show.

The records reveal taxpayers covered trips to attend President Donald Trump’s first address to Congress, to tour a prison in Texas and to witness Paul Ryan being sworn in as House speaker.

Republicans — who control the state Assembly with 63 members — took 60 trips out of state, while Democrats (with 35 seats) took 24 trips in the past three years.

The records were released Thursday by Assembly Speaker Robin Vos (R-Rochester) at a time when Vos is under scrutiny for his own travel after former Ohio House Speaker Cliff Rosenberger resigned in April amid an FBI investigation into his travel.

Vos joined Rosenberger on some of those trips. He has said he has not been contacted by the FBI and is confident he has followed all ethics laws.

The records show Democrats and Republicans in the Wisconsin Assembly spent more than $102,000 in taxpayer funds on conference registration fees, meals and hotels, and on airfare or gasoline.

Democrats’ travel expenses totaled nearly $32,000 while Republicans spent more than $70,000. Receiving the payments were 29 Republicans and 17 Democrats.

Vos defended the taxpayer-funded travel, saying it was crucial for lawmakers to “facilitate bipartisan practices” when crafting legislation.

The majority of the expenses were to attend conferences held by the National Conference of State Legislatures — a group that, among other things, provides education and training for lawmakers.

“If we’re going to be paying dues, we should actually be sending people to meetings,” said Vos, who is vice president of the group.

While the bulk of lawmakers’ travel was to meetings of state government groups, two Republican lawmakers — Adam Jarchow of Balsam Lake and Terry Katsma of Oostburg — were reimbursed a combined $2,104 for attending a 2017 meeting of the Federalist Society, a national group for conservative lawyers that often gets involved in state Supreme Court races.

Supreme Court elections are officially nonpartisan but draw heavy spending from ideological groups.

Vos said lawmakers are prohibited from being reimbursed for expenses incurred at meetings of groups who participate in officially partisan elec-

tions.

Vos said his office limits the number of lawmakers who can attend any one conference and sets a fixed percentage of the total airfare costs that must be reimbursed by taxpayers.

“So we do it in a way that is as frugal as possible while we maximize the chance for them to get the interaction to learn from whatever conference they’re attending,” Vos said.

Of all Assembly lawmakers, Vos took the most trips — accounting for more than $22,000 worth of the expenses.

And Assembly Minority Leader Gordon Hintz of Oshkosh’s travels cost more than $3,700 over those years, the most of any Democrat, according to the figures.

Hintz did not respond to a request for an interview.

Vos and two other GOP lawmakers — Mike Rohrkaste of Neenah and Tyler Vorpagel of Plymouth — also took a state plane to Ohio in February 2017 to participate in a news conference with lawmakers from that state. That oneday trip, which has been previously reported, cost $4,300.

In addition to the taxpayer-funded travel, lawmakers sometimes take trips that are covered by outside groups. That has raised concerns from ethics watchdogs who say lawmakers could be unduly influenced by those funding their travel.

Last year, Wisconsin representatives and senators received more than $164,000 in travel and other perks from business groups, ideological organizations and nonpartisan entities, a USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin review found.

State Rep. Tyler August (R-Lake Geneva) took in the most, with nearly $24,000 of his expenses covered for trips to China, Australia and around the United States.

Scot Ross, executive director of liberal advocacy group One Wisconsin Now, criticized Vos for the percentage of the costs he alone incurred.

“Memo to Vos: The taxpayers of Wisconsin aren’t your personal travel agent,” Ross said.