Wisconsin Rep. Joe Parisi, center, D-Madison, Friday, cheers on the crowd on the fourth day of large scale protests at the State Capitol in Madison, Wis., Friday, Feb. 18, 2011. Union members, students and others have been protesting the governor’s bill to eliminate collective bargaining rights for many state workers. The Wisconsin State Patrol was dispatched Friday to find a Democratic state senator who fled the Capitol to delay the near-certain passage of a bill to end a half-century of collective bargaining rights for public workers, a measure that’s attracted thousands of protesters for four days. (AP Photo/Andy Manis)MADISON, Wis. (AP) – The Wisconsin State Patrol was dispatched Friday to find a Democratic state senator who fled the Capitol to delay the near-certain passage of a bill to end a half-century of collective bargaining rights for public workers, a measure that’s attracted thousands of protesters for four days.
With Democrats saying they won’t return before Saturday, it was unclear when the Senate would be able to begin debating Gov. Scott Walker’s measure meant to ease the state’s budget woes. Democrats who disappeared Thursday at first kept their whereabouts secret, then started to emerge to give interviews and fan the protests.
Senate Republicans convened briefly Friday morning to renew a call to find the Democrats, then recessed. Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald, R-Juneau, told reporters he has asked the governor to send two state troopers to Senate Democratic Minority Leader Mark Miller’s suburban Madison home. He said he believes Miller may be there – he did not elaborate on why he thought that – and Walker agreed to dispatch the officers.
Early Friday, an Associated Press reporter went to Miller’s home in Monona, but no one answered the door. In an interview on ABC’s “Good Morning America,” Miller said the Democrats “had left the state so we were out of reach of the Wisconsin State Patrol.”
The Wisconsin Constitution prohibits police from arresting state lawmakers while the Legislature is in session, except in cases of felonies, breaches of the peace or treason. Fitzgerald said he’s not looking to have Miller arrested, but he wants to send a signal about how serious things are becoming in the Capitol.