Republicans who control the Wisconsin Senate voted Tuesday to fire the state's utility regulator, citing his support for setting energy rates based on customers' ability to pay and opening up the solar energy sector. .
The Senate voted 21-11 to confirm Public Service Commissioner Tyler Huebner. Democratic Gov. Tony Evers appointed him to the commission in March 2020 and again in March 2021. Huebner previously served as executive director of RENEW Wisconsin, a nonprofit organization that advocates for renewable energy.
He is the latest in a string of gubernatorial appointees removed by the Senate over the past five years following dissatisfaction with Republican lawmakers under the Evers administration. Democratic Sen. Brad Pfaff, who served as Evers' agriculture secretary until the Senate fired him in 2019, argued that Huebner is one of the brightest minds in renewable energy, a Republican. accused of trying to cripple the state government.
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Refusing to confirm Mr. Huebner is “not something to be proud of on base,” Pfaff said. “It sends a signal that it doesn't matter what your background is. It doesn't matter your qualifications, it doesn't matter your hard work… What matters is the political party, who appointed you.”
Republican Sen. Julian Bradley, a member of the Senate Public Works Committee, said the vote was not political, noting that the Senate has confirmed many of Evers' appointments since the governor took office. He pointed out that The Senate voted 27-5 on Tuesday to confirm Summer Strand, who Evers appointed in March 2023 after Huebner was fired.
Bradley said on the Senate floor that Huebner supports setting energy rates based on a customer's ability to pay rather than usage, a concept known as income-based pricing. State law doesn't allow the PSC to take that approach, Bradley said, but Huebner insists it does. The senator called it activism.
Republican Sen. Van Wangard, the other member of the Senate Public Utilities Committee, said in a statement after the vote that Mr. He said Republicans are also upset that the law passed allowing them to be leased. Your utility may charge you a fee. Utilities generally oppose such agreements, and Wangard said Congress has not approved them.
Democratic Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers waits to speak at the virtual Democratic National Convention on August 19, 2020 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. (Melina Mara – Pool/Getty Images)
He added that in 2021, the PSC ordered utilities to provide data on workplace diversity in their annual reports without any authority, and that Hübner was evasive during the meeting.
Huebner said in a statement that he was proud of the decisions he made to “balance safety, reliability, and affordability.”
Evers issued a statement saying the vote “defies legitimacy and logic.”
“We're talking about qualified, hard-working Wisconsinites,” Evers said. “They should be celebrated for their accomplishments and experiences, not bullied, vilified or fired simply for doing their job.”
Meanwhile, Evers on Tuesday appointed Christy Nieto, administrator of the commission's Energy Regulatory Analysis Division, to replace Chairwoman Rebecca Valk, who announced earlier this month that she planned to retire in early February. did. Evers first appointed Valk in 2019.
All of these changes will leave one vacancy on the three-member commission heading into the spring.
Senate Republicans have voted to deny confirmation of multiple appointees since 2019, starting with Pfaff's rejection.
Last September, he voted to veto Wisconsin Elections Commissioner Megan Wolf, but Attorney General Josh Kaul won a court ruling that invalidated the veto.
In October, Republicans rejected eight more Evers appointees, including Joseph Czarneski, a Democratic member of the Board of Elections, who abstained from voting on whether Wolf should be reappointed. The move stalled, preventing Wolf's reappointment from legally reaching the Senate and angering Republicans who have vowed to remove him.
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Also among the eight appointees who lost their jobs were four members of the state Department of Natural Resources board. They drew the ire of Republicans by hedging whether a new wolf management plan should include strict population limits.
