Editor’s note: The following statement was released Wednesday for publication by State Rep. Scott Johnson.

Rep. Scott Johnson, R-Jefferson, of the 33rd Assembly District gave the following statement in response to the actions taken by Gov. Tony Evers on Wednesday. 

Our budget included a tax plan that reduced income taxes by $3.5 billion over the biennium, targeted at the middle brackets. Gov. Evers gutted this tax plan, all but eliminating income tax relief on Wisconsin families from this budget. 

By the stroke of his pen, the governor vetoed the third bracket, which means those with truly middle-class incomes will see hardly any reductions in their tax bill. Families making $50,000 per year, struggling to make ends meet due to the record-high inflation of the past few years, will now receive practically no tax relief. 

The Governor and his staff couldn’t stop there though. He unilaterally went on to increase property taxes to pay for his outrageous 400 yearlong increase to public school aid. 

Do we need tax cuts? Yes. Do we need funding for our public schools? Absolutely. What has been done to the budget through the line-item veto just frankly is not sustainable, and certainly is not practical. 

These actions taken by Gov. Evers are extremely disappointing, because I know how much went into drafting this budget. I am a Republican legislator who wants to work with the other side, but when things like this occur, it really makes it tough to do so. And in the end, the people who are hurt the most are not us in the Capitol, it’s you, the taxpayer. 

The 33rd Assembly District, represented by Scott Johnson, R-Jefferson, includes the communities, in part or full, of Fort Atkinson, Jefferson, Milton, Helenville, Hebron, Sullivan, Oakland and Palmyra. A portion of the city of Whitewater, which resides in Jefferson County, also is included.