GOP wants significant, divisive changes to previous bipartisan legislation (SB 200) which would have prevented any future backlog of sexual assault kits.

MADISON – Last week, Republicans introduced LRB-5536/1 which relates to sexual assault kits but made significant, divisive changes to previous legislation. There is already strong, bipartisan support for SB 200, which would prevent any future backlog of sexual assault kits by standardizing the processing and storage of kits and create a tracking system for survivors to monitor the progress of their kits.

This legislation was the product of months of stakeholder engagement and input from law enforcement and experts at the Department of Justice. This legislation passed the Senate unanimously and has 66 co-sponsors in the Assembly. Assembly Democratic Leader Gordon Hintz (D-Oshkosh) released the following statement about this partisan, Republican tactic:

“Republicans are choosing to politicize what should be a straightforward, bipartisan bill. This issue impacts real people in a serious way. Playing these political games does a disservice to victims and the law enforcement professionals who work on their cases. We already have a bill that does what needs to be done to address the backlog of sexual assault kits and ensure efficient testing moving forward. This is more of the same cynical politics from Robin Vos and Wisconsin Republicans, and the people of our state deserve better.”