Matt Rothschild Calls for Resignation of Chancellor Blank and UW System President Cross

Matt Rothschild calls for resignation of Chancellor Blank and
UW System President Cross in the face of Scott Walker and
the Republican Party's attacks on the UW System. From
For the Record Show with Neil Heinen (WISC -TV)

Matt Rothschild, Executive Director of the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign, is calling for UW-Madison Chancellor Rebecca M. Blank and UW System President Ray Cross to resign.

Said Rothschild in response to a question that UW faculty tenure and related faculty governance issues such as academic freedom can be protected by the UW System Board of Regents [dominated by politically vetted Scott Walker appointees]:

"I think it's hard to sift and winnow if you're a professor if you got the Board of Regents breathing down your back constantly. I was really kind of shocked and appalled that President Cross and Chancellor Blank didn't do do more to defend the University of Wisconsin System and tenure. Because when the decision came down from the Joint Finance Committee that they were to cut five/sixths of what they said they were going to cut, $250 million, and when they came down with, 'you know, we're going to get rid of tenure,' what did they get from the president and the chancellor? Statements of gratitude to the Joint Finance Committee! That was I think appalling to people who are in the University System, I actually think they should resign."

Rothschild made his comments on the For the Record Show with Neil Heinen, also to be televised on Sunday morning at 10:00 (WISC TV- Madison).

After Rothschild's call for the resignations, Heinen tried to make an argument that this unprecedented attack on the UW System by Scott Walker and the Wisconsin Republican Party's elected legislators was really bipartisan and begun under Walker's predecessor, Gov. Jim Doyle.

Rothschild will be making several appearances in the coming days including on Monday morning on the Joy Cardin Show on WPR at 7:30 talking about the Legislative Audit Bureau, and in La Crosse, speaking this coming Monday afternoon at 5:00 p.m. at the north end of Copeland Park about saving "democracy in Wisconsin."

Rothschild is also a former editor at the The Progressive Magazine based in Madison.

Walker is expected to sign the state budget in the coming days, and then announce his candidacy for the presidency in the coming weeks.