(The Center Square) – The office of Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers spent $16,500 on airfare and hotel nights for Evers’ economic development trip to Europe in April but records provided by his office were unclear on whether any of those were the governor’s expenses.
The office responded after six months to a request from The Center Square for records of the governor and his staff’s expenses for the trip with one bill from the Wisconsin Economic Department Corp. including a pair of round-trip flights and hotel stays in four cities.
The bill did not identify who stayed in the rooms on the trip, which ran from March 29-31 in Braunschweig, April 1-2 in Wlesbaden, April 3-5 in Dijon and April 6-8 in Berlin.
The plane tickets were identified as “Gau” and “Schroeder,” seemingly indicating the tickets were for Evers Chief of Staff Maggie Gau and Evers Executive Assistant Jack Schroeder.
The flights – from Madison to Hanover, Germany and from Berlin back to Madison – cost $5,099.67 apiece.
WEDC has not responded to a similar request from The Center Square related to its staff’s expenses on the trade trip. WEDC’s legal counsel has not responded to multiple follow-up questions related to the timeline of its response.
Evers’ office did not respond to follow-up questions related to the public records request or why it didn’t include Evers’ expenses, travel expenses within Europe and food on the trip. The response also did not indicate if there were security expenses as Evers traveled.
The WEDC’s budget for the 2025-26 fiscal year included $900,000 for trade trips “including trips planned to Japan, Canada, Mexico and Germany” according to its budget documents.
Governors in other states, including Republican Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee and Democratic Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, have responded to similar requests for travel expenses and included both food and travel expenses in the responses.
Whitmer’s expenses have been covered by corporate donations to the Michigan Economic Development Foundation, which receives funding from companies that benefit from tax incentives from state government, the subject of a recent report from The Detroit News.
