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Life on the Run For Democrats In Union Fights

By MONICA DAVEY

CHICAGO — By now, Jon Erpenbach, one of 14 Democratic state senators on the run from Wisconsin, has switched hotels in this city three times, a necessity, he says, as word kept slipping out about where he was staying.

At first it was unsettling: the essentials were forgotten — extra slacks, socks, even underwear — in a last-minute race to get south of the state line. But gradually the lawmakers restocked, thanks to packages delivered by family members and trips to discount stores.

And while they seem to be adjusting to the rhythms of life on the lam, they are still trying to come to grips with being part of a sudden Democratic diaspora that everyone knows about but that the lawmakers themselves do not want to reveal. Speaking by telephone, many of them will say merely that they are staying “somewhere in northern Illinois,” in hotels or homes or something else, together or separately or both.

“It all feels very spylike,” said Senator Chris Larson, who managed to get a belt from his Milwaukee-area home with help from a friend who met him in a parking lot. “It’s almost like a reality TV show,” Mr. Larson said, ticking off some in the melting pot of personalities who find themselves together — a lot: a pregnant mother, a dairy farmer, an urban senator, a lawmaker who was first elected in 1956, and Mr. Larson himself, who took office less than two months ago.

As battles over limits to public-sector unions and collective-bargaining rights erupted in capitals in Wisconsin, Indiana and Ohio, Illinois suddenly found itself as the refuge of choice for outnumbered Democrats fleeing their states to block the passage of such bills. By Wednesday evening, most of Indiana’s 40 Democratic state representatives were living in rooms (“plain but all we need,” in the words of one) at the Comfort Suites in Urbana, Ill., about 100 miles west of the state Capitol in Indianapolis. Wisconsin’s Senate Democrats were preparing to mark their first full week, on Thursday, somewhere in northern Illinois.

Republican leaders left behind in the various Capitols fumed, but Gov. Patrick J. Quinn of Illinois seemed to delight in the new arrivals, some of whom said Mr. Quinn, a Democrat, had telephoned them to offer his personal welcome. “We believe in hospitality and tourism and being friendly,” Mr. Quinn said on Wednesday, quickly adding, “I also believe in unions.”

The main reason Illinois was suddenly a magnet for vanishing lawmakers was a matter of geography. From both Wisconsin and Indiana, getting over the Illinois line before state law enforcement authorities might be able to find them and haul them back to their stately chambers was a matter of a few hours by car. Still, the state seemed a fitting getaway. As Republicans seized control in a number of Midwestern capitals in November, Illinois was one of the few where Democrats held on to theirs.

“It seems like very friendly territory,” said State Representative Win Moses, 68, one of the Indiana Democrats who say they have been meeting in a hotel conference room, working on business as usual (so far, they have drawn up 105 amendments to the Republicans’ proposed state budget), dining at the Cracker Barrel, and waiting for some sign from Indianapolis that efforts to limit unions will be dropped.

The theory of these lawmakers from Indiana was the same as those from Wisconsin: the only way to slow bills to which they were opposed was to leave, since Democrats control only 40 of the 100 seats in Indiana’s House, but a bill cannot pass without 67 representatives present.

“It was time to do something different, so I went and got my clothes,” Mr. Moses said. In the case of the Indiana crew, they openly divulged their location only hours after disappearing from the Statehouse. The way they understood it, the Indiana law enforcement authorities could not follow them over the line anyway, so why bother keeping secrets?

The legislators from Wisconsin have been far more cryptic. Some said they had received threatening e-mails and phone messages, and a comment on one newspaper Web site read, “Looks like I need to go hunting south of the border,” Mr. Larson recalled. Not long ago, a handful of people who said they were Tea Party members turned up in a regular meeting spot at which the senators had come to gather, taking photographs of the senators’ cars. They would not, Mr. Larson said, return to that location (wherever it was).

For many, days look like this: wake up, talk on the phone with the other senators, call your Madison office, talk on the phone with the other senators, handle constituents’ e-mails and calls, talk on the phone with the other senators. Food has often been room service.

The 14 secretly gathered last Thursday morning in Madison, hours before a floor vote was to take place, and agreed to disappear — a move no one could remember having seen before. Standing in a circle, they sealed the plan, all putting their hands in like a sports team.

For now, these senators say, most people from their home districts still seem supportive, and their families, if confused as the days dragged on, still seemed patient. But pressure is mounting: Those left in Madison this week, supporters of Gov. Scott Walker’s plan to limit collective bargaining and cut benefits, agreed to a brand new rule about paychecks. Direct deposits to senators’ bank accounts are now barred for anyone who misses two or more days of the legislative session. Those who wish to be paid their salary must collect their checks in person, on the Senate floor.

Democratic Party leaders in Indiana volunteered to pay for legislators’ hotel stays, but some of the Wisconsin senators said they were on their own, using discount travel Web sites in search of deals every time they moved to a new hideout.

“I really miss my kids, and I’m going to have to find a Laundromat soon, said Mr. Erpenbach, who is living, he says, out of a duffel and a backpack. “But I can deal with this. When we come home is up to the governor.”

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Standoffs, Protests and a Prank Call

By KATE ZERNIKE

MADISON, Wis. — An increasingly heated national debate about the rights of union workers was stuck in a standoff Wednesday as Democratic lawmakers here and in Indiana stayed away from their Capitols to frustrate Republican efforts to vote on legislation that would undercut collective bargaining and the ability to organize.

While Republicans insisted that the bills were required to balance state budgets, Democrats and thousands of protesters who circled and chanted outside the Capitols in the two states insisted that the legislation was an all-out attack on the middle class.

In Ohio, where thousands of protesters last week had argued against a bill that would ban collective bargaining for state workers, Senate leaders agreed to change the legislation, to allow state workers the chance to negotiate wages. But the measure would now ban public employees from striking.

As the fights in Wisconsin, Ohio and Indiana have garnered national attention, more fights were expected soon — in Oklahoma, where the House is considering legislation that would ban collective bargaining with municipal unions, and in Tennessee, where Republican lawmakers had introduced legislation to prevent collective bargaining between teachers’ unions and local school boards.

In Wisconsin, Democratic lawmakers said the state’s Republican governor, Scott Walker, was out purely to bust the unions, noting that the unions had already agreed to the concessions on wages and benefits to balance the budget.

Their suspicions were increased after the revelation of comments Mr. Walker made during what turned out to be a prank phone call from a blogger posing as a well-known conservative donor. In the call, the governor discussed tactics to trick Democrats back to the Capitol, and compared his efforts to President Ronald Reagan’s firing of the air traffic controllers in 1981. “This is our moment, this is our time to change history,” Mr. Walker said.

The caller was Ian Murphy, the editor of the New York-based Web site Buffalo Beast, posing as David Koch, who with his brother Charles leads Koch Industries, which finances libertarian causes like the Cato Institute and Americans for Prosperity and which helped mobilize a Tea Party demonstration in support of the governor on Saturday.

Mr. Walker told him that his office had considered inviting the Democrats back on the premise of having an informal conversation, at which point the Republicans could declare that they had quorum.

In a news conference later, Mr. Walker said he did not want to get “distracted” by a phone call. But he said the legislation, which would take away unions’ power to bargain on anything besides wages, was necessary to allow the state’s municipalities the ability to deal with tough financial times.

The legislation, he said, would save local governments $1.44 billion, which would more than offset the cuts to local governments in the budget he expects to release Tuesday.

The Senate needs a quorum of 20 members to consider legislation with budget implications, and Republicans have only 19 votes. Democrats, who had fled to the Chicago area, insisted that it was the governor who was refusing to compromise after the unions had made financial concessions. Both sides said that if the standoff was not resolved in the next couple of days, the state would lose its ability to refinance debt for a savings of $165 million.

The Democratic members of the Indiana House of Representatives — like their counterparts in Wisconsin, a minority — left Indianapolis quietly Tuesday night to deny Republicans quorum, hoping to kill legislation that included a bill that would allow workers in private sector unions the right to opt out of their dues or fees.

Gov. Mitch Daniels, a Republican, accused the absent Democrats of showing “complete contempt for the democratic process,” adding, “You don’t walk off the job, take your public paycheck with you, and attempt to bring the whole process to a halt.”

But thousands of agitated protesters in hard hats and work boots clogged the halls of the Statehouse, chanting and cheering in support of the Democrats, most of whom remained camped at a discount hotel in Urbana, Ill., about a two-hour drive across the state line from Indianapolis.

In a call to reporters who had gathered in his office, B. Patrick Bauer, the minority speaker of the House, said from Urbana that the union legislation had been but one of many “wrongful bills” that would “rip the heart out of the middle class.”

Asked when the Democrats might return to Indiana, Mr. Bauer said: “What reason would you go if you’re faced with war words? I’m willing to go there, but I want to know that they’ll talk.”

The Capitols were transformed by the protests. In Wisconsin, where the demonstrations stretched into their second week, protesters had set up sleeping bags and mattresses, as well as a children’s play area and a first aid station. At an information desk, they could find earplugs for children and a place to charge their mobile devices.

The chanting and drumming of protesters provided a heavy bass soundtrack as the governor spoke to reporters inside his ornate conference room. The noise was quieted only slightly by the arrival of free pizzas sent by a local entrepreneur in support of the demonstrators.

Protesters took the empty boxes and made signs — “Why can’t we be friends with benefits?” and, in a nod to this college town’s mascot, “Walker is a weasel, not a badger.”

In the Statehouse in Indianapolis, the sound of the protests was similarly overwhelming.

“The Democrats were tremendous to walk out, and they’ve got my vote,” said Rick Royer, 51, a heavy equipment operator. “I can put my daughter through college all because of the union. I’m going to support what got us here.”

Late Tuesday, the Democratic lawmakers sent State Representative Brian C. Bosma, the majority leader, a list of concerns about almost a dozen bills and said in a statement from Urbana that they would stay put unless they got assurances that the bills would not be called at all this session.

Mr. Bosma said he would not concede to a list of demands. “Instead,” he said, “we expect the Democrats to return to do the work they were elected to do.”

And in Wisconsin, Republicans in the Senate had scheduled a debate for Thursday on a bill that would require voters to show identification at the polls. The bill has been of concern to Democrats, and Republicans were hoping it might lure even just one of them back to the Senate floor.