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Wisconsin Assembly, District 8/Asamblea de Wisconsin, Distrito 8

Wisconsin Legislative BranchWisconsin’s legislature makes state laws. The legislature has two houses: the Wisconsin Senate and the Wisconsin Assembly. Proposed laws (bills) can originate from either the state senate or assembly. Both houses must approve the bill before it is passed on to the governor for signature or veto. The legislature can override a veto with a two-thirds majority vote in each house. The legislature controls the spending of state funds through appropriation.Wisconsin AssemblyThe Wisconsin Assembly has ninety-nine representatives. Voters elect representatives to represent their assembly district for a two-year term. There is no term limit.__________Poder Legislativo de Wisconsin La legislatura de Wisconsin produce las leyes estatales. La legislatura consta de dos cámaras: el Senado de Wisconsin y la Asamblea de Wisconsin. Las propuestas de ley pueden originarse tanto en el Senado estatal como en la Asamblea. Ambas cámaras deben aprobar el proyecto de ley antes de transmitirla al gobernador para su firma o veto. La legislatura puede anular un veto con un voto mayoritario de dos tercios en cada cámara. La legislatura controla el gasto de los fondos estatales a través de las leyes de asignación. Asamblea de WisconsinLa Asamblea de Wisconsin tiene noventa y nueve representantes. Los votantes eligen representantes para representar a su asamblea de distrito por un término de dos años. No hay límite de términos.Nota: Las respuestas de los candidatos que aparecen en español se tradujeron de las respuestas originales de los candidatos en inglés.

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Ranked Candidates

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    Ismael Luna
    (Dem)

  • Candidate picture

    Sylvia Ortiz-Velez
    (Dem)

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    Angel Sanchez
    (Rep)

Biographical Information

Please describe your priorities for your term in office and your specific qualifications to effectively address those issues.

What do you see as the most pressing housing-related issue in Wisconsin, and what policies, if any, would you support to address the issue?

What redistricting process, if any, do you believe the legislature should put in place before the next national census to ensure fair representation for voters?

What, if anything, will you do to ensure our schools have the resources to improve outcomes for its students, including those with disabilities?

What guardrails, if any, would you support to protect our environment, health, property values, and household budgets from large projects such as hyperscale data centers and Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs)?

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Committee Ismael Luna for Assembly
Campaign Email hello@ismaelluna.com
Campaign Phone 414-293-2589
Campaign Mailing Address 1423 W Walker St
Milwaukee, WI 53204
Website http://www.IsmaelLuna.com
Facebook http://www.Facebook.com/LunaForAssembly
Instagram http://www.Instagram.com/LunaForAssembly
Education Bachelor's Political Science, Spanish Minor; Master's in Public Policy, Social Policy, and Philosophy
Personal Pronouns he/him
Campaign Announcement http://pro.stateaffairs.com/wi/press-releases/luna-campaign-south-side-community-advocate-and-nonprofit-professional-ismael-luna-launches-campaign-for-wisconsin-state-assembly-district-8
District 8 deserves a representative who has lived the issues you care about and will fight every day for you. I grew up on Milwaukee's South Side, was homeless at 14, and today work at a homeless shelter, helping women find stable housing. I am a Milwaukee Public Schools graduate, a first-generation college graduate with a bachelor's in political science and Spanish, and hold a master's in public policy. I became a first-time homeowner at 21 and previously served as Vice Chair of RISE Drug Free MKE. My priorities are lowering the cost of housing and healthcare, repairing our streets, protecting immigrant families from ICE, and investing in small businesses and local jobs. I will fight for you with urgency.
If you live in District 8, you have seen it too. Too many boarded-up homes sit vacant on our blocks while neighbors struggle to find rent they can actually afford. I know this issue personally. I was homeless at 14 and now help women find stable housing for a living. That kind of vacancy alongside that kind of need is a policy failure, and I will treat it as one. I support expanding state funding for affordable and subsidized housing, incentives for mixed-income development, and stronger renter protections against unjust evictions and predatory rents. I also support lifting Wisconsin's preemption of local rent stabilization and investing directly in rehabilitating vacant South Side properties so they become homes again.
I support an independent, nonpartisan system for drawing legislative districts at all levels, geared toward creating a legislature that closely reflects the statewide partisan vote rather than one shaped by gerrymandering. Wisconsin's redistricting history shows how easily maps can be manipulated to entrench power rather than reflect voters' will. An independent commission, free from legislative self-interest, is the clearest path to fair representation.
If your kids go to school in District 8, or you did, you know what underfunding looks like up close. I am a proud Milwaukee Public Schools graduate and believe every child here deserves a fully resourced school. I will fight to ensure state funding covers the full cost of education without relying on local referendums, invest in smaller class sizes and more support staff, and fund mental health, special education, and English language learning. Our neighborhood is home to many bilingual and multilingual families, and our schools need dedicated funding for culturally competent instruction and staff who reflect our students. I support reimbursing special education costs for public schools at 90%, in line with current standards.
Wisconsin has lived through what happens when big projects move into Wisconsin without real protections for the people already here. I will push as a top priority to pass a strong regulatory framework for large-scale data centers, modeled on legislation authored by Representative Stroud and Senator Habush Sinykin. That framework requires data centers to pay their own way for energy infrastructure, meet renewable energy standards, protect ratepayers from rising utility costs, recycle water, and operate transparently. Communities of color and working-class neighborhoods like ours have historically carried the heaviest burden of industrial pollution and rising utility costs. I will make sure that does not happen here again.
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