WASHINGTON — Senator Tammy Baldwin, D-Wisconsin, narrowly won re-election this month, after the toughest campaign of her political career.
“I have always worked across the aisle in order to advance issues that help Wisconsinites,” Baldwin told Spectrum News in a recent interview.
On the campaign trail, Baldwin highlighted her willingness to work with Republicans to get things done. The Lugar Center and Georgetown University McCourt School of Public Policy calculated that Baldwin was the 31st most bipartisan lawmaker in the 100-member Senate last year
With Republicans assuming control of the Senate in January, working across the aisle will become a necessity for Baldwin. She said many voters told her during the campaign about their struggle to pay their bills. To help them, Baldwin said she’d like to build on her previous work, including her efforts to lower prescription drug prices.
“We passed a bill two years ago that mandates that Medicare negotiate with the prescription drug companies, the pharmaceutical companies, to lower prices, and they have completed their first round of negotiation,” Baldwin said. “But there are more rounds to come.”
As a member of the Senate Health Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, Baldwin will have a role in the expected battle over President-elect Donald Trump’s selection of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to lead the department of Health and Human Services. Kennedy's nomination has been denounced by some public health experts.
When asked what she needs to hear from him to vote to confirm him, Baldwin said “that he will rely on the science.”
“And, you know, I've certainly been concerned by some of the things that seem to be conspiratorial,” she continued. “The agency that he will head has many divisions that are extremely critical to fighting disease, curing disease, including the National Institute for Health.”
Although Democrats will no longer control the Senate, Baldwin said she’s up to the task.
“In the Senate, you have to work on a bipartisan basis to pass legislation, right? You can't do it with just one party, because you have to overcome a filibuster,” Baldwin said.
Baldwin said she looks forward to reaching out to freshman members from both parties to see how they can work together on legislation. The last time she did that, she co-sponsored two bills with then-Ohio Republican Senator JD Vance, who’s now the vice president-elect.