Wisconsin Gov. says Democrats failed to do their job

(Reuters) - Thousands of demonstrators converged on the Wisconsin state capital on Sunday to oppose a bid to reduce public employee union bargaining power, marking the start of a second week of growing protests with threats of wider dissent ahead.

Inside the Capitol's central rotunda and in its balconies, opponents of the controversial proposal by Republican Governor Scott Walker banged drums and shouted "We're not going away!"

Outside, where wet snow was falling, protesters chanted "Union busting is disgusting" against the governor's bid, which supporters say is needed to control state debt and spending and opponents contend would break the back of state worker unions.

While the crowds had dwindled from Saturday, when officials estimated about 55,000 demonstrators gathered, a major showing was expected on Monday, when the Wisconsin Education Association Council, representing some 98,000 public education employees, was planning a rally.

Monday is a mandatory furlough day for state workers.

Speaking in a television interview on Sunday, the governor said he expects the Democrats who oppose his plan will agree to debate it early this week.

Fourteen state Democratic senators have left the state to deny the Wisconsin legislature a quorum needed to consider the controversial proposal.

Those senators have "failed to do their jobs," Walker said on Fox Network's "Fox News Sunday."

"If you want to participate in democracy, you've got to be in the arena, and the arena is right here in Madison, Wisconsin," he said.

Mike Browne, an aide to Wisconsin Senate minority leader Mark Miller, said Democrats were ready to compromise but not on Walker's demands to weaken public union collective bargaining.

"He has before him the option to do what he wants financially. But he needs to compromise," Browne said. "The ball is in the governor's court."

Local media reported late Sunday that Republican majority leader Scott Fitzgerald said he will convene the Senate on Tuesday with or without the Democrats. Fitzgerald's party holds a 19-14 majority but needs a quorum of 20 to vote on spending bills. Other bills require only a quorum of 17 members.

One opponent of the governor's proposal, David Poklinkoski, the president of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Local 2304, called it "a bold, opening salvo not only in Wisconsin but across the country."

"Private sector workers know we're next," he said, adding: "If you had told me last Friday, when the governor dropped this bomb on us, that 200,000 people would have turned out in the streets over the next week to protest, I would have said 'no way.'

"But the other side has made it clear that we're ground zero in a national fight. So we need to act like it, and so far we have," he said.