Nass was a member of the Whitewater City Council from 1977 to 1981 and a member of the UW-Whitewater Board of Visitors from 1979 to 1989. He was first elected to the Wisconsin State Assembly in 1990, from the 31st Assembly District, and was thereafter reelected.[1][2] He remained a member of the Assembly until 2014, when he was elected to the Wisconsin State Senate from the 11th District.[2] Nass is one of the Senate's most conservative members.[3][4]
Nass has become known for his adversarial relationship with the University of Wisconsin System,[5][6][7] which he accuses of "liberal indoctrination."[8] That position that assumed greater significance in 2007–08, when Nass was chair of the Assembly's Colleges and Universities Committee, which oversees the entire UW System, and 2010, when Nass regained control of the committee (after Republicans regained a majority of the state Senate).[5] In 2007, Nass worked to cut funds for specific University of Wisconsin programs that he disagreed with philosophically, including the Havens Wright Center for Social Justice in UW–Madison's sociology department and the UW-Extension School For Workers, saying that they are "too far to the left."[9]Paul Soglin, the mayor of Madison, Wisconsin, responded by calling Nass "the outlaw chairman of an Assembly committee that is designed to destroy the University of Wisconsin System."[10] In 2017, Nass accused UW of waging a "war on men" with an initiative about masculinity, and criticized a course offered by UW on white privilege.[6] By 2020, Nass was the vice chair of the universities committee.[8]
In 2010, Nass said he would introduce legislation banning pavement markers designed to minimize conflicts between bicyclists and motorists.[11][12] Nass accused "liberal extremists in Madison who hate cars and think everyone should bike to work" with "basically making it difficult to use an automobile."[12] Nass's position drew a caustic response from Madison mayor Dave Cieslewicz, who noted that Madison is 70 miles from the district that Nass represents. "Not having been able to solve a single significant state problem (which they actually got elected to do) in their combined 37 years in office these guys now want to micromanage the city of Madison. There's a way they can do that, of course. They can give up their seats in the Legislature and run for the Madison City Council."[13]
During the COVID-19 pandemic, Nass criticized public health measures put into place by Democratic Governor Tony Evers, and in April 2020, Nass accused the state Health Secretary, Andrea Palm, of promoting "excessive levels of fear."[16] In July 2020, after Evers issued an order requiring the wearing of face coverings in public indoor spaces to prevent the spread of the virus, Nass called the order "illegal and unnecessary" and urged the state legislature to convene an emergency session to repeal the order.[17] During the pandemic, Nass supported the termination of Evers' emergency declarations.[18] He also pushed to require state workers to return to physical offices, revoke funding for schools that did not hold in-person classes, restrict the power of state and local health agencies, and expand school choice programs.[3] He introduced legislation to block the University of Wisconsin from instituting COVID-19 testing, masking and vaccination protocols on its campuses across the state.[19][7]
