MILWAUKEE (Reuters) – The legal challenge to the new Wisconsin law that curbs the union rights of public workers moved forward on Wednesday with the filing of a formal complaint against the Republican lawmakers who steered the bill through the legislature.

In a court action filed in the state capital of Madison, Ismael Ozanne, the district attorney for Dane County, claims a key meeting of top Republican lawmakers from the Assembly and Senate prior to the bill's passage last week violated Wisconsin's open meetings law.

During that meeting of the so-called joint conference committee, the Republicans, who supported the anti-union measure, separated it from the budget repair bill it had been attached to.

That maneuver allowed the Republican-majority Senate, which had been stymied for weeks after its 14 Democratic members fled to Illinois to delay action on the measure, to quickly pass it without a quorum.

Ozanne claims the joint conference committee meeting took place with less than two hours notice, in violation of state law and the legislature's own rules. He wants the state court to declare the anti-union measure the two houses subsequently passed, and that Republican Gov. Scott Walker signed into law, "void."

Peter Barca, the only Democratic legislator allowed to attend the joint conference committee meeting, said he was "grateful" that Ozanne had filed the complaint and criticized "the way the public has been shut out of this debate time after time."

A spokesman for Scott Fitzgerald, the top Republican in the state Senate, called the complaint a predictable turn of events and said "we are fully confident that it's going to be found that we followed all the laws to a 'T'.. that there was nothing improper."

(Writing by James B. Kelleher; Additional Reporting by John Rondy; Editing by Greg McCune)

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The head of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Gregory Jaczko, told lawmakers on Wednesday he strongly believes the United States could "mitigate" the impact of a nuclear crisis similar to the one unfolding in Japan.

(Reporting by Ayesha Rascoe; Editing by David Gregorio)

SACRAMENTO (Reuters) – California lawmakers on Wednesday approved eight of 20 bills making up Governor Jerry Brown's state budget plan but did not take up its cornerstone, legislation asking voters to extend tax increases.

Brown, a Democrat, needs a handful of Republican lawmakers to support his plan for a ballot measure for a special election in June that would ask voters to extend tax increases that expire this year.

Revenue from the extensions would be paired with some $12 billion in spending cuts to help fill a state budget gap that may near $27 billion through mid-2012 and to bolster the state's finances in future years.

Democrats who control the legislature support a tax measure but Republicans oppose it, though some have been in talks with Brown on other matters that many observers in the state capital of Sacramento believe may help him win the votes he needs.

Lawmakers approved bills imposing spending cuts on health and welfare programs, shifting funds between state accounts and other moves to help close the state's budget gap.

California has the largest budget shortfall of any state at a time when weak state finances are a concern for lawmakers in Washington.

Sessions in the state Assembly and Senate were scheduled to resume on Thursday, when lawmakers will take up more of the budget legislation, likely including the sole bill to stall on Wednesday.

That bill proposes putting an estimated $1.7 billion into the state's coffers by scrapping local redevelopment agencies. It did not have enough votes to clear the Assembly so the Senate did not take it up.

(Reporting by Jim Christie)