Six Republican Wisconsin lawmakers fought Tuesday to survive recall challenges stemming from the political backlash against GOP Gov. Scott Walker's move to strip public employee unions of most collective bargaining rights.

Less than a month before recall elections, Wisconsin Senate Republicans struggled Thursday with how to respond to bipartisan pressure for them to vote on a bill extending unemployment benefits.

Wisconsin state employees will start paying more for their health care and pension benefits in late August, state officials said Wednesday as a coalition of unions filed a new lawsuit against the GOP-supported plan that strips away collective bargaining rights from most public workers.

Wisconsin's polarizing union rights law is set to take effect after the state Supreme Court determined that a judge overstepped her authority when she voided the governor's plan to strip most public workers of their collective bargaining rights.

The latest version of Wisconsin Republican Gov. Scott Walker's plan to take away public employees' collective bargaining rights would be largely the same as what the Legislature passed in March, except local transit workers would be added to those who are exempt.

Wisconsin's Republican lawmakers re-opened the fight over collective bargaining rights Friday, proposing new police and firefighters pay more for their health insurance and pension benefits.

Wisconsin's law taking away nearly all collective bargaining rights from most public workers was struck down Thursday by a circuit court judge but the ruling will not be the final say in the union fight that brought tens of thousands of protesters to the Capitol earlier this year.

Gov. Scott Walker no longer expects to see the savings from forcing state workers to pay more for their health insurance and pension benefits before the start of the next budget year in July.