Now that Roseanne Barr’s Twitter racism has cut short her sitcom’s reboot, we’re still left with plenty of quality TV … that’s mostly on summer hiatus (or has been cancelled entirely boooooooooo).
A lot of state legislatures are taking a little time off right now, too, with only eight states actively holding session this week.
That number does not, however, include Virginia or Missouri, where special sessions gave rise to Very Big Happenings in both states this week.
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A Different World: … is what you get when Democrats almost wrest majority control away from Republicans in a single election by flipping 15 state House seats.
EXTREME STATEHOUSE NERD ALERT
The play-by-play:
- A key GOP Medicaid expansion supporter and a key expansion opponent actually share the chairmanship of the budget-writing Senate Finance Committee (no joke, they alternate the days when each holds the gavel), and the GOP members on the committee wouldn’t let a budget that contained Medicaid expansion get reported to the floor for a full vote of the chamber.
- Enter the parliamentary procedure gymnastics.
- The Senate Democrats and the small cohort of Medicaid expansion-supporting Republicans’ plan was this: Introduce failed Budget One as a “substitute” amendment to Budget Two on the floor.
- Budget One had enough votes to narrowly pass the full Senate, and this way, it would just replace Budget Two.
- Senate Majority Leader Tommy Norment is that key Medicaid-expanding opponent who co-chairs the Senate Finance Committee I mentioned above.
- He’s also a master parliamentarian.
- So when Norment moved to reconsider the vote on the failed, Medicaid-expanding Budget One, his Medicaid-supporting co-chair, Sen. Emmett Hanger, smelled a rat.
- Thankfully, it happened to be Sen. Hanger’s turn to wield the gavel in committee that day.
- Democratic Leader Dick Saslaw rose to point out that voting twice on Budget One in committee might prevent it from being able to be considered on the floor the following day.
- Hanger got the hint, ruled Norment’s motion out of order, and immediately adjourned the committee meeting to prevent further shenanigans.
The actual budget votes on Wednesday were a little less dramatic, but they took forever.
- Because even after the substitute, Medicaid-expanding Budget One was adopted as a replacement for Budget Two, Republicans who opposed Medicaid expansion had to air their grievances on the floor, mostly in the form of a long series of garbage amendments to the measure designed to either push personal and social agenda items or hamstring the expansion entirely.
(I watched more of the proceedings than I’m eager to admit.)
- After the budget finally passed the Senate (four Republicans ended up supporting it, though Democrats only needed two defectors to push it through, since the Democratic lieutenant governor can’t break ties on budget votes), it had to go back to the House, since it’d been tweaked somewhat in conference committee to enable passage in the upper chamber.
Finally, a little after 8 PM, Virginia officially had a two-year budget that expands Medicaid. Hooray!
Full House: The Missouri House of Representatives isn’t going to get the chance to impeach Gov. Eric Greitens after all.
- The legislature convened a special session on May 18 to investigate (and likely impeach) the governor, but Greitens up and resigned this week, so … so much for that.
(He probably feels pretty silly about dropping $185,000 on TV ads begging for support last week.)
- Greitens reportedly offered his resignation in exchange for the St. Louis prosecutor agreeing to drop a felony computer tampering charge he faced for allegedly using fundraising lists from his nonprofit foundation to raise money for his gubernatorial bid without paying for fair-market value for them, which violated campaign finance law.
- Seems to have worked out: Greitens announced his resignation (effective Friday) on Tuesday, and on Wednesday, the St. Louis prosecutor announced the dismissal of the charge.
Saved By The Bell: Remember when I said the Nevada recalls were dead?
- Yeah, well, they were, and are, but the GOP backers of the efforts to recall Democratic state Sens. Joyce Woodhouse and Nicole Cannizzaro have filed a last-ditch appeal to the April ruling that found that recall organizers failed to submit enough signatures to recall either of the two lawmakers.
- Nevada law requires recall efforts to gather signatures of 25 percent of the voters who cast ballots in the most recent election of the targeted officeholders—in this case, the 2016 elections of these two state senators—within a 90-day period.
- April’s ruling upheld a law that permits voters to remove their signatures from the recall petitions after they’ve been submitted to the state, and this allowed Democratic organizers to submit thousands of withdrawal requests.
- However, the judge in the case ruled the petitions insufficient even before those names were struck, so it’s unclear what Republicans’ path to success might be here.
- Losing sucks, though, and that’s what spurred these recall attempts in the first place—the unlikelihood that Republicans can win back a majority in the state Senate through good old fashioned general elections.
Perfectly Strange: Remember Arizona state Rep. Don Shooter, the Republican lawmaker who was expelled by his colleagues back in February after a long, dark history of sexual misconduct came to light?
Let me bump that for you:
- After allegations against Shooter began to surface in 2017, an independent investigation into his conduct commenced. Here’s what it found.
- Shooter’s “pattern of unwelcome and hostile conduct” began as soon as he took office in 2011 and is detailed in great length in the resulting 80-page report.
- His sexual misconduct included:
- Grabbing his crotch while standing next to a lobbyist and telling her how “pretty” she was,
- Telling a fellow lawmaker that he would perform anal sex on a rival while making the rival legislator’s wife watch, and
- Making repeated unwelcome sexualized comments about a fellow lawmaker’s breasts.
- Expulsion from the Arizona House required a two-thirds vote—40 of 60 lawmakers—and 56 House members ultimately voted in favor of booting Shooter.
- Well, kids, it looks like this a-hole didn’t get the hint. Because Shooter’s running for office again.
Not-so-fun fact about this district: It went 61-34 for Trump in 2016.
Night Court: Mark your calendars now: Another crucial state Supreme Court election in Wisconsin is slated for April 2, 2019.
- Shirley Abrahamson, a progressive justice who has served on the court for over 40 years, has announced her intent to retire when her term ends next year.
- The election to replace her will determine if the highest court in the Badger State stays at 4-3 in favor of conservatives or leans further to the right by becoming a 5-2 bench.
Fun fact! Abrahamson was the first woman to become a Wisconsin Supreme Court justice, and she’s served on the court longer than anyone in state history.
The Golden Girls (and guys): Recent fundraising numbers tell a happy story for Democrats running for seats in the Iowa legislature this year.
Well, that’s probably enough TV for one day—don’t want to ruin your eyes or stunt your growth or whatever it is too much tube is supposed to do.
Tune in next week—same bat-time, same bat-channel!