Just hours before lawmakers returned to Richmond for the General Assembly’s reconvened session Wednesday, Gov. Glenn Youngkin and key Democrats put their irreconcilable differences over the state’s biennial budget aside and agreed to start over with a clean slate.
Using a procedural maneuver, the House of Delegates by a unanimous vote essentially killed the $64 billion spending plan for fiscal years 2024-26, which the Democratic-controlled legislature sent to the governor’s desk last month.
Speaking to reporters at the state Capitol early Wednesday afternoon, Youngkin said that he will call a special session May 13 to review a new budget, followed by a vote two days later. This would allow the administration and Democrats 30 days to craft a new proposal that both sides can agree on.
“We believe that this is a good path forward for the commonwealth, it reflects the work that has been done from the General Assembly and from the governor’s office, and we came together over the last few days and worked well together to agree on this,” Youngkin said. “I think that this is a very positive step forward to reach a budget that serves the commonwealth of Virginia and reflects the collective priorities of everyone, including the General Assembly.”
The budget that Democrats passed in March includes more than $2.5 billion in new funding for K-12 public education, a 3% salary increase for teachers and state employees, $2.5 million for the proposed inland port in Washington County and $70 million in one-time general fund support to accelerate the Interstate 81 northbound lane widening project.
The spending plan proposed by Democrats rejected Youngkin’s proposed $1 billion in tax relief over two years and an overhaul of Virginia’s tax base that would pay for a reduction in the income tax by raising the sales tax rate.
When the House reconvened Wednesday morning, Del. Charniele Herring, D-Alexandria and the House majority leader, initially chastised Youngkin for pushing back against the budget bill that Democrats had sent him, alleging that the Republican governor was unwilling to compromise.
“We worked with stakeholders, senators, we even tried to work with Governor Youngkin’s administration, but apparently that wasn’t enough for the governor,” Herring said on the House floor.
“The bipartisan legislation aimed at moving Virginia in the right direction: legislation that would help our families, seniors, and students. After session, the governor spent time on a vanity tour, circling the commonwealth, calling our bipartisan budget backwards,” Herring said, referring to Youngkin’s weekslong statewide campaign to rally support for his proposed changes to what he calls “the backward budget.”
At an event in a Richmond suburb last month, Youngkin vowed to cut more than $2.6 billion in tax increases from the state’s biennial budget that the General Assembly sent him, and he didn’t rule out vetoing the entire spending plan if lawmakers didn’t include the proposed $2 billion sports arena in Alexandria that Senate Democrats refused to even consider.
Three weeks later, just hours before his deadline for acting on legislation, Youngkin at a news conference at the state Capitol rolled out a package of more than 230 amendments to the budget. His move came after he vetoed a record-shattering 130 pieces of legislation and proposed changes to an additional 100 bills.
But he also offered Democrats an olive branch by proposing $21.2 billion in K-12 education over the biennium, $1 billion in funding for higher education to support a cap on tuition increases and a 3% pay increase for teachers and state employees, and an increase in investments in health and human resources of $3.2 billion over the biennium.
“While I appreciate the conciliatory tone on April 8, nothing in his actions said that there is indeed reconciliation,” Herring said Wednesday, referring to the news conference. However, she added that Youngkin had met with House leadership earlier in the day, expressing his desire for finding “a way to work together.”
The House then unanimously voted that the governor’s budget amendments did not meet constitutional standards, followed by a vote to “pass the bill by” for the day, effectively killing it in its current form. The move allows for negotiations to begin from scratch.
Del. Terry Austin, R-Botetourt County, said that the renewed push of lawmakers and the administration to work together puts budget talks on the right trajectory.
“I’ve always felt like we’re not that far apart and that we can get there,” Austin said. “I’m feeling very comfortable about it. I’m happy with everyone’s involvement, the executive branch and the legislature, we all work very well together. Everybody wants a budget.”
Youngkin said in his conversation with reporters Wednesday that it was a “collective decision” to start the conversations over. “You will see from the vote this morning that it is unanimous amongst all of us to press forward in this fashion,” he said.
While he added that the two sides have yet to settle on specifics to find common ground for a new budget bill, compromise will be the target of the collaborative work between his administration and Democrats in the next 30 days.
“We’ve committed to start working, and I think that’s really important. Oftentimes you see a 30-day period and you think, we’ve got time, but we recognize that there is a lot of work to do between here and there. We’re going to work to achieve a real compromise budget, and that’s the goal,” Youngkin said.
Sen. Louise Lucas, D-Portsmouth and the chair of the Senate Finance and Appropriations Committee, said that what has changed since Youngkin’s news conference earlier this month is that there has been a lot of collaboration between both sides.
“I think that nothing helps this process more than everybody getting together, sitting around the table and talking about what we can do together to help each other,” said Lucas, one of Youngkin’s fiercest opponents in the legislature. “I think we all may have had different ways we thought we were going to get there, but now we are going to work towards something that keeps the temperature down a little bit.”
Del. Luke Torian, D-Prince William County and the chair of the House Appropriations Committee, added that while both sides have agreed to work together to flesh out a new budget bill, no decisions have been made.
“Everything will be up for discussion and deliberation, and everything that we had in our budget that we sent to the governor is still on the table. We will go to work immediately after today’s session,” Torian said.