MOScout Daily Update: House to Hear Roeber Complaint - Senate Approps Starts Mark-Up - US Senate Watch and more...

The Week Ahead

The case of Rep. Rick Roeber will be front and center this week in the House.

·         The House Ethics Committee will meet at Noon.  And it’s expected that its report will be read into the House Journal when the House convenes at 4PM.  The expectation is that it’s pretty horrible.  The allegations are terrible.  And taking the extraordinary step of rejection Roeber’s resignation indicates that the Ethics Committee found them credible.

·         Assuming the proceedings follow the path of the complaint against Rep. Wiley Price… we’d expect to see HC 2 filed today.  This will be the House Ethics Complaint against Roeber.  That would be first read today, and up for debate later this week.

·         One rumor – no idea if it’s true – is that Roeber will return to the chamber this week, perhaps to fight the allegations?

·         But even that aside, the question is how much oxygen this sucks up, and how much it distracts from other work during this critical final stretch?

Over in the Senate, tonight is the charity bowl event.  That means a relative quick and light afternoon session.  But the Tuesday and Wednesday should be typical final stretch evenings – long and sometimes laborious.

Budget

All eyes on the Senate side of the building will be on the Senate Appropriations Committee.

It meets today at 1PM and begins mark-up on the budget.  This process will continue through the week, and finish up so they can debate it on the floor next week.

Obviously, there are a zillion little issues, and line items that will be futzed this way and that.  But the elephant is Medicaid expansion.

And

Regardless how the committee acts – placing it back into the budget or leaving it out – it appears destined for a floor battle next week. 

Either Dems, arguing that the voter amended the constitution to expand Medicaid, will filibuster the lack of funding; or Republicans will filibuster, perhaps echoing Sen. Bob Onder’s declaration last week that with Dems in charge in DC, more Medicaid means more abortions.

One House observer thinks the Senate budget process will end in a PQ.  And the worry there is: if the Senate blows up, what happens to the all House bills sitting over there?

US Senate Watch

·         Mark McCloskey did not announce as a US Senate candidate this weekend.  But KC Star’s Jeanne Kuang reported that “he appeared to be testing the waters.”  So I guess that’s something to keep an eye on.

·         Rudi Keller reports that Eric Greitens in his speech over the weekend is leaning heavily on the Trump effect. “Greitens proclaimed he had the support of many major allies of former President Donald Trump, including Rudy Giuliani, and dropped Trump’s name 11 times in the first five minutes of his talk.”

·         Meanwhile, one MOScouter noted that Greitens appears to be have retained his propensity to avoid any non-controlled environment, perhaps nervous that questions will focus on his past behavior. “Greitens is getting separate rooms at Lincoln Days away from the activists to avoid non scripted conversations. Did it in Jackson County and Macon.  Schmitt gets to work the room and talk about suing Biden and Greitens is in a position where he can’t even talk to voters.”

And

We’re still waiting on the congressionals… In the meantime, it’s hard to see any Republican state senators making a tough vote on say Medicaid expansion when there’s a thought that they might be running for congress in 2022….

Supreme Court Apps

Catching up from last week.  Here’s who is applying to fill the vacancy on the Missouri Supreme Court…

Cory L. Atkins, Chad E. Blomberg, Donald E. Burrell Jr., R. Craig Carter, William M. Corrigan Jr., Katherine M. Fowler, Kenneth R. Garrett III, Jennifer R. Growcock, Matthew P. Hamner, Lisa White Hardwick, Marjorie M. Lewis, Shaun J. Mackelprang, Tracey A. Mason-White, Jeffery T. McPherson, Darrell E. Missey, Jalilah Otto, Robin Ransom, David E. Roland, Sherry A. Rozell, Jason M. Sengheiser, Cristian M. Stevens, Stanley J. Wallach, David G. Wasinger, Jonathan R. Whitehead, and Raymond E. Williams.

eMailbag

·         My two cents on the Medicaid poll. The numbers could be 100% to 0%, if the people keep electing these R’s, there’s no incentive for them to comply with the peoples’ will.

·         I don't think it is that it is that unlikely that a Missouri senator would be running for President in 2024. Senator Greitens.

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