MOScout Daily Update: How Folks Are Viewing HB 19 - Dems Fundraise off Prop A - Two Types of PQs - FRA Safe? - Hawley on Medicaid and more…

HB 19 Fallout

Just five legislative days remain.  Over the weekend, folks were assessing the extent to which the House’s desertion of House Bill 19 will impact inter-chamber relations during the final week.

HB 19 had hundred of millions of dollars of capital projects that the Senate expected passed with the other operational budget bills.  But the House balked as it tallied the cost of additional spending.

A sample of some texts and emails I received over the weekend.  It was all over the board, there’s no consensus on whether it was an act of bravery or betrayal, whether it triggers a furious backlash or just some harsh speechifying…

The odds of a quiet last week of session just went out the window… For weeks I have been listening to senators and staff crow about the project $$$ they got into HB 19. To have the House Budget chair purposely pull the chair out from under them by not taking up the bill with leaderships apparent buy-in will not set well. It also puts Kehoe in a box on the MU/MSU deal ($50M for MU/Doctoral degrees for MSU) that was derailed when HB 19 was not passed. Not something that will sit well with the Governor…

House members, most who are concerned about the size of recent state budgets, had a right to examine the bills for more than two or three hours before voting for a $500 million piece of legislation that would take $300+ million off of the bottom line. The public deserved better than what the Senate did… Governor Kehoe is the big winner here. He won’t have to veto an additional $200+ million of additional spending because HB19 died. If he vetoes some of the formula money too, Missouri gets closer to having $1.5 billion on the bottom line.

Let me see if I got this right. The Missouri House Republicans don’t believe the State of Missouri has the revenues to invest in, workforce development centers in our poorest counties, fund a STEM tutoring center for low income students or build a 200 bed mental health hospital to deal with the emergency mental health crisis in our state by refusing to take up HB 19 dealing with capital improvements.   BUT, they are going to force their members to vote on a $300 million dollar subsidy to the Kansas City Royals without a public hearing or taking any public input on a bill dealing with collegiate athletes. Sounds like a sure way to get a Republican primary opponent for everyone that votes YES… Even I could write the attack ads against these Republicans in  August ’26…

I had stuff in there and I'm gonna have to make a tough client call Monday after I stupidly relayed good news too soon. But I also realize that almost everyone (including me) is looking out for narrow, parochial, short-term interests; few try to look out for the broad, long-term public interest - because there isn't political benefit in that. Dirk's in the latter group and it didn’t help me here but the state and nation would be better off with more like him.

And

·       One player sees the possibility of a global agreement… I would look for a deal to be offered for HB 19 by the House, which will take a special session to pass. That deal could include a stadium deal for KC and possibly include a deal for VLT legislation that the casino operators will hate.

·       And another wisely sees the long-term implications of the state’s dwindling cash reserve: Many legislators are on the Budget Committee and Appropriations Committee so they can get projects added. They are going to have to get used to hearing “no.”The largesse provided in the last three or four budgets is over. Reps and senators are going to look to exit those committees when cutting becomes necessary (and unpopular).

MO Dems Fundraising off Prop A

Two Types of PQs

In my estimation not all PQs are equal.  A Senate PQ of HJR 73 would be qualitatively different from a PQ of the Prop A change.  A PQ over Amendment 3 would not be as “traumatic” to the working of the Senate, as a PQ over the Prop A change.   

Republicans want to repeal Amendment 3 and Dems don’t.  The issue is black and white in many folks’ mind, and it’s not clear what compromise either side could offer to the other.

The Prop A issue is different. The Dems are willing to talk about that, and are willing to make compromises.  PQ-ing an issue when the other side is willing to talk and find a deal is a expression of bad faith in the way the Senate works.  That would undermine the trust in the body, and would negatively impact next session.

Hawley for Medicaid

Senator Josh Hawley pens an op/ed in the New York Times saying the GOP shouldn’t touch Medicaid as it works to cut the budget deficit.  Read it here.

·       Let’s begin with the facts of the matter. Medicaid is a federal program that provides health care to low-income Americans in partnership with state governments. Today it serves over 70 million Americans, including well over one million residents of Missouri, the state I represent.

·       As for Missouri, it is one of 40 Medicaid expansion states — because our voters wanted it that way. In 2020, the same year Mr. Trump carried the Missouri popular vote by a decisive margin, voters mandated that the state expand Medicaid coverage to working-class individuals unable to afford health care elsewhere. Voters went so far as to inscribe that expansion in our state constitution. Now some 21 percent of Missourians benefit from Medicaid or CHIP, the companion insurance program for lower-income children. And many of our rural hospitals and health providers depend on the funding from these programs to keep their doors open.

·       All of which means this: If Congress cuts funding for Medicaid benefits, Missouri workers and their children will lose their health care. And hospitals will close. It’s that simple. And that pattern will replicate in states across the country.

And

Wall Street Journal reports that the current draft to cut Medicaid doesn’t touch the FRA tax, a apocalyptic fear among some Missouri budgeteers.

·       A section-by-section summary of the bill text, which was viewed by The Wall Street Journal, includes some of the changes Republicans have weighed for Medicaid, including work requirements and more frequent eligibility checks. But it doesn’t lower the minimum share the federal government contributes to Medicaid in each state, cap per-person federal spending in the program or other steps some spending hawks sought.

·       The proposal includes efforts to clamp down on states’ use of special tax arrangements to pay their share of Medicaid costs. The Republican plan would freeze at current rates the arrangements known as “provider taxes” and ban states from establishing new ones…

Lobbyist Registrations

Erin Schrimpf added Discovery Center of Springfield.

Birthdays

Happy birthdays to Peter Kinder, and Leann Chilton.