1. Partisan View of COVID
2. Business Uncertainty
3. Business Reopening Concerns
4. COVID Liability Coming?
5. Missouri Initial Unemployment Claims
6. State Budget Shortfall

$5K+ Contributions

Missourians for Healthcare - $750,000 from Health Forward Foundation.

Keep Government Accountable - $250,000 from United Auto Workers V Cap.

KC Relaxing Beyond State Standard

After teasing a Phase Two, Governor Mike Parson instead announced an extension of Phase One for another two weeks. Of course, Parson has made it clear recently that the state will take no action to enforce it.

KC Mayor Quinton Lucas seized the opening to release new guidelines which are actually less stringent than the statewide order.

Driving the Day: Reopening Phase Two

With the “Phase one” reopening order expiring on Sunday, Governor Mike Parson promised to outline what “Phase two” will look like at today’s press briefing. With his recent shoulder shrug at businesses flouting the last order, it’s unclear whether the new rules really matter.

Parson: The Buck Stops There

Governor Mike Parson waved off suggestions that he should do anything to enforce his April 27 order about how businesses must conduct themselves during the reopening.  Instead he said repeatedly that it was at the discretion of the local health departments. 

How will Parson deal with a business thumbing its nose at the order underlying his Show Me Strong Recovery Plan? Restaurants may offer dining-in services, provided that the limitations on social distancing and other precautionary public health measures, including proper spacing of at least six feet (6’) between tables, lack of communal seating areas to parties that are not connected, and having no more than ten (10) people at a single table, are properly adhered to.

· Does he just say they’re not exercising personal responsibility and shrug his shoulders?

Sain Withdraws

Rep. Matt Sain withdrew his filing for House 14. 

COVID Dashboard

The governor’s office unveiled a new COVID dashboard. See it here. This has been reported for weeks, but the one inescapable fact in the data is that the virus has hit African Americans in disproportionally hard. Black Missourians account for 33% of all COVID cases, and 38% of the deaths.

Senate 29: CL PAC Responds

One day after Peter Herschend sent $10K to a pro-David Cole PAC, the Conservative Caucus’ CL PAC responded by sending $10K to the Table Rock Conservative PAC, a pro-Mike Moon PAC.

Cleaner Lawsuit

Just like that, CLEANER is in court. The defenders of CLEAN put a copy of the lawsuit up on their website. The suit attacks the summary language. See it here.

MDC Seeks Relevancy Chief

The Missouri Department of Conservation seeks “Relevancy Chief.”  Lead the development and implementation of a new Department program focused on the engagement and service to broader constituencies…

Parson on LIHTC

The mighty Jason Rosenbaum interviews Governor Mike Parson about restarting the state incentives for the low-income housing tax credit. Parson doesn’t commit, but says everything is on the table for getting the Missouri economy going again. Listen to it here.

House Passes Priorities

The House passed two big priorities yesterday.

· They passed SJR 38, handled by Rep. Dean Plocher. This is also known as “CLEANER,” the GOP plan to replace the CLEAN Missouri redistricting plan.

· The passed Rep. Holly Rehder’s prescription drug monitoring program.

PDMP Bill Stripped Down

The conference committee substitute on the prescription drug monitoring program appears to have removed the fentanyl provision which caused some House Dems to balk. See it here.

On the conference committee: Sens. Luetkemeyer, Sater, O’Laughlin, Rizzo and Sifton; and Reps. Rehder, Stephens (128), Kolkmeyer, Roberts (77), and McCreery.

Sen. Mike Bernskoetter’s SCR 32 “urges the Missouri Congressional delegation to support legislation for the declassification of POW/MIA records.” It passed the Senate unanimously, and yesterday passed the House with only one No vote. The NO vote was…. Rep. Andrew McDaniel.

The longer it takes the economy to rebound, the more vexing the state’s budget problems will be going forward.

· From the Weekender: 58.3% of lobbyists surveyed are “Very concerned” about the state of the budget, believing the “impact from current crisis will extend beyond this fiscal year.” And only 12.5 think it’s “one-year turbulence.”

Remington/MOScout Poll: Senate 33

When 92% of your primary voters approve of the job the president’s doing, and as many of them considered themselves “Trump Republicans” as “evangelical Republicans” and “traditional Republicans” combines, it’s pretty clear what your campaign messaging is going to be….

Axios this morning has a chart of state revenue declines, calling it an “economic death spiral.” Missouri is near the top/bottom. See it here. Yes, it’s bad. But probably not that bad. Remember, there’s probably a pretty big chuck of the drop that’s just been deferred until July because we moved our tax deadline. And in theory, folks who are getting a refund filed as usual while folks who owe will wait until the summer.

Grain Belt Restrictions Repelled in Senate

The effort to prohibit eminent domain in the Grain Belt project had its first run in the Senate last night.  Sen. Mike Berskoetter added the provision to a Senate substitute to HB 1330.  A variety of senators from different parts of the ideological spectrum spoke against the proposal. 

Pfizer COVID Vaccine Trial

Press release: Pfizer Inc. and BioNTech SE announced today that the first participants have been dosed in the U.S. in the Phase 1/2 clinical trial for the BNT162 vaccine program to prevent COVID-19. The trial is part of a global development program, and the dosing of the first cohort in Germany was completed last week…

Post-Dispatch reports that “County Executive Sam Page said in a post on Twitter that Pfizer has chosen its St. Louis County facility to produce the possible vaccine.”