The end of January brought with it the end of the third full week of the 2025 General Assembly Session. Today is day 25 of the 46-day Session, so we are past the midpoint and have a couple of important days coming up.
We are rapidly approaching crossover, the date by which the House and Senate have to finish work on their own legislation, except for the budget bills. The daily floor sessions will be longer on Monday and Tuesday, as we work to amend and debate the remaining bills. Tomorrow, both the Senate Finance and Appropriations and the House Appropriations Committees will release versions of the budget, which will be voted on in the respective chambers on Thursday.
This time of session is always particularly busy. The final weeks of session will be dominated by budget negotiations, advocating for my legislation in the House of Delegates, and considering the hundreds of bills coming over from the other chamber. The budget discussions, however, are often the most time consuming, particularly with the current political climate in Richmond.
Virginia historically builds its budget in a conservative way. Every budget report is essentially an estimate of what our revenues and expenses will be over a two-year period of time. Adjustments have to be made from time to time when revenues are more or less than expected or there are unanticipated expenses or a shift in priorities. The budget must be approved by both the House and Senate and signed by the Governor. Just like any bill, the Governor has the authority to amend or veto the budget bill.
Typically, legislators spend the weeks between when we adjourn sine die and the reconvened session waiting for the Governor’s amendments and vetoes. For the last three years, those weeks have been spent in a standoff with the Governor, as he tried to avoid compromise and threatened a veto of the budget. Members of the General Assembly scampered to save their priorities and develop consensus on a budget that the Governor would sign. I do not expect anything different this year.
This Governor came into office during the pandemic, a time when an incredible amount of COVID relief funding was flowing from the federal government. Our country, just like every other nation in the world, was in crisis. The funding was intended to shore up our infrastructure and keep services available during those challenging times. Of course, one of the byproducts of those efforts was inflation, which we have struggled to deal with in recent years. But another byproduct is that the Governor has assumed that state government always works this way. In the first two years of his administration, he essentially financed tax cuts with the false “surpluses” that were produced by the extra federal revenue Virginia received. Our economy has outperformed many other states, so this year we have produced a real surplus. He is intending to use that surplus to claim Virginia’s taxpayers are “overtaxed” and to make all sorts of calls for refunding or cutting taxes. Nobody is opposed to paying less taxes, but it is essential we fund the services that Virginians count on, including safe roads and communities, health care, and public education.
This year, we are struggling to put together a budget that the Governor will sign. He has called for new, permanent tax cuts that, over the long haul, will produce an imbalanced budget. The Governor does not need to think in the long-term, as he cannot succeed himself and will leave office in less than a year. We do not have that luxury. We are working to provide tax relief to Virginians, while trying to identify ways to backfill the Medicaid deficit. As I mentioned before, this is the largest ever mid-year shortfall in Medicaid. So it was not surprising perhaps to see that Senator Ryan McDougle, the Republican leader in the State Senate from Hanover County, introduced legislation to create the Office of Medicaid Financial Oversight. It is striking to me that the leader of the Governor’s own party has this level of recognition of the challenges we are facing, but the Governor does not.
- Virginia Mercury: Virginia Medicaid recipients on edge as GOP weighs cuts
- WVTF: What happens if Medicaid is cut? Virginia lawmakers aren’t waiting to find out
- NBC29 (Charlottesville): State Senator Deeds calls for Medicaid protections
- State Senate Democrats say special session is likely if feds cut Medicaid funding – Cardinal News
Beyond those considerations, we also must factor in the budget amendments put forward by every member of the General Assembly. There are important programs in communities throughout Virginia, and all of that must be reviewed when putting together the budget. This is the only way we produce a budget that serves all of the people in the Commonwealth.
It continues to be my high honor to serve you in the General Assembly. If I may be of service to you during this legislative session or after we adjourn, please contact my office at (804) 698-7511 or senatordeeds@senate.virginia.gov.
Best,
P.S. Just a reminder that the money committees will meet tomorrow afternoon. The links to the video streams are available under helpful links below as well as on LIS. The subcommittee reports will be available under committee reports on the budget page.
