Minnesota’s Republican legislative leaders met with reporters this morning — with 10 days left until a state shutdown — to plead their case in the budget battle.
They said they keep compromising, but Gov. Mark Dayton won’t.
Senate Majority Leader Amy Koch said:
“It really does make you start to wonder. In 90 days, we have seen no detailed budget plan. … There is more common ground than the governor would let on with his negotiations.”
The Republicans passed a $34 billion budget, which was vetoed by the governor. Since the session ended, they’ve offered two proposals: first $110 million in spending, and then they dropped their tax-cut proposal and shifted about $200 million more in spending. But still, the $34 billion budget with no tax increase.
Dayton has pooh-poohed those efforts. His take, of course, is quite different. He said he’s the one making the moves, noting that he started with a $38 billion budget, but dropped that to about $36 billion, which includes a tax increase on the highest-paid Minnesotans.
Republicans want Dayton to call a special session now to work on the budget, but he says that would cost too much and won’t do it until an agreement is reached.
The Republicans have been unalterably opposed to raising even as much as one dollar in new revenue. Their entire legislative and messaging strategy and been designed with only one purpose in mind; to conceal that fact.
A failure once again on both parties. How many days from the start of the session until anything serious came from either side?
And here we are spending time, money and energy on preparing for a shutdown.
We have citizens wondering about services and their jobs because our leaders at the capitol can’t seem to find a way to do their job.
Speaking of jobs, if any of us were this productive with our own jobs we would be unemployed.
The republican proposal represents a 6% increase in spending. We don’t need, nor can we afford any more than that.
@#1: They tried to conceal it? Emmer and the rest of the party ran on the approach the Republicans have taken on the budget. What they fail to grasp is that Emmer didn’t win his race.
@#2: You’re giving the private sector too much credit.