Virginia’s leaders remain far apart on a state budget deal, with the negotiations and disagreements increasingly spilling into public view.
In an interview with the Richmond Times-Dispatch, Gov. Abigail Spanberger responded to rumors that the General Assembly is considering putting vetoed legislation into the budget. In addition to efforts to save the legislation Spanberger vetoed, rumors are circulating that Senate Democrats want to send the governor the budget in the final days of June — just days before funding runs out on July 1 — leaving her little time to respond before a shutdown.
“The idea that you would basically do kind of Russian roulette with our budget, or a game of chicken with the state’s budget … that is an abuse of the process,” Spanberger told the RTD.
The unconfirmed buzz is that Senate Democrats want to include bills to allow public-sector employees to participate in collective bargaining and to establish a retail marijuana market — both vetoed by Spanberger — in the budget.
Spanberger, who told the RTD that she also has heard these rumors, said: “We could have had a bill, right? Just as the legislature didn’t like my amendments, I didn’t think their bill was ready, right? … they passed by my amendments, didn’t even take them up — their prerogative.”
Spanberger continued in her statement to the RTD: “the idea that we, that members of the General Assembly would be holding localities and their budgets in this purgatory space so that they can try and jam me with a budget is two things: one, kind of an outrageous possibility, and two, broadly something that most legislators I have spoken to wholly oppose,” she said.
Senate Appropriations Chair Louise Lucas, D-Portsmouth, responded to these statements from Spanberger with multiple social media posts on Wednesday morning.
“Once again, the Governor is wrong on the policy and knows Virginians will cook her if there is a government shutdown,” she wrote. “The Governor should be honest and tell the public what she won’t do – she won’t tax billion dollar corporations to provide long term revenue to help pay for K12 and public safety and to backfill the federal cuts from Trump.”
Lucas also called out the House of Delegates for their insistence on maintaining tax breaks promised to data centers in Virginia.
“The Governor and the House are the ones that are gambling with our future by allowing the data centers to expand without concern for power, water, or paying their fair share of taxes,” she wrote.
House Appropriations Chair Luke Torian, D-Prince William, did not respond to a request for comment Wednesday morning.
Lucas also responded to comments from a Cardinal News story in which Spanberger told Dwayne Yancey that legislators have privately told her that some of the pushback she has received is because she is a woman.
“You have gotta be kidding me!” Lucas wrote on social media. “There is a record number of women in the [General Assembly] and four of them are in leadership and a woman [lieutenant governor], yet you think this is all about you! Okay, you thought it to be a great idea but just remember, you started this mess!”