While the legislative session ends tomorrow, the Senate plans to meet in extraordinary session on Friday to pass a bill restructuring the Government Accountability Board and accompanying campaign finance changes.
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Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald’s office announced the move after Senate Republicans met privately to discuss the bills Tuesday. “We’re going to caucus (Tuesday)”.
Republican senators also are looking for unspecified changes to the campaign finance bill.
The Assembly passed both measures last month, but the bills got bogged down in the Senate, where a few more moderate Republican lawmakers sought revisions to both proposals.
The campaign finance bill that passed the Assembly would allow for unlimited corporate contributions to political parties. Republican supporters say the goal is protecting free-speech rights of those who want to spend money on elections and the changes are needed to update the state’s 40-year-old election law in the wake of several adverse state and federal court rulings.
The Senate was expected to come to the floor Tuesday but Fitzgerald canceled that session, too, in favor of holding another meeting on the legislation.
The last scheduled day for the Legislature’s fall session is Thursday.
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“Those are the issues people care about”, he said.
