Its 6:30 pm on Monday August 10 and the Mississippi Legislature has returned to the capitol under the guise of handling issues associated with COVID-19. In reality we are operating outside the law and in violation of our own rules.
In March when the legislature decided to suspend the regular session due to the coronavirus outbreak we passed a resolution HCR69 that suspended the rules and normal operating procedures and allowed the legislature to return anytime during the year to handle COVID issues. The resolution was very specific that we could only return for that specific purpose.
Most folks don’t know all the rules of the legislature but our rules are set in either the constitution, that governs when we meet, or adopted at the beginning of the session. The rules can change but the constitutional limitations are not suppose to ever change. But this year it seems no rules apply.
If we fast forward from March until today, we are back at the Capitol because the Speaker of the House and the Lt. Governor exercised the authority given them in HCR69. That was the power to call us back to deal with COVID issues. But to our surprise, we are not dealing with COVID issues. The first issue that was brought up was to override the Governors veto of the education budget and now I sit and wait as the leadership argue over a state agency budget. Neither of these issues have anything to do with COVID and they both are a result of the legislature not doing their job before we left the regular session.
So now I wait wasting time and your money as folks in charge around here argue over their petty differences and for their pet projects. The state suffers as we do nothing.
So far this year the democrat caucus is very happy because conservative policy is non-existent.
Dana
