By Michael Shepherd - July 7, 2023
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A bipartisan budget became a largely partisan one after Republicans abandoned it. For the last few weeks, it looked like Democrats were going to pass a second spending plan this year by a simple majority. A breakthrough last week led to the Legislature's budget panel voting out a bipartisan document.

On Thursday, a group of Republicans turned on the deal that they helped negotiate, putting everybody back where they started. Only three Republicans in both chambers ended up backing the budget that was endorsed last week by four of the party's five appropriators. It passed the House in an 80-58 vote, falling short of the two-thirds majority needed to enact it immediately.

The only side effect of the move is that the administration of Gov. Janet Mills will need to wait until early October to spend the money. While the effect of the move is narrow, it gummed up the process on Thursday, frustrated Democrats and added up to an example of how conservative frustrations with the deal forced dealmaking-inclined leaders to sharply change their tune.

It was a much better budget deal for the Democrats who control the Legislature, to be sure. They got money to start their paid family and medical leave program, while a widely supported child care overhaul from Senate President Troy Jackson, D-Allagash, also made it through alongside an expanded child tax credit also championed by top Democrats.

Democrats effectively ignored the top Republican demands during negotiations. The minority party had been pushing for $200 million in income tax cuts. Most of their appropriators were eventually won over by the inclusion of a bill from House Minority Leader Billy Bob Faulkingham, R-Winter Harbor, that expedited an income tax exemption for pensions up to $35,000 annually and indexed it to the maximum Social Security benefit.

When more conservative members started to vent about the deal last week, Faulkingham said his negotiators improved the ultimate product. On Thursday, he was speaking against the measure on the floor and announcing that his caucus would vote en masse against it, saying the deal was an "almost desperate" attempt to get Democrats to include Republican priorities.

"I listened to the other side," he said. "But at the end of the day, I listen to my caucus, and I answer to them. This budget is too important to come in for just come in for a little bit of scraps at the table."

The paid leave money was a major sticking point for rank-and-file Republicans, as was a deal to replace a popular property tax freeze for seniors, according to Rep. Sawin Millett of Waterford, a veteran budget negotiator and the lone Republican to back the budget in the lower chamber. In the Senate, the only party members to back it were Minority Leader Trey Stewart of Presque Isle and Rick Bennett, an appropriator from Oxford.

Bennett offered a lengthy critique of the document and the process, saying the budget projected to cost $545 million on net over the next two years is historic both for the level of spending it will drive as well as for some of the priorities tied up in it, including a Republican-led transportation funding shift.

"We all had an impact on this budget, and I think it's better because of our collective work," he said.