Jeremy Alford says that for as much as this current crop of legislators has in common, they’ve never appeared as far apart as they do now.
“Corporate-style team building, like a flag football game and basketball practices, are helping with morale, but aren’t creating badly-needed alliances,” Alford writes in his latest column. “The late-night cocktails and parties at the Pentagon Barracks are bringing them together, too, but aren’t serving to galvanize the bunch at the Capitol.”
The majority of House and Senate members are facing re-election this fall, Alford notes, representing one shared goal.
“But it’s also one of the problems,” he writes. “Re-election is largely a solo-player game and can lead to selfishness, a cornerstone quality in politics. Every legislator, with no exceptions, is also facing a series of tough votes to balance a budget with a $1.6 billion shortfall, which is only shining a brighter light on the growing divides.”
Alford says curiosities first surfaced during the second week of the session, when lawmakers in the House sunk an otherwise mundane piece of legislation to increase a set of economic development fees.
“I’m a little concerned when I see a fee vote like that,” said Senate President John Alario, R-Westwego, “especially compared to the tax bills we’re debating.”
“Such a bill would usually breeze through, but it was viewed as an early sign that the approaching votes on the floor to raise taxes may be no simple matter,” Alford writes. “Moreover, it showed a major division of Democratic votes, with roughly a dozen or so in the nay column.” Democrats interviewed by LaPolitics said it was not an organized effort.
“Right now it’s a free-for-all out there,” said one Democratic lawmaker.
Jeremy Alford publishes LaPolitics Weekly, a newsletter on Louisiana politics, at LaPolitics.com. Follow him on Twitter, or on Facebook. He can be reached at JJA@LaPolitics.com.
