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Legislature votes to restrict placeholder bills amid objections that changes don’t go far enough

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Legislature votes to restrict placeholder bills amid objections that changes don’t go far enough

By Emma Davis
Legislature votes to restrict placeholder bills amid objections that changes don’t go far enough
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Sen. Anne Carney (D-Cumberland) presents the joint order amending the rules on behalf of the Rules Committee on Jan. 14. (Emma Davis/ Maine Morning Star)

The Maine Legislature approved on Tuesday procedural tweaks that lawmakers debated since last session, notably limits to the use of vague placeholder bills that drew sharp criticism from both sides of the aisle. 

However, Republicans made clear in floor speeches and divided votes that they do not believe the changes go far enough. 

The Senate voted 22-12 and the House passed it without a roll call vote. 

The Rules Committee, which put forth the joint order to recommend the rule changes, heard a slew of proposals over the summer, when the committee met for the first time since 2018 despite being required to meet annually. The main impetus for the Rules Committee to propose changes to legislative processes was widespread outcry over the increased use of vague placeholder bills, known as concept drafts, particularly those that don’t provide sufficient information about what the bill will be about. 

Under the new rules, sponsors are required to fully draft and provide proposed amendment language to legislative staff three business days before a public hearing and for that amendment to be posted online at least two business days before the public hearing. Notably, this means formal, statutory language and not bullet points. 

If the sponsor does not meet that deadline, the bill will be automatically withdrawn and placed in the legislative files, which in plain language means it is automatically killed. 

Legislature’s rules committee recommends changes to limit placeholder bills

Sen. Anne Carney (D-Cumberland), who sponsored the joint order on behalf of the committee, acknowledged on the Senate floor ahead of the vote that the rule changes do not offer perfect solutions and referred to them as “fixing an airplane that’s in flight.”

“The Legislature has already taken off,” Carney said. “People have submitted concept drafts. There were a lot of demands on the nonpartisan staff. And so we were operating in an environment where we knew that we could address high priority issues. We also knew that there were things that might have to be deferred.” 

The deadline for lawmakers to submit bills was on Friday. Some Republicans voted for the joint order while making clear they had reservations, including Senate Minority Leader Trey Stewart (R-Aroostook), who sits on the Rules Committee. 

“I actually don’t feel that there is in fact any need for concept drafts,” Stewart said on the floor, repeating his stance from earlier committee discussions. 

While other Republicans on the committee voiced support for banning concept drafts with limited exceptions, such as for the budget document, Stewart added that he also doesn’t think concept drafts are necessary for the budget. 

Stewart ended with a cautionary note to his fellow lawmakers to not overburden nonpartisan staff by workshopping the language for their concept draft amendments too close to the new deadline. 

Strain on nonpartisan staff was a key part of debate when the Rules Committee settled on the contents of the joint order last week. The committee decided to include a narrow waiver of confidentiality for nonpartisan staff to inform committee chairs of amendment drafting status to assist with scheduling — an effort to prevent nonpartisan staff from being blamed if a lawmaker is not making a good faith effort to meet the deadline. 

Sen. Rick Bennett (R-Oxford) said it brought him “sadness and regret” to vote against the joint order. Bennett, who has long advocated for eliminating concept drafts and other procedural reforms, was the sole member of the Rules Committee to oppose the joint order, with two members absent, because he argued the changes did not go far enough. 

“We have organized ourselves poorly,” Bennett said. “We have squandered our own talent and our time.”

Some of the other changes now in place include allowing for model legislation adopted from other states or uniform laws to be linked to rather than have nonpartisan staff take time to draft themselves, requiring notices of public hearings on the legislative website rather than the current rule of just flagging in newspapers, and offering a “hybrid model” for automatically assigning legislation to committees when the Legislature is now in session in an attempt to free up some space on the House and Senate calendars.

Bennett proposed several of his own orders on Tuesday in an attempt to take the changes a step further, though his proposals failed to pass. 

One of Bennett’s orders would have eliminated most concept drafts. It failed 15-18. 

Another of his orders would have moved beyond the “hybrid model” for bill referencing to instead make automatic referral to committees the standard. It failed 16-18.

Bennett also sought to change the two-thirds threshold to call for an Article V convention instead to a simple majority. Article V of the U.S. Constitution allows for a convention for proposing amendments with the support of two-thirds of the states. (Bennett is eyeing an Article V convention to make changes to campaign finance law this session.)

A 3-7 vote of the committee on Bennett’s proposal last week already indicated support for such a change was unlikely, and the order failed 16-19 on Tuesday.

The Rules Committee is planning to meet midway through the first regular session to discuss more adjustments, including the issues Bennett raised as well as placing more restrictions around late-night voting, which drew particular criticism last session for budget debates.