Lawmakers in Mississippi are facing a dilemma after missing weekend deadlines to iron out a plan for funding the state government after July 1, 2025.
While the Senate gaveled in at the state capitol on Saturday morning for what is commonly referred to as “conference weekend” – a time that has become status quo for leaders of both chambers to negotiate the state’s multi-billion-dollar budget for the incoming fiscal year – the House had decided to go home. Before gaveling out on Friday, Republican Speaker Jason White told representatives they could travel back to their respective districts before returning Monday afternoon.
The decision by White had some puzzled, considering conference weekend and its deadlines for budget-related bills was due to begin. But if you ask White, the move shouldn’t be surprising.
Instead, he and the House wanted to start negotiations on the estimated $7 billion budget weeks in advance to ensure taxpayer dollars are not misspent as a consequence of a rushed, blurry-eyed weekend. When the Senate chose to maintain tradition and stay in Jackson for the weekend, White didn’t budge on his belief that budget talks need to begin earlier each session.
“When I was elected Speaker on January 2, 2024, I pledged to my House colleagues and all Mississippians to strive for a more transparent and open budget process. Members would not be expected to meet behind closed doors late on weekend nights to rush out a budget without full vetting and an opportunity to question and scrutinize every tax dollar spent,” White said in a Saturday afternoon statement.
Senate leaders scoffed in disbelief at the seemingly principle-driven decision by White, asserting the speaker’s unwillingness to participate in conference weekend puts state agencies in peril.
“We all took the same oath. We adopted the rules,” Republican Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann told reporters after all budget-related bills died Saturday. “We all agreed to be here. If we can’t set a budget, that means, for Child Protective Services, we have little girls tonight having to stay in hotel rooms. Teachers can’t sign their contracts for their jobs. Highway patrolmen are out there not knowing how much they’ll get paid.”
Hosemann and others in the chamber didn’t stop there. Senate Appropriations Chair Briggs Hopson, also a Republican, asserted that Senate negotiators were prepared to meet with House negotiators for budget talks as early as Monday. However, House negotiators did not make themselves available until Thursday morning, leaving not enough time to hash out a budget proposal without a weekend full of work.
“We were ready to negotiate early in the week and unable to get agreement with the House to negotiate until Thursday morning,” Hopson said, adding that handshake agreements were reached with the House on around 70 of the 105 budget-related bills.
“There were a lot of hard discussions, and we made good progress,” he continued. “I felt like we were on course to get most, if not all, of the bills done by [Saturday].”
White fired back at that notion and said the House filed budget proposals known as conference reports and sent them to the Senate on Friday. Hopson and other Senate leaders disagreed, saying they had not seen any reports from the House.
“Contrary to comments made by Senate leadership, the House did indeed debate and pass the entire budget and sent a combination of both House appropriations and Senate appropriations bills and all of those were simply met with Senate amendments that would not allow them to pass and thereby force a conference weekend,” White said.
Dissent between the two chambers and the inability to agree on a timely budget plan has resulted in two options for the government to be funded in Fiscal Year 2026: (1) Lawmakers can suspend the rules and possibly extend the current session past its scheduled end date of April 6 to revive all budget-related bills, or (2) Republican Gov. Tate Reeves will have to call a special session for lawmakers to return to Jackson, where setting the budget would be the only item on the agenda.
When those two options were presented on the Senate floor on Saturday, many announced they would not be voting for a suspension of the rules. This outspokenness spurred Hosemann to blame the House for what he says will be a waste of taxpayer dollars for a special session to be called.
“A special session will be very expensive,” he said. “We just cut taxes, but now, we’re going to spend tens of thousands of dollars so [the House] can have the weekend off. If anyone sees any of their House members this weekend, they need to ask them, ‘Why didn’t you do your job?'”
White, on the other hand, believes the budget can be agreed upon and taken to both floors for a full vote by the scheduled end of the current session: “If the Senate wishes to engage in an open and transparent process, the House stands ready to work and there is plenty of time to conclude our business.”
