Episode 1: How does the General Assembly work?
Each week on Bold Dominion, we explain one big topic. This week, that topic is the General Assembly itself. We're about a week into the 2020 session, so it's a good time to figure out: how does the General Assembly actually work?
Guests include Graham Moomaw, politics reporter at The Virginia Mercury; Peter Galuszka, Virginia journalist; and Sally Hudson, delegate representing Virginia House District 57.
Read the Transcript:
Nathan Moore 0:00
This is Bold Dominion, an explainer for state politics in a changing Virginia. I'm Nathan Moore.
Peter Galaska 0:07
There's a lot of turgid expertise that goes into knowing how the rules work, who can vote on what, how to change things, how to put in language that shifts the policy your way.
Graham Moomaw 0:18
So if there's something that the majority just doesn't really want to deal with, they have plenty of ways to just avoid it altogether.
Sally Hudson 0:24
Virginia's General Assembly has a number of rules and traditions that are not designed to empower the legislature, to encourage citizen engagement. And I think that, you know, that's a big part of what called me into this service.
Nathan Moore 0:41
And these are some of our regular voices here on Bold Dominion. Sally Hudson is a new House Delegate representing the Charlottesville area's 57th District. We'll hear more from her later in the show. Before that, Graham Moomaw, state politics reporter at the Virginia Mercury, and Peter Glasgow, longtime journalist here in Virginia. Well, each week on Bold Dominion, I'm gonna lean on these folks and others to help explain one big topic. This week, that big topic is the General Assembly itself. We're about a week into the 2020 session, and it's a good time to figure out: how does the Assembly actually work? If you've tuned into this podcast, I figure you know the basics of how Congress works, or at least the Schoolhouse Rock version. Lawmakers from across the state show up in Richmond, they propose bills, those bills get voted up or down, and if the bills pass, they go to the Governor's desk, where he can sign them into law or veto them. But, it's a little more complicated than that.
Graham Moomaw 1:32
So the real- real needs of the state policy-making process happens in the legislative committees and subcommittees.
Nathan Moore 1:39
Graham Moomaw is a state politics reporter at the Virginia Mercury -- that's a nonprofit online news organization covering state government and policy.
Graham Moomaw 1:46
This session is a 60-day session and there's gonna be thousands and thousands of bills. A tiny fraction of those are going to actually get on to the House floor, the Senate floor for a vote by the whole body. So, the committee process is where everything really begins and the vast majority of bills will- probably won't make it through the committees. By the time something gets to the floor, typically, it's probably gonna pass, you know, the markup all happens in committee, so any issues have usually been ironed out. With the number of bills and the- the short time frame that lawmakers have to get through them all- it's kind of just a madhouse where everybody separates into these smaller groups and- so it's kind of a sprint for the 60-day session.
Nathan Moore 2:28
The floor votes, then, almost seem like they're- they're more like political performance and less actual deliberation.
Graham Moomaw 2:34
Right. So once- once something gets to the floor they have to- there has to be three readings before its final passage. So usually what happens is the patron will stand up and give a very brief explanation of "here's what the bill does." And if it's something very contentious, there will there will be, you know, back and forth and speeches and... but usually the vote is- is well known in advance how it's gonna turn out. And a lot of the stuff that gets to the floor, you know, there's a lot of just very technical changes to state law that aren't necessarily political. And a lot of that stuff will pass in a block vote if they know that there's no need to spend a lot of time on it. But, when a really hot button issue, like, you know, guns or abortion or something like that gets to the floor, you know, there's- there's usually a lot of speechifying that goes on.
Nathan Moore 3:25
In some ways- the- the- a lot- I mean, if you've got 2700 bills already, clearly a lot has started well before the actual session. Um-
Graham Moomaw 3:33
Yeah.
Nathan Moore 3:33
You know, how much is already sort of set in motion and if not decided -- all but decided -- before things even start?
Graham Moomaw 3:40
I mean, there's- there's definitely a lot of conversations between lawmakers about what the agenda is gonna be who's gonna have what bill, but there's a lot of overlap too, you know? Several different Democrats might put in the same idea and have minor differences in their- in their bills and a lot of times those will get ironed out in the committee process. So committees will take up, for instance, all the bills dealing with background checks on guns. And, they'll kind of hammer out everything on that one issue and a lot of bills will get sort of rolled into one, they'll take the best pieces of each one and get it into shape. Something that everybody agrees is the best version they can get.
Nathan Moore 4:22
Are- are committee assignments the most important thing for a lawmaker?
Graham Moomaw 4:27
Yeah, they're pretty significant. You know, everybody kind of has the thing that they're passionate about. So, if you don't get that committee assignment that you really want, that can be a bummer. Danica Roem, she's a pretty well known member of the House of Delegates. She ran for office all about fixing, you know, traffic congestion in her district in Prince William County. And then when she got down here under the Republican control, she really wanted to be on the Transportation Committee, but she didn't get it. So, you know, this issue that she's talked up to her constituents and promised to go down to Richmond and work mainly on this thing. She kind of can't really do that in a- in a meaningful way without being on the Transportation Committee. She can still put in transportation related bills but then she's just sort of presenting them in that committee, but she's not sitting on the committee and she doesn't really have a vote on her bill. So if it dies in committee, that's- that's the end of it.
Nathan Moore 5:23
Yeah, that's actually sort of a good segue into my next sort of line of thinking here. You know, Virginia has this system where- where the majority party really does call all the shots. I mean-
Graham Moomaw 5:31
Right.
Nathan Moore 5:31
Republicans had that majority in both Houses for almost all of the last decade, um-
Graham Moomaw 5:36
Yep.
Nathan Moore 5:36
And- and they used that committee structure to- it seems like to snuff out a lot of bills that Democrats presented, certainly before those bills even got to a floor vote. Um-
Graham Moomaw 5:45
Right.
Nathan Moore 5:45
How- how do they do that?
Graham Moomaw 5:48
They do it because they can, pretty much. The Senate- Senate Republicans have been seen in the past as more moderate. So a lot of times, you know, bills will pass out of the Senate with bipartisan support, and even though the Senate Republicans are on board with it if the House Republicans don't like it, they can just kind of let it- let it die a slow death in their chamber. Last- last session, there were a bunch of LGBT, a couple of LGBTQ rights bills that passed out of the State Senate with bipartisan support, but they just never got a hearing and a House committee. So if there's something that- that the majority just doesn't really want to deal with, they have plenty of ways to just avoid it altogether. You know, and a lot of times they'll use the committees to keep things off the floor if they don't want all their members to have to vote on it. And, usually that means an actual recorded vote in the committee, but sometimes it can just- they'll just say "we ran out of time," you know, "we didn't get to take up that bill. Sorry. You can bring it back next year."
Nathan Moore 6:52
Are there- what- what can a minority party in the Virginia House or Senate even really do? I mean, this is a question Democrats had to try and figure out the last decade, but now the Republicans are trying to figure out what a minority party can do.
Graham Moomaw 7:04
So there's- there's really two things. There's a lot of things you can do for your constituents that aren't necessarily political, you know. But, then there's this whole separate sort of class of bills, that's just sort of staking out a position of what you believe in. So, you put- you can put in the bill and you can go give a speech in front of the committee explaining why you think it's a good idea. But, you know, a lot of the times if you're in the minority, you're under no illusions that your bill's gonna pass. It's just kind of a way to signal to the folks back home that you're fighting the good fight and stating, you know, what's important to you.
Nathan Moore 7:37
Graham Moomaw of the Virginia Mercury, online at virginiamercury.org. So, the committee process. There's still something about it that feels like alchemy. You've got an idea for something, you draft it up, it goes to committees. Maybe it comes out on the other side turned into gold. But how does this actually function?
Peter Galaska 7:55
Well, its- first off, there's a lot of- this kind of turgid expertise, if you want to put it that way, that goes into knowing how the rules work, who can vote on what, how to change things, how to put in language that- that shifts the policy your way. And, there are people who are masters at this, especially people who've been there for years and really know how to do it.
Nathan Moore 8:17
Peter Galaska is a journalist who has covered Virginia news and politics for four decades.
Peter Galaska 8:21
And, that's where it comes from. I mean, what's really key is writing the language for the bills. And, you know, whether the language is clear or not clear, whether it's explicit or not. And that's- that's how it works, and it's pretty complicated. I don't quite understand it myself.
Nathan Moore 8:34
The idea, I think, that- that some of us have is this, like, "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington," you know, you like, "Oh, I love this bill. This is important to me, I'm gonna stand up and give an impassioned speech." But that's- really, it's not that- that, uh, that the lawmaker necessarily has that impassioned speech that they feel compelled to give. It's- it's really part of a theater production almost.
Peter Galaska 8:51
Yeah, it is. I mean, that's a great movie, and it still has a lot of truth in it. And the thing I always liked about that- that film was the cynicism that you had this kind of comedy and cynicism at the same time. And, but no, that's- that's what happens. And there is honest drama sometimes where you- people really do come from honestly from different positions and clash. And they're both trying, say, to represent their constituents who might have different views on things.
Nathan Moore 9:15
In the General Assembly, then, you know, the- how much of the policies that get proposed and eventually passed comes from the party itself? How much come from people on the ground, new lawmakers and veteran lawmakers, you know, really pushing- pushing new things?
Peter Galaska 9:31
Well, that's a great question, because a lot of times a lot of the laws are actually written or drafted originally by the lobbyists. And, so they come in, they draft the law. And- and it's not to put them down because a lot of lobbyists are actually very effective and very important because they really understand, say, an industry or a trade group or a group of teachers or whatever, they know the issues very well. Now, where it really gets extreme, um, is something like ALEX, which is American Legislative Exchange Council, which was set up by the Koch brothers to promote free market conservative, you know, pro fossil fuel views. They would send pre-printed templates of laws to legislatures throughout the country and expect everyone to pass the same law. And it's just fill-in-the-blanks kind of thing, from their point of view, and that to me is really kind of suspect.
Sally Hudson 10:23
Virginia ranks among the top states in the country for boilerplate legislation submitted on behalf of- of national lobbying groups.
Nathan Moore 10:32
That's Sally Hudson, freshman lawmaker from Charlottesville representing the 57th House District. She was elected in November to fill the seat of David Toscano, who just retired. But hang tight for a minute. We're gonna hear more from Sally Hudson in the second half of the show.
You're listening to Bold Dominion, an explainer about state politics in our changing Virginia. We're on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, SoundCloud, and wherever fine podcasts are served. Learn more and subscribe: bolddominion.org. Bold Dominion is a member of the Virginia Audio Collective, a group of podcasts based at WTJU 91.1 FM, virginiaaudio.org. Let's get back to Sally Hudson, Virginia Delegate representing the Charlottesville area.
Sally Hudson 11:24
So, I think the most important thing to know about the Virginia General Assembly is that we are a citizen legislature. So that means that all of the Delegates and Senators are part-time. We all have jobs back in our home districts, and we serve for a very short window each year. The Virginia General Assembly only runs for eight weeks in the long years and six weeks in the short years. So it's a real breakneck sprint. Now, that has some good features to it. It means that, it tends to- to dissuade people from being career politicians where this is their only gig. You know, we all have a life back home and since we're living back in our districts full time, we stay in touch with our constituents. And the idea there is that it, you know, it really helps us stay grounded in our communities and make sure that we bring that voice with us to Richmond. On the flip side, that does mean that the General Assembly moves too fast for a lot of careful deliberation from the legislature. And, when you kneecap the legislature in that way, it doesn't mean that less work gets done, it just means it gets done by the people who get to do it full time. So in Virginia, we've got a really powerful executive branch, and we've got a super powerful lobbying corps, because they're the ones with the time and the money to be working on legislation year-round. So, if, you know, if we're really only full-time for eight weeks, a lot of the people who are doing the careful drafting of the bills are the paid lobbyists, you know, the industry lobbyists, the corporate lobbyists, who in many cases are literally writing legislation themselves and then dropping it on some Delegate's desk and saying, "Hey, can you file this for me?" And that means that Virginia ranks among the top states in the country for boilerplate legislation submitted on behalf of- of national lobbying groups. You can actually tell, these days we've gotten so good at digitizing the written word that some- there was a great project done by ProPublica, I think, and published by USA Today, where they- they digitize all of the bills that have passed through all of the state legislatures around the country, and then identified the chunks of texts that were popping up consistently in chamber to chamber and identified Virginia as one of the states with the most template bills pulled from big national organizations and it- I think it's in large part because our assembly moves so fast that we don't do a lot of bill-writing in the moment. You know, Virginia General Assembly is really not a deliberative body. We are passing -- or at least reviewing -- two or 3000 bills in eight weeks, which means there's simply not time to really workshop all of them in the moment.
Nathan Moore 13:53
That's industrial scale.
Sally Hudson 13:54
Yeah, it really is. It's- it's like drinking from a firehose and then some. A lot of what we're doing is casting up or down votes, you know, tweaking and tightening here and there, but the real work of the General Assembly is done during the off season.
Nathan Moore 14:07
Yeah.
Sally Hudson 14:08
When we have time to do the research and the writing and building the stakeholder communities to have a well-wrought piece of legislation.
Nathan Moore 14:15
So I remember when I- yeah, I've only been in Virginia about nine years now, not quite. And- and I only started paying attention to the General Assembly, you know, some years after that. And- and when I first started looking at it, it was kind of like, you know, you say, "Oh, the- the General Assembly is doing its thing. Let's call our lawmakers, make sure they vote us- the way we want to," you know, that kind of thing. But it's- it's almost like, by the time the session comes, it's almost just performance, at times, it feels like. Maybe it's over- overstating it, but.
Sally Hudson 14:38
No, I mean, it- the system definitely empowers people who play the inside baseball, like, you have to know that the General Assembly is coming. It starts in early January. But, if you don't have your act together to start supporting a bill in November or December, the odds that it's actually gonna make it through is- are really low because of the speed and the pace that we operate at. So, um, you know, for a lot of times, a citizen's first experience with the General Assembly is hearing that it's coming in the news, and then showing up in Richmond to see their representative, maybe three or four weeks in, and then learning that it's already halfway done, and watching something that they care about a lot die and then having to kind of lick your wounds in the off season and come back, prepared next fall to do it again. So, if you're kind of just tuning into the General Assembly now, keep an eye on how fast it moves, and you'll get a sense of how, um, you know, you really, you really have to be prepped up front in order to navigate the gauntlet that is the General Assembly.
Nathan Moore 15:38
So it's January now, but- but if somebody's listening to this in, like July, how would they- I mean, what should you do then? I mean, is there somebody you can call, somebody you can say, "Hey, I really want this. This is the thing I care about, this is the thing I'm passionate about, Virginia needs to go this direction." What's the citizen way in?
Sally Hudson 15:53
So my strong hope is that there will be somebody listening to this in July because that is the perfect time to talk- to contact your state legislator. You know, the off season, especially in the summer, is a great time to start sitting down and saying, "Hey, this is really interesting to me," and to start pulling together the pieces that you need to pass a bill. You know, the- the Schoolhouse Rock's version of how a bill becomes a law isn't really the whole story, you know, you need the bill to be written and you know, you need it to get all the votes that it needs, but there is a lot of refining that happens to a piece of legislation, a lot of vetting it with various stakeholders, you know, folks that may be concerned about this or that provision. And so if you can start initiating the process in the summer, that gives you plenty of time to do the wordsmithing, to run different drafts behind- beyond different groups and, and- and get their read. You know, I think that that's one of the really cool things about engaging in the legislative process is it gives you an opportunity to meet folks from all walks of life, who will have different angles on a bill. You know, no- no matter how well-intentioned your bill is, there's always going to be some wrinkle of it that affects some people that you haven't thought about before. You know, some- some business that relies on, you know, the, you know, the way that- that piece operates or some family that's gonna be affected. And so if you- if you get your ducks in a row early, it gives you the time to run it up the flagpole with a lot of different groups and say, "Hey, how you feel about this? How would this affect your life?"
Nathan Moore 17:14
Mhm. Off mic some weeks ago, you and I were talking about- about how different the experience is versus, like, that sort of "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington" way where it's like, "I care about this thing. I'm gonna write a bill and craft it and argue for it on the floor." And, you've already described that it's not that. Um, but I was sort of surprised even that it almost the- the teamwork element to it, in the Democratic Caucus at the Assembly, how- how much sort of gets kind of stacked up at the- at the party level and then sort of doled out to introduce across the board.
Sally Hudson 17:41
So that's another feature of the General Assembly that I think citizens should really know about. Is that we live in a state where the rules favor rule by one party. We're a Jefferson manual state and the short story is that means that the speaker is all powerful, and the speaker comes from whichever party holds the majority. And so, that team really gets to run the show. And so, you know, we have 55 Democrats in the House this year and 45 Republicans, but since the speaker is a Democrat, our Speaker will be Eileen Filler-Corn, she- she gets to pick all the members of the committees, all the members of subcommittees, she gets to choose where the bills get routed, and that makes it an incredibly powerful position. And it's very difficult for the minority party to exert much power to kind of balance things out. You know, Democrats had the short end of the stick for the last many years, with a Republican Speaker. To, you know, despite broad support for things like common sense gun safety, and the Equal Rights Amendment, there was no way for Democrats to bring those bills to a vote and actually learn that the majority of Delegates supported it because the Speaker wouldn't have it. And so that's, you know, one of the features the General Assembly that I think is really important, there are other states where those decisions are made by committees that include representation from both parties. And, and that means that it's a little bit harder for one party to just run the show based on one Speaker. And you know, there are pros and cons to that, too, in the sense that if you're a Democrat in Virginia right now, you're could be pretty excited that the 55 democrats are really going to run the show. But you know, someday the tables will turn again, and Democrats will be in the minority. And we will one day be frustrated that, you know, we can't elevate issues that we care about, that Virginians broadly support, because we don't hold the keys to the Speaker's castle. And so I think that it's- it's an interesting choice that Virginia makes to, you know, have absolute power when you're in power, but to really be in the doghouse when you're out of power.
Nathan Moore 19:37
There were some orientation sessions for- for a new lawmaker in the General Assembly. Take me through what the orientation sessions were like.
Sally Hudson 19:44
So there's a lot to learn. Some of its just logistics like, "Where do I get my mail?" You know, it's a- it's a big institution. It's kind of like your first day of college orientation. You know, you got to learn where all of the offices and services and buildings are. It's a big building, trying to keep thousands of people moving in-sync. And the staff at the General Assembly are amazing. You know, the folks who keep it all running on time are just fantastic. And they- they're totally steeped in the history of the place and they're an incredible resource. And then there's the- the lawmaking parts, you know, how do you learn the rules of parliamentary procedure? Because the- the knowledge is power, really, you know, legislative game, you know, understanding how it is that the bills move through the various systems. So really becoming a student of that game is also important.
Nathan Moore 20:29
I saw in the papers here that you have introduced a bill to give localities the say over whether they keep Confederate statues or not. How is that one, like, help me track how that- that process works. Introducing that bill, and then, like, where it goes from here?
Sally Hudson 20:46
Yeah, so that's a bill that's super important to our community here in Charlottesville. Currently, in Virginia state code, localities can put up war memorials, but they can't take them down. And that's a challenge for us. Because, of course, we have Confederate monuments here that have been the site of really acute pain and violence for our community. And also, part of the ongoing mythology of white supremacy that pops up- props up so much of Virginia history. And so, our community voted now, three years ago, to take down those statues and to decide that we're going to celebrate our history in a different way, but because of the state code, we can't do that. So, the- the concrete legislative provision that we can introduce to change that is to modify the state code to specify that, sure, localities can erect statues, but they can also decide what they do with them over the long haul, they can move them, they can modify them, they can recontext- contextualize them, they're local property. And that means that, you know, city councils and county boards can decide what to do. So, that's the Charlottesville version of the story- is that we would like that local authority, that lots of communities all across Virginia have their own version of the story too. The city in Norfolk has a statue that their, um, would like to take down and move into Confederate cemetery, the city of Alexandria has statues that they would also like to reposition. And so now that we're taking all of those stories into Richmond, it's not just about, "How do we write the bill that helps Charlottesville, but "How do we write the bill that solves all of the communities' challenges," because there are little bits and pieces of Confederate history and Jim Crow provisions littered all throughout the Virginia state code. And so, kind of tidying them up in a way that solves all the many problems is a more coordinated effort. There's more than 100 acts of the General Assembly, I think, that specifically authorized the erection of a monument. And so it's, it's kind of very careful and not so sexy work to clean up the historical paper trail that would really give communities of the right to decide what we celebrate.
Nathan Moore 22:50
Yeah. And so this is now on the docket of bills that will be considered. It'll get assigned to some committee, has it already? I guess not-
Sally Hudson 22:56
No, not yet. Yeah.
Nathan Moore 22:58
And then what?
Sally Hudson 22:59
And then we talk about it. And I think this is gonna be a really interesting opportunity for Democrats to show our colors. Because the- the local authority over Confederate monuments was a great example of a bill that was just dead-on-arrival under a Republican majority. The you know, Speaker would route it to a committee where he knew it would get killed. I think last year the bill died on us on a 6-2 vote. But there were both Democrat- there were Democrats who voted for it and voted against it. And so, there is not yet, I think, unanimous support for this measure, even within the Democratic Party. But, it's also easier to take that vote as a Democrat, when you know that there will be plenty of Republicans who are really adding the- the bulk of the votes. I think, now with Democrats in the majority people know that we have the opportunity to pass this legislation if we make it a priority. And so it's a little harder to cast that vote quietly if you're a Democrat. For me, I think one of the most encouraging facts that- that makes me think we've got a real solid shot at making progress here this session, is that the- the Governor has also voiced support for this measure. I think he's trying to do an awful lot of work to make right with Virginia's history. And so, having his support means a lot.
Nathan Moore 24:10
So the Speaker of the House, Eileen Filler-Corn, has a lot of power, as you just described. Let's say you take somebody like a- a Lee Carter introducing a bill to repeal right-to-work legislation. That is, making it then easier to form a union. That's definitely not universally loved by all Democrats, and it's pretty much loathed by- by the Republicans in the state. What happens to that kind of bill?
Sally Hudson 24:33
It- we're gonna see. That's a great example of, I think, another- another chance for Democrats to show our colors. You know, the- so here's it- here's another feature of the General Assembly that we should know, is that the General Assembly is divided into committees. I think that there are 14 standing committees? And each committee has 20 some odd people on it. But each committee then has subcommittees which are like five to seven people and subcommittees are where the real work in the General Assembly gets done. That's when you've got people who are gonna meet for long enough and read things carefully. And really kind of workshop and wordsmith. So the work gets done in groups of five to seven people. And then if they decide to support the bill and pass it up to their committee, the overwhelming share of bills that make it out of subcommittee will make it out of committee. You know, they'll do some, maybe, continued refinement, but then if the committee refers it up to the full chamber, the vast majority of those bills pass. Like, the work is done in the small group, and then everybody else says, "Okay, well, I'm trusting my colleagues who had a chance to do this really carefully." And so if they gave it their stamp of approval, then it's- it's going to move on. And so that means that the act of persuasion becomes a real small numbers game. Suddenly, it's not about getting 51 votes in a body- in a body of 100. It's about getting three or four votes in a group of five to seven. And, that has pros and cons. It means if you're a citizen advocate, you know, it's a smaller numbers game. There's only a handful of people that you need to talk to get on board. Um, but that-
Nathan Moore 26:02
Who the heck are they?
Sally Hudson 26:03
Right, but who are they? One: they could be people who are scattered all over Virginia, who may not be anywhere close to you, you know, may not know or care who you are, because, you know, they don't represent you specifically in their district. And it also means that the leadership can have convenient little pockets to tuck away bills that they don't want to deal with. So if, if you've got a bill, if you're in the leadership and you got a bill that you would like to see go quietly into the night, you can tuck it away in a subcommittee where you can trust that you've got the three or four votes to knock it down. And so again, I think we will learn an awful lot about the values that the current Democratic leadership is going to prioritize based on where they route bills. You know, you will- you know, in many ways, you can learn whether or not the Speaker wants a bill to pass by where they assign it, because they know going in whether or not it's got the votes to get out.
Nathan Moore 26:57
Sally Hudson is a member of the General Assembly representing House District 57. Thanks to her and all of our guests today, Peter Galaska and Graham Moomaw. Special thanks to the Virginia Mercury, online at virginiamercury.org. Bold Dominion is online at bolddominion.org. Go ahead and subscribe. I know you want to. And I will talk with you next week.