No California State Budget Despite Defection of One Republican State Senator and Pledge from Governor Schwarzenegger to Reduce “

[courtesy of California Progress Report]

By Frank D. Russo

Despite threats that it may cost him his Senate seat, Republican Abel Maldanado broke ranks with his fellow party members and cast a ballot for the California state budget bill and all the associated traler bills that relate to it. These bills did not pass even with 25 Democrats all voting for it and Maldanado making the 26th vote because 27 votes are needed to meet the two-thirds required by the California State Constitution.

Maldanado said: "I think a vote for this a budget is for fiscal responsibility. If I lose my election for a balanced budget that doesn't raise taxes, than that is a price I am willing to pay."

Governor Schwarzenegger issued a statement tonight after the Senate failed to pass a budget as he had urged, and revealed that he had promised Senate Republicans that he would use his “blue pencil” authority—under which he can eliminate entirely or reduce any item in the budget—to reduce the operating deficit to zero. This had been the stated goal of the 15 Republicans in the Senate as to the budget itself. Despite continued rhetoric, this removed the fiscal fig leaf from the Republicans’ intransigence, as Maldanado said when he announced he was voting for the budget.

The Republican Senators are demanding that California Attorney General Jerry Brown be precluded from enforcing the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) as far as it relates to global warming and perhaps several other non budget related changes before they will vote for the budget. Schwarzenegger, while not opposed to some changes in CEQA in this regard, nevertheless opposes this holding up the state budget.

The Republican Senate caucus made an agreement that none of its members would vote for the budget unless a majority of them were willing to do so. This puts them at odds with Democrats who have strong majorities in both houses of the California legislature, their Republican counterparts in the Assembly, and a Republican Governor.

Senator Don Perata told reporters after the vote that he had done all he could to listen to Republicans in his house on the budget but that he saw no signs of getting the last single vote needed from them, so he told Senators that they were free to go back to their districts and released them from staying in Sacramento. He warned them that they would be facing a number of angry constituents when they returned home.