CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. (WVIR) – Governor Glenn Youngkin has made his decisions on which of hundreds of bills should become law in the Commonwealth and which will not make the cut.
This year, Youngkin signed 599 bills, amended 159, and vetoed 157.
Larry Sabato, Director of the UVA Center for Politics, says there was not anything particularly surprising about Youngkin’s actions in the final year of his term.
Though no single veto or approval is likely to make a massive impact in the 2025 gubernatorial race, Sabato says you can expect both sides to weaponize the Governor’s choices as they campaign.
“The Republican nominee will end up saying, look at how he held the budget line against the big spending Democrats,” said Sabato. “The Democrats will say, can you believe this guy is vetoing an increase in the minimum wage?”
For Senator Creigh Deeds, a Democrat who represents Virginia’s 11th District, Youngkin’s amendments to the budget are top of mind. Deeds says the Governor diverted funds from areas that truly needed it.
In addition, Deeds says, Youngkin vetoed a bill that would have banned firearms on college campuses for the second year in a row. In its list of actions taken since the November 2022 shooting on Grounds, UVA says it has continuously supported this piece of legislation.
“It’s very difficult to understand some of the vetoes and some of the amendments, but we will just have to deal with them, it’s part of the process,” said Deeds. “I’m sorry we have not found more common ground with this governor. I’m hopeful we’ll find more common ground with the next governor.”
Eight of the bills 55th District Delegate Amy Laufer introduced made it to Youngkin’s desk. Five crossed the finish line without any amendments, including a maternal health bill that would provide remote monitoring for pregnant women with high blood pressure and diabetes.
Youngkin did, however, veto two of Laufer’s bills. HB2002 would have ensured that the Department of Election could remove an individual from the voter roll only if they either removed themselves or if a state agency determined that they should be removed.
This comes after Youngkin purged more than a thousand voters from the roll last October, prompting a lawsuit from the Department of Justice.
“I’m really disappointed that the Governor vetoed that bill,” said Laufer. “This was a way to ensure that especially folks that are serving overseas would not be removed from the voter rolls.”
Luther Cifers is the Republican State Senator for Virginia’s 10th District, who replaced now-Congressman John McGuire in a special election.
Because he was a late addition to the General Assembly, Cifers was not able to introduce any bills himself. He was, however, successfully able to transfer SB1486, a bill to help protect the privacy of students on school-issued devices.
As for everything else he encountered during his first session, Cifers says there were pluses and minuses.
“What I like is that we added some $300 million to the rainy-day fund,” said Cifers. “We saw some gun control legislation, the abortion amendment, and some other stuff that for conservatives, were not what we wanted to see.”
The General Assembly is now preparing to head back on April 2nd for a veto session.
Cifers, who has no political experience, says he’s been pleasantly surprised by the productivity he’s seen so far.
“Being outside of government, it’s easy to have a cynical eye,” said Cifers. “I would say if anything, this process has done more to restore my faith in government than otherwise. I think we’ve got a lot of well-intentioned people, granted some ideological differences, but well-intentioned people who are trying to do what’s best for the Commonwealth.”
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