Dillon has backed away from his comments of yesterday...
Dillon said his tiff with the governor dealt with the procedure and timing of voting on the budget bills. But he says they still agree that big cuts being called for by Republicans are a bad idea, and the state's going to have to find additional revenue to balance the budget.
"I think she and I are on the same page when it comes to, really, what the fight is about right now, if you look to next year's budget is we don't believe in eliminating all scholarships for college kids," Dillon said. "We don't believe in a 20 percent cut to revenue sharing. We don't believe in cuts to early ed. We don't believe in cuts to Medicaid."
Good. But you know what, Speaker Dillon? We've got WOOD TV at this very second playing up this "divide", so you might want to KEEP saying this to the press, if you want to get that "same page about cuts" message out there.
Dillon says that he doesn't have the votes for the governor's plan, which makes you wonder just how they will avoid those cuts.
Speaker of the House, Andy Dillon, has said there's no way he has the votes in the House to pass the governor's plan, but dismissed questions that the democratic party is fracturing.
Alrighty then, let's see the budget that will pass. The one that doesn't believe in all those cuts, but still comes up with the revenue.
Dillon says it will start to move next week, which means September 15th - two weeks before the end of the fiscal year. Two weeks. Two weeks to reconcile with a Senate that has indicated it won't play ball.
Better make sure you stick them with the cuts then.
Recall that Speaker Dillon had this to say back in January.
We must not repeat the mistakes of the past where budgets were not passed until the 11th hour. In these uncertain times, it is imperative that our communities, schools and universities know their budgets as early as possible.
To avoid a similar outcome, I challenge the Senate and the Governor to work with us to have a budget compromise in hand before our summer break.
This is no time for political games or 11th hour panic. The stakes are too high. The people deserve better.
Yeah, we do. Couldn't agree more. Get it done.