The Pennsylvania State Capitol Building, in downtown Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.
Republicans who control Pennsylvania’s Senate on Jan. 11 kicked off the new legislative session by pushing through a trio of proposed constitutional amendments that sparked a partisan fight and poses a challenge to the incoming Democratic governor, Josh Shapiro.
The proposals, if approved by the state House of Representatives, would give voters say over expanding voter-identification requirements, curtailing a governor’s regulatory authority and giving victims of child sexual abuse a new chance to sue perpetrators.
Republicans tied together the proposed amendments into one bill, prompting objections from Democrats who have long supported the measure concerning victims of child sexual abuse—including when Republicans opposed it—but oppose the other two amendments.
The Senate’s 28-20 vote was largely along party lines, with one Democrat siding with Republicans after more than two hours of debate.
The Senate’s vote—the chamber’s first consequential vote of the new legislative session—comes six days before Shapiro is sworn in, as Republicans moved speedily to enact pet policies without facing the veto pen of a Democratic governor.
Shapiro, the two-term state attorney general who is to be inaugurated as Pennsylvania’s 48th governor Tuesday, cannot veto proposed constitutional amendments.
For his part, Shapiro has talked of trying to sow bipartisanship after outgoing Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf set a 50-year record for the number of vetoes.
Asked about the measures Jan. 11, Shapiro declined to join the fight publicly, saying “clearly this is going to have to be a negotiation between the House and the Senate.”
Still, Shapiro reiterated that he wants to avoid the kind of partisan fights that led Wolf to pursue policymaking through regulations and Republican lawmakers to pursue constitutional amendments.
