State Rep. Joe Aragona, R-Clinton Township, today issued the following statement on the Consensus Revenue Estimating Conference:

The Democrat trifecta already blew through a $9 billion surplus. It doesn’t matter if there’s more projected revenue – spending should not go up.

If we’ve got another billion in projected revenue that’s great, but it’s not a license to spend frivolously. There is still a lot of waste in the budget that we need to cut, and we should be looking for a way to return some of the surplus to the people of Michigan.

There is room within the budget for more money for roads.

We were willing to make a road funding deal during lame duck, but Democrats who controlled the House refused to negotiate, which is why we walked. Speaker Hall understands leverage, and he knows you cannot want something more than the other guy. That’s a lesson straight out of The Art of a Deal.

We’ve been clear about our priorities and proved that we are willing to follow through. It wasn’t easy to walk out because a lot of our members had perfect voting records, but we had to send a message. And now we are back in majority.

We need to cut out the waste and make sure that taxpayers are getting a good value for their money. We don’t need to spend money on free public WiFi for the Greektown casino area or $500 e-bike credits or a bunch of woke DEI bullshit. That’s all money that should be going to roads. We need to stop giving massive subsidies to corporations that don’t follow through on their promises to create jobs. That’s money that should get put toward infrastructure.

Earmark reform

House Republicans are changing the rules so that people can’t stick stuff into the budget in secret. From now on, lawmakers are going to have to list the sponsor’s name, recipient, and purpose. If you think there’s a good project that is needed that spends dollars wisely, then put your name on it and defend it.

The Senate is going to have to follow that rule too, because earmarks without names attached are not going to survive a conference committee.

Take the $4,500 coffeemaker for example.

A Whitmer political appointee spent $4,500 of taxpayer money to buy a high-end coffeemaker after getting a $20 million grant from the state that was supposed to be used to start a business accelerator.

That funding was negotiated in secret and the organization that received it didn’t even exist at the time the money for it was put in the budget. We still don’t know why the governor approved the grant in the first place. That’s a good example of why the oversight committee is getting subpoena power.

The House-passed version of the Fiscal Year 2024-2025 budget included clawback language that would have pulled the funding. The clawback had bipartisan support in both the House and Senate, but then that language mysteriously disappeared from the final version of the budget when it came out of conference committee. That is money that could have gone toward roads.

Expect to see the clawback language again. And this time, it stays in.