State Rep. Greg Alexander today backed action taken by the Michigan House to protect legal House Republican efforts to use tax dollars responsibly and cut waste, fraud and abuse.

Attorney General Dana Nessel recently issued an opinion declaring a law unconstitutional that was used by the House Appropriations Committee to disapprove over $600 million work project requests from the State Budget Office within the 2024-25 state budget.

The House has filed a lawsuit against 16 state departments as well as administration officials, seeking to continue the pause until a thorough and needed review of the spending can be completed after Alexander said it was jammed through in the previous budget.

“The ability for one legislative chamber to pause special work projects from a previous budget is something that has been in state law for over 40 years,” said Alexander, of Carsonville. “The role of the Attorney General is not to amend existing laws or create new ones. This law provides critical checks and balances for people’s tax dollars. When House Republicans took majority to start last year, we promised people we represented that we were going to take a serious look at unsustainable state spending, help people get more value for their tax dollars, and cut the waste and backroom budget deals that we have been seeing over the last several years. This was a mechanism we used to separate good projects from bad projects from the previous budget. It was a way to review legitimate questions surrounding some of these projects and why significant amounts of money for them are still with the state instead of our communities. We will continue standing up for taxpayers and their hard-earned dollars.”

Alexander noted that dozens of the work projects had yet to receive a single dollar from the state despite being approved over a year ago. Other work projects have set aside taxpayer dollars for things like welfare for illegal aliens and various radical, partisan programs.

Under new work project requirements championed by Alexander and House Republicans that are designed to improve transparency and oversight, all state-funded projects must now have a legislative sponsor, be submitted to a public website, and remain publicly posted for at least 45 days before they can be included in a state spending measure. The new process allows projects to be properly vetted and examines how taxpayer dollars will be used.