Stitt still pushing for income tax cut, while legislators abruptly adjourn negotiations

Gov. Kevin Stitt on Friday renewed his call for an income tax cut to be included as part of the state budget being negotiated by leaders of the Oklahoma House and Senate.

Stitt spoke at a news conference he conducts most Fridays during the legislative session. Instead of the Blue Room at the state Capitol, though, he held the event in Tulsa at the Tulsa Police Department’s Real Time Crime Center.

After bringing lawmakers together last week for what he called a “budget summit,” Stitt hasn’t participated in those meetings since Monday. An income-tax cut, while supported by Stitt and House Speaker Charles McCall, has not been a major subject in those meetings in Stitt’s absence. Those discussions continued at the Capitol on Friday, a day when the building usually is quiet and most legislators have returned to their districts.

Senate President Pro Tempore Greg Treat has remained firmly against an income-tax cut, saying the state cannot afford it while also meeting its other obligations and that the Senate approved the elimination of the state grocery tax earlier this year. Treat, R-Oklahoma City, said Thursday it seemed to him the House was somewhat backing off its tax-cut push.

“They have not definitively said they have, but it appears they have,” Treat said. “They’re no longer looking at it.”

McCall, R-Atoka, said Friday afternoon that wasn't the case. He said the House believes the Senate is making a mistake in not considering any income tax proposal.

"I find it ironic the Senate is asking me to guarantee we put up and pass a veto override, when they refuse to put up a vote, just a vote, on the tax cut," McCall said.

McCall and Treat spoke with reporters Friday after budget negotiations abruptly adjourned. Treat had asked House leaders for a pledge that they would override any items in the final budget agreement on which Stitt might issue a line-item veto and McCall declined to do so. Treat told McCall that negotiations wouldn't resume until 9 a.m. on Monday.

Treat said the House had, essentially, abdicated its leadership to the governor's office.

"It's unfortunate the House of Representatives just turned over to the governor's office," Treat said. "I've been saying over and over, is the speaker in charge of the House or is the governor in charge of the House? We just got a clear, well, non-answer.

"Any concessions that we made today are not valid if the House is not willing to override vetoes that the governor may have. It's been told to me repeatedly that the speaker's team has told lobbyists and government agencies that they will not override vetoes and I think I got ― it wasn't a clear response, but an understanding today that that may very well be what the speaker has directed his team to do."

Treat said such agreements between the chambers to override executive vetoes were standard, although McCall later disputed that assessment. McCall said the Senate's action in adjourning the meeting until Monday assured that, because of the timeline of the veto process, any Stitt veto of budget items would stand, because the legislative session can last only through May 31. That would not give legislators enough time to override any vetoes.

"To even contemplate a veto override at this point speaks to the fact the Senate ... they have a problem with the governor," McCall said. "Their problem with the governor is their problem. But we'll try to get everybody together and try to work through that, but they just did exactly what they said they didn't want to do today. They did not want to turn over control of the budget to the governor. By not getting an agreement today, that's what's happened."

Stitt, during his press conference, was ready Friday with an easel and a pre-prepared chart ready to go when asked if he might veto any budget proposal that didn’t include an income tax cut. Stitt said he wouldn’t speak to whether or not he would veto the budget “at this point,” but then launched into a familiar tax-cut spiel.

“I’ve been very clear,” he said. “My priorities are this ― let’s make sure that we protect the future of Oklahoma. I think Oklahomans know … that we’ve got an amazing economy. Our economy has been great, but we can’t just keep spending every dime that we have, or we’re going to put ourselves in a bad situation.”

He said he’s emphasized three things ― not spending more than recurring revenues, ensuring the state savings remain at a healthy level, with around $5 billion in the account and including an income tax cut.

“When we have excess revenue, we have to continue to choke off government, not grow government,” he said.

Stitt accused the Senate of “funny math” and alleged that its leaders “tried to confuse” people by saying Stitt was trying to cut agency budgets. “There are no cuts,” Stitt said. “I would never suggest we’re cutting something. I’m just saying, let’s not grow it.”

Stitt said his proposals remain on the table ― either a 0.25% cut for all Oklahomans, or developing a tax bracket that would leave the top rate of 4.75% untouched but would take away income tax “that the poorest Oklahomans pay.” He said the latter level would be $27,100 for a couple filing jointly.

“I would hate to see the Legislature just taking our last year’s expenses and just raising them up … and then we have no way to cut taxes,” Stitt said. “You can’t go through and try to play Santa Claus … and then say, ‘Oh, sorry governor, we don’t have any room for tax cuts, because we’ve spent all the money.’ I think that’s a backward way to budget. I don’t think business works that way. I don’t think government should work that way.”

Stitt says he’ll sign updated bill designed to assist survivors of domestic violence

Stitt said he “would 100 percent sign” Senate Bill 1835, which passed the Senate by a 38-0 vote on Thursday and now is under House consideration. The bill would direct courts to consider as a mitigating factor during sentencing that the person has been abused physically, sexually or psychologically by the person’s sexual partner, family member or member of the household, the trafficker of the person or other individual who used the person for financial gain.

Stitt vetoed an earlier version of the bill, Senate Bill 1470, known as the “Oklahoma Survivors’ Act.” In his veto message, Stitt said the bill, authored by Treat, wasn’t only about domestic violence survivors. The Senate voted 46-1 to override Stitt’s veto but the House has yet to hold an override vote.

Stitt said he asked for a trailer bill to Senate Bill 1470 and that Senate Bill 1835 contains “exactly what we want. But remember, the bill that I vetoed … what that bill did was it just wasn’t talking about domestic violence victims.” He said if it had become law, “everybody in prison could have come back and said, ‘I want my sentence reduced because of trauma that I had from my past.’”

The current bill in the Legislature wouldn’t allow for that, Stitt said.

“When you’re talking about domestic violence and a battered-woman situation, we absolutely want to consider that,” he said. “It’s my understanding that they went back to the drawing board and they’re actually putting a bill on my desk that does what they said the other one did. I’d be very happy – cannot wait to sign that.”

Stitt recognizes National Police Week with stop at Tulsa Police Department

Stitt said he was holding his weekly press conference at the Tulsa Police Department in recognition of National Police Week, which ends Saturday.

“We all want safe communities,” Stitt said. “It’s the men and women that serve in uniform that keep our communities safe. We just want to make sure we support them, and the culture, that they know in Oklahoma that we have their back and we’re going to do whatever we can to help the police department here in the state of Oklahoma.”

He spoke of the jurisdictional issues faced by Tulsa police after the Supreme Court ruled in 2020, in a case brought by convicted child molester Jimcy McGirt, that Oklahoma lacked jurisdiction to prosecute him because he was a tribal citizen, and his alleged crimes had occurred on a tribal reservation. The ruling reshaped the criminal justice system in eastern Oklahoma and has led to recognition of a growing number of tribal reservations within the state. Much of Tulsa falls into either the Muscogee Nation reservation or the Cherokee Nation reservation.

“The McGirt decision has kind of thrown them a curveball but they’ve done a really good job of trying to keep the community safe,” he said.

This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: Gov. Kevin Stitt again pushes for tax cuts as lawmakers talk budget