Did you know that the vast majority of state reps who sponsor amendments then withdraw them before they can be voted on? Amendments could allow legislators to skip over the byzantine committee process and bring legislation to the floor. But instead of insisting that our state government consider legislation that would help millions of people, state reps use amendments as resume builders, sponsoring amendments and then withdrawing them.
Jordan Berg Powers, Jonathan Cohn, and Anna Callahan chat about Massachusetts politics. You can watch this episode on YouTube.
You’re listening to Incorruptible Massachusetts. Our goal is to help people understand state politics: investigate why it’s so broken, imagine what we could have here in MA if we fixed it, and report on how you can get involved.
To stay informed:
* Subscribe to our YouTube channel
* Subscribe to this podcast
* Sign up to get updates or to volunteer with us at https://www.incorruptiblemass.org/
Did you know that the vast majority of state reps who sponsor amendments then withdraw them before they can be voted on? Amendments could allow legislators to skip over the byzantine committee process and bring legislation to the floor. But instead of insisting that our state government consider legislation that would help millions of people, state reps use amendments as resume builders, sponsoring amendments and then withdrawing them.
Jordan Berg Powers, Jonathan Cohn, and Anna Callahan chat about Massachusetts politics. You can watch this episode on YouTube.
You’re listening to Incorruptible Massachusetts. Our goal is to help people understand state politics: investigate why it’s so broken, imagine what we could have here in MA if we fixed it, and report on how you can get involved.
To stay informed:
* Subscribe to our YouTube channel
* Subscribe to this podcast
* Sign up to get updates or to volunteer with us at https://www.incorruptiblemass.org/
Producer 0:00
[This transcript was produced by a computer program then hand edited. It may still contain inaccuracies. The audio is the authoritative version of this podcast. Last edits were made on 6/23/2021 @ 23:14ET by FL.]
Anna Callahan 0:00
Hey there welcome everybody. This is Incorruptible Mass where we investigate why our state legislature is so broken, what we could have here in Massachusetts if we fixed it and how you can get involved. So I'm here with my super amazing co-hosts, Mr. Jonathan Cohn and Mr. Jordan Berg Powers. If you would introduce yourselves.
Jonathan Cohn 0:25
Yeah. Jonathan Cohn, he/him, I'm an activist based in Boston involved in progressive issue and electoral campaigns for the past eight years.
Jordan Berg Powers 0:35
My name is Jordan Berg Powers. I use he/him and I am coming from a remote location on vacation. That's too much to say at once.
Anna Callahan 0:44
Love it. I'm Anna Callahan. Ms. Anna Callahan, she/her, coming atcha from Medford. Let's talk about amendments. So I love this topic, in part because we got on the zoom call today and I was like, "Hey, man, what is an amendment anyway? How is it different from bill? Don't they just take bills, and then they just take the entire text of the bill and they turn it into an amendment like, What's the difference here? And why are amendments kind of dumb? Why do amendments sort of show off our inability to pass policy?" I think to me, what's interesting about amendments is it really highlights the fact that we are totally incapable of passing policy. So I'm actually going to go ahead and just hand it off to Jonathan. You were talking a little bit about how the purpose of an amendment is to highlight something that is not a foregone conclusion in the bill.
Jonathan Cohn 1:47
Exactly. So like the typical way one would think that an amendment would work would be that you see the text of a bill that's about to approach the floor, and you think that something is missing from it, or you think that something is written poorly, whether it's a gaping intentional, or gaping unintentional flaw, or you want to change something entirely, maybe you want to strike a section, or add a section, because you want to have meaningful changes. An amendment is knowing that you have that kind of ability to add something to it. And typically, it'll be a subtraction in this case, as well. One of the things that that would actually be kind of mean that like there was some type of engagement prior to it coming to the floor, you might have lobbied for something to be included, you lost out. You want to try again on the floor,
Anna Callahan 2:40
You maybe want to show who is not supporting this thing nothing, right?
Jonathan Cohn 2:44
Exactly.
Anna Callahan 2:44
You want to highlight...
Jonathan Cohn 2:45
You might want to try that, exactly. And that's why we're bringing a roll call vote, which you can do with an amendment. The other ability is it's a way of taking things out of the process, that you can't choose whether or not your bill advances that goes through the whole legislative process, it goes to committee hearings, it goes through the committee, like multiple committees have to move something forward, it needs the graces of leadership to get to the floor. An amendment it says you don't need that approval. You just draft it, you file it, and you're the one who can decide what to do with it. There's a lot of lobbying that will happen around that to get people to possibly withdraw the amendments, but they're the only ones who can either push it to a vote or withdraw it, and then push it whether or not. Whether it's a voice vote or a recorded vote is also up to you as the person filing it. And the other thing would be on that, what was I going to note on that? But yeah, sorry for the brief digression, but it's typically the assumption that something didn't get through the standard process with a bill moving forward and you want that last chance to move it forward before the bill actually gets issued is done. Anything to add to that, Jordan?
Jordan Berg Powers 4:09
No, no. Just to move the conversation forward, instead of Massachusetts, tried to pass actual legislation through the process, right. So most states pass bills, but our state doesn't pass bills. It doesn't get things out of committee. And because the Speaker has total control of the committee process, actual bills that can actually affect people's lives in substantive ways-- in ways that would positively transform not just a few thousands or tens of thousands of people but millions of people who live in our state-- the only way to pass them or at least to have the issues in those policies raised for elected officials to talk about is through the amendment process, which is like the most bonkers way of showing how broken our system is that we try to pass substantive legislation through the process that's meant to amend the bills. [laughs]
Anna Callahan 5:02
And I'm going to jump in with the the next level of bonkers, which is that what we normally hear about amendments is that this amendment passed, like, oh, the Senate passed an amendment 39 to zero.
Jonathan Cohn 5:19
Exactly. So many of the times you actually amendments pass or often, but especially when it comes to budget season, in the Senate, there'll be unanimous votes in the House, you often see what's called consolidation of amendments, where they take together all of the amendments that cover a subject area, put them together, throw them aside, figure out what additional like earmarks they want to add for that, rename it, and then vote on it unanimously. When you have things like that, where if you have unanimity or only token opposition, it always raises the question of why wasn't this just in the main originating bill? Because when you think about amending a bill, you typically think that there was some fight that you want to continue forward, because either you don't think that you will win, and you want to show the actual kind of divide that exists. You think that with a little bit of fighting, you can get that majority that you need. But if it was unanimous, and there was no clear, major lobbying campaign to make that unanimous, it just feels like they have certain theatrics where it's left out so that you can file it, and then you can be the one to take credit for it, because it was your amendment, whereas in a base budget or base bill, it doesn't belong.
Anna Callahan 6:45
Yeah. Should've just been in the bill, right?
Jonathan Cohn 6:47
Yeah!
Anna Callahan 6:48
Why? Why? it was unanimous, why wasn't it in the bill?
Jonathan Cohn 6:50
Why waste anybody's day?
Anna Callahan 6:53
Totally.
Jordan Berg Powers 6:54
I think it just highlights that this whole amendment process is really just about show. It's not about a legislative process. It's for show, in the broken process that we have in our State House. So the other one that drives me the most crazy, is every year during budget season, you'll get all of these organizations will say, call your person to sign on to sponsor this amendment to the budget. We want you to pass this amendment to the budget. But then they know that not only is that not gonna pass as a part of the budget, but actually, they're not even gonna vote on it, they're gonna pull it before it even has a chance to-- and by pull it, it means they're gonna say, "Mr. Speaker, we'd like to amend this bill," and then they'll say, "Nevermind. Mr. Speaker, we're not going to amend-- we're not going to ask you to amend this bill," which is the silliest thing in the world! Who would ask for an amendment, and then say, JK, right? Except if you want just for show, if you want to go through the process of pretending to care about you while doing nothing substantive to actually care about the issue. But more importantly, because I think we always talk about this as issues, the people who it affects, right, you don't care about the people who it affects, because you won't actually demand that people stand up and say yes or no, on this thing that matters. And the more important an issue is, the bigger the issue, the bigger the change that they're trying to do through the amendment process, the least likely it is to get into the budget process. If you're trying to make a bill that should be a bill and amend the budget, guess what, this is not gonna happen. It's just unlikely. Because our State House is broken, it might happen, because it's a lie. There's no rhyme or reason. It's a lottery system. But like the lottery 99.9% of time, you're gonna lose. [laughing] You're holding out for that .01 percent you might win.
Jonathan Cohn 8:49
Or that .01 percent chance being when House leadership decides that they want to use the budget as the vehicle the past something, then you're golden because somebody's higher ranking will file it for you. And why it's not just being passed as a bill is that-- it's unfair-- but it's just easier to just take the taxes that you want, vote on it as an amendment, and move on.
Anna Callahan 9:11
And an example that happened last term that I heard about was there was some climate legislation that was really important to a lot of outside organizations and a lot of people. And it became an amendment, which meant that it really could have been brought forward by anybody. But the person whose name was on the bill was pretty public about their ownership of the bill. And, you know, this concept and what they meant by their ownership of the bill is "Don't you dare put forward my bill! That's mine, it has my name on it. It is only me. If I pull it, the no one else can put it up." Right? That's part of the culture of the statehouse that people sort of obey these bullying tactics. I want people to think about the the idea that somebody has ownership of a policy, because their name is on it, they own it, and only one out of 160 people is permitted to-- which is not the law! I just want to be clear about this for people listening. There's no rule that says that someone else cannot bring this forward. This is purely the culture and the bullying that happens inside of the State House, that says, "You who promised outside organizations and your constituents and a bunch of other people, that you would bring this bill forward, because it matters. You cannot do that. Don't do that! Because I will be mean to you if you do that. And people give in, right? All this is this culture that happens at the State House and the group think about how important your relationships are, that your relationship with another person inside the State House is more important than saving the planet or not bankrupting everybody who you know, has medical debt, or any of these other things that matter to us, to constituents, to the 7 million people who live here in Massachusetts.
Jordan Berg Powers 11:08
And I think it's important because the pushback against this is always like, "well, this is how it works. This is how you'll get things done." And the thing I always say is like, "Yeah, but except that, no, most things don't get done." Like again, it's like winning the lottery, it is how things get done, and your thing might get done, but it's probably not going to get done. See, the fact that there's still no major legislation on housing, no legislation on the environment, they still funded the Big [inaudible] Act that they themselves did pass, right? We have to be perfect to get the opportunity to pass things that they should just be passing. And then they'll say, "Well, this is just how it's done." But most things don't get done. Like most of the big things, most of the things that affect people's day to day lives are getting worse. They're not addressing them. We're just hoping that the right person that day cares about that issue to pass it. And it's just a really broken system. That's the pushback-- is that we have to be in this broken system and go along to get along for the opportunity that might someday, if we're lucky, just in case, maybe, our delegate heard.
Jonathan Cohn 12:17
What's striking about it is how occasionally people will speak on an amendment and then withdraw it as though like in some ways, at least you are bringing more attention to your amendment. And I guess you get a gold star for doing that. But if you aren't carrying it through and you never thought you were carrying it through, you can also just hold a press conference. There are other ways of drawing attention to the issue that aren't like making people do work for no clear end.
Anna Callahan 12:52
And Jonathan, you talked about the voting rights package. And what happened there?
Jonathan Cohn 12:56
Yeah, well, before [that] I'll quickly talk about other examples of this before. And that's another good example of amendments. But you'll see cases like this: just earlier this month, when you had the COVID Rules - COVID Extension Bill that they had in the House, and there were 21 amendments filed and 17 of them were withdrawn. And then even back in the 2018 session, when that house had a health care reform bill, and 174 amendments were filed by reps, and 144 of them were withdrawn. So 83% of the amendments were withdrawn, which makes you wonder, why did you make your staff go through the process of writing these amendments that you knew you are going to withdraw?
Anna Callahan 13:46
It's a great question! Why do you think they do that?
Jonathan Cohn 13:51
It's unclear to me. Often they think that maybe the stars will align, and we'll finally get in.
Anna Callahan 13:59
Is it a resume builder? Is it like, look at the amendment I filed?
Jordan Berg Powers 14:02
I think it's a resume. I think it's to placate us. It's to placate progressives. It's to placate their members. They'll go back to their community they'll say "I filed an amendment for that, but it didn't get passed."
Anna Callahan 14:14
Right.
Jordan Berg Powers 14:14
It is to go about the process of pretending that they care about people. Well, actually, pretending or fighting for us. It's the lie. It's a lie. [INAUDIBLE] Massachusetts consistently tells its voters that it is going to do something to make their lives better and never do it. But we will pretend. We will go through this. We will go through this pretend, this play act, because it is! It's a play act! I'm gonna put out a bill that won't even get voted on. I'm going to I put it up and then I'm going to take it away. Then you've done nothing. You've done nothing. You've literally done nothing.
Anna Callahan 14:22
Wow!
Jordan Berg Powers 14:31
It is all for show. It's all for show. So I just want to back up and explain what we're talking about because people don't quite understand the pulling a sponsor. So it is just that simple. It is just a simple idea that somebody says "I have a bill," and you say "I want to amend that bill," and then most times the Speaker will just say, "you're not going to, I need you to take that bill away so that we can just move this forward." Because again, most bills-- they want it done-- they release it to the members the night before that morning, and they want to pass it by two or three o'clock that day! So they don't even want to discuss the bill, let alone how you might fix it. And so that's what they're doing. They're they're literally they're going into a back room, and the Speaker's people are saying, we don't want to waste time voting on this thing, that again, will have an impact on people's lives. Because it's not gonna pass. So screw you and screw the things that it cares about because we will need to get this done by three so people can go home, right? That's the attitude. Not like we're going to take a week discussing this legislation, because it's actually gonna be important, which it probably won't be, in fairness. And so we're gonna take the time, right? No! We're gonna wait to the last second to pass the budget, and then keep everybody up all night. We're not gonna spend a month planning the budget, and doing some timely things to have a discussion that brings regular people in and makes it a better budget. We're gonna wait to the last second, we're gonna scram it all together, and we're gonna make your stay up all night for three days for no reason at all, except we're all really bad at this. Right? So it goes through this process, but it's not real. It's not a real process. I think it's important to note that they are saying they're going to sponsor, they're saying they're gonna amend the bill, and then just telling the Speaker "No, I'm not." So nothing has happened. Literally nothing has happened that's substantive in that process.
Jordan Berg Powers 16:39
Go ahead, Anna.
Anna Callahan 16:40
I was just gonna say it's not random. It's not that they're bad at this. The reason that they put forward bills that are 800 pages with three hours before a vote on it is because they don't want people to read the bill. They don't want people to organize around the bill. "They," we know who we're talking about-- Speaker and leadership and their donors and the group of people that controls the State House and what's allowed to pass there-- they have pre-decided what is going to pass and what is not going to pass. So that it cannot, in fact, be any different from the way that they have pre-decided it should go?
Jordan Berg Powers 17:29
I just want to say that that is the use of a good amendment, because I totally agree that fix to the thing that I said.
Anna Callahan 17:36
My amendment!
Jordan Berg Powers 17:37
That's exactly-- that amendment to what I said is right. You have fixed the thing that I was talking about. Sorry about that Jonathan.
Anna Callahan 17:44
I also want to jump in and and just talk a little bit-- and this I've only realized today, like I learned so much from you guys on this podcast so I just love it! Progressives *could* be using amendments to bring up *anything*. We talk all the time about these black boxes where it goes into a committee, and all the chairs are appointed by the Speaker and the people are on there because the Speaker approved them, and you can't see how they vote and like blah, blah, blah, we complain all the time about that part of the process. And yet, *anyone* could bring *anything* up as an amendment-- AN ENTIRE BILL, and force a vote. We don't *have* to go through that process. And yet, what happens? Everybody pulls their amendments. They put up an amendment so that they can say I have an amendment. Look at how good I am. Look, my constituents, at the list of amendments that I sponsored, and then they deny that amendment, they kill that amendment themselves. I mean, what do they get credit for? They put on their resume that they were the ones who sponsored it, and then did they put on their resume that they were the ones that killed it?
Jordan Berg Powers 19:06
[Laughs]
Jonathan Cohn 19:07
It reminds me of an amusing dynamic in which many legislators who are always horrified at the idea of people roll-calling full on policy amendments, also file policy amendments that they just withdraw, but you're still making a long time filing, it almost looks as though you want it to be voted on to the average person. It looks as though you would actually carry that forward to do something that you're also telling your colleagues is just beyond the pale to do. And obviously anything of your demand, it should be relevant to what you're discussing, but they just take so much off the table immediately, with the one exception is one thing you'd alluded to before, is the times the amendments actually do get through tend to be when it's kind of has the good graces of House leadership, something that they put together sometimes that actually did have process, even though for some reason they can't make it a bill itself and do it that way. An example of that would be the Roe Act provisions last year. There was a process. To her credit, Claire Cronin did have like meetings with a number of state reps to figure out what they could pass that would get people's support before putting something together. The opposite of doing that is what the House did recently, when it came to voting reforms where, when there is an ongoing discussion about extending some of the mail-in voting and early voting reforms and last year, as well as building on them with some other voting rights steps that we can take here. That headed-- that goes to the Election Laws Committee, they would presumably report something out or come out... Rather than going through that process, without even telling the Senate that they were moving anything forward, the House just decided to put together a few of the provisions together, stripping out quite a bit from like the main package there and pass it through a budget supplemental without telling people that that's what they were about to vote on. So like most of the reps didn't fully know how it was different than other language that they saw. So for instance, what the amendment ended up doing from Representative Mike Moran was to make a vote-by-mail permanent for only the biennial state election, and then any municipal election that coincides, which is *none of them*??! I don't know, like...
Anna Callahan 20:09
[laughs]
Jonathan Cohn 21:39
And so leaving out presidential primaries and pretty much all local elections from that and dropping things like Same-day Registration that was a part of the larger package of the VOTES Act, reforms to jail based voting and other steps. They just took parts that they liked, didn't tell anybody, added them in and so everybody's gonna vote for it because they are decent. They're not doing harm. But they just took out a whole bunch of things without any process.
Anna Callahan 22:11
Hmm.
Jordan Berg Powers 22:13
And so I just want to talk lastly about this other piece, which is this idea that-- so one of the things that people who are trying to pass legislation and lobbyists or do is they'll find people connected to leadership to try to sponsor their bill. That makes sense, because again, it's all a lottery. It is not based on actual data, or things that need to fix people's lives or anything else. It's like just random
Anna Callahan 22:38
...or what the people of Massachusetts want.
Jordan Berg Powers 22:39
--whether or not, or when it's just-- , right? It's not democratic in any way. It's just Speaker will allow to get voted on and passed. And so getting somebody who's connected to the small sort of cabal of people, the small group of people who actually make decisions, having connected to them-- be a person saying, "Yes, we should pass this bill," is a way to increase the chances that it will pass. But you get this converse problem, which then if I had to go through the amendment process, to then amend the bill, amend the budget for your priority, the person who's connected leadership is never going to force a vote on your thing, because that would make them not connected to leadership, leadership would get mad, and they'd be ostracized, they'd be bullied out of being effective. And so you get this converse where the people who can help you pass a bill, because they're connected to the right person, they get drinks with the right person, are also people who will never fight for your bill. They will never force votes on your bill. They will never speak loudly for your bill, they won't go out of their way to try, right? They're just there by definition, going to quietly try to get your bill to the people who like it. And so you get this thing where big legislation, also doesn't get amended doesn't get votes to the amendment process, because those people will pull it. And to Anna's earlier point, they have this weird ownership that they'll say you can't bring this up as an amendment because my bill, which of course, is silly, it makes no sense. And none of this is real anyway, it's all for show-- might as well show how many people are actually gonna vote for this thing, right? Let's figure out who supports things. Because I think that's the piece. And that's the thing that I think is most important to me, is like this process should be a process we figure out "who is *for* these things and who isn't?" Who's for Single Payer and who isn't? Who is for making sure that we have healthcare that actually works and who isn't? Who is for making sure that we don't all burn a lot?
Anna Callahan 24:42
And from our perspective, as constituents, is the person that I am voting for, are they actually doing the things that they're telling me that they're doing? Are they in fact, voting for the policies they're promising me they are. The entire reason that I am sending them to that seat and that they're getting paid for by tax dollars to do the job that I am voting for them to do. Are they doing it? And we can't find that out.
Jordan Berg Powers 25:12
I mean, I would say, I would submit to the people Massachusetts that the fact that they won't force votes, and they won't take votes, and they won't advocate for them is [INAUDIBLE], we just have to be more sophisticated and say that clearly. That it's not enough to say that you'll sponsor an amendment. I need you to force a roll call or I don't believe that you actually support it. I think you're lying. You know, the same way that they pass a bill on education and then they don't fund it. They promise us every year they care about our kids, but they don't fund it like they care about our kids. So I just think we need to be clear that this process is not real, and stop engaging in it and be clear that they're lying to us. If you won't vote on it, then you don't believe in it, end of story.
Anna Callahan 25:55
And stop promoting these people who put on their stuff saying, oh, that we love this person because they, they they sponsored an amendment. Like if they pull that amendment, they withdraw that amendment, we got to stop supporting that person.
Jonathan Cohn 26:10
That and because there's only note with a hold on a second, I was just going to-- talk amongst yourselves. I'll get back to it.
Jorden Berg Powers 26:21
Yes.
Anna Callahan 26:22
Amendments. One of the many reasons our state politics is deeply broken. [laughs]
Jordan Berg Powers 26:29
Yeah, that's the weird thing that-- go ahead, Jonathan.
Jonathan Cohn 26:33
Yeah, that was just that. Just kind of reiterating that point of how it just kind of a bizarre phenomenon when people ask you to support amendments that they will go into the job that just reminds you, the point I wanted to make was is that it takes a certain type of cynicism, or like, yeah, I think cynicism is probably the best word when I'm thinking about it. If you're an activist, and you're constantly contacting your legislator about an amendment that the filer withdraws, and then you contact your legislators about something the filer withdraws. And you keep doing that it breeds a cynicism in the process itself. And then to some extent, right, you're right to be cynical about that part of the process. But it becomes dangerous, if that breeds into other parts of the process and makes you not want to engage because you feel like you're just like that you you're having engaged in a bunch of "we're pretending to lobby and you're pretending to "advocate" situation.
Anna Callahan 27:33
Yep, that's what they want. They want nobody engaged. You know.
Jonathan Cohn 27:39
Pretty much. It's like how during that period in the pandemic, when it was just a few members of leadership in the room operating under unanimous consent, and meaning that nobody present objects, they could just pass bills with nobody being in the building. It was kind of the ideal mode of operating.
Anna Callahan 27:54
[laughs] Yeah, it was visually what it usually is, in reality behind the scenes.
Jonathan Cohn 28:03
Well said.
Anna Callahan 28:05
Well, thank you so much, my friends. Wonderful to have you as always. And next week, who knows what we'll talk about. If you want to tell us what to talk about. You can email us, let us know. And if you want me to have better sound effects and not put them at the wrong time like I did last week, then donate somehow. [laughs] We're getting goofy today. It's 90 degrees outside. Jordan's on vacation. Thank you, everybody for listening. If you're still here, we love you. And we'll talk to you next week.
Jordan Berg Powers 28:44
Thanks, everyone.
Jonathan Cohn 28:45
See ya.