Their goal was to resolve internal differences privately before a long-stalled campaign finance bill reemerges on the Senate floor Friday. But as Senate Democrats and Progressives met Thursday afternoon in a basement conference room near the Statehouse, a pitched debate erupted instead.
With tempers flaring over matters both philosophical and procedural, the group of 18 senators had to call in Senate Secretary John Bloomer (pictured standing at right) to explain how they should revisit legislation pulled abruptly from the floor late last month.
The crux of the issue is this: Two weeks ago, the Senate voted 21-8 to amend a comprehensive campaign finance bill to bar direct corporate contributions to political candidates. But before that and another amendment could be fully attached to the underlying bill, Senate President Pro Tem John Campbell (D-Windsor) ordered it to lie.
In other words, he sent it to legislative purgatory.
In the weeks since, Campbell and the bill’s author, Sen. Jeanette White (D-Windham) have been working behind the scenes to tweak it in order to resolve a bevy of concerns raised during the floor debate. As VTDigger’s Nat Rudarakanchana reported earlier this week, those changes were incorporated into a substitute version of the bill, which was approved Tuesday by the Senate Government Operations Committee.
Oddly, though, despite the fact that more than two-thirds of the Senate had voted in favor of banning corporate contributions, the committee stripped that particular provision from its substitute bill.
That had supporters of the ban fuming at Thursday’s meeting. Chief among them was Sen. Peter Galbraith (D-Windham), who wrote the corporate contribution amendment.
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When he won re-election as Senate President, John Campbell promised everyone that he was going to clean up the procedural train wrecks, internal squabbling, and poor Senate management that had characterized his previous years as President.
Things like this, the Death with Dignity bill, the wind bill, and other examples make it pretty clear that he isn’t capable of making good on that promise.
Hopefully the Democratic caucus has finally learned (the hard way) that Campbell lacks the leadership, political, team-building or managerial skills needed to be an effective Senate President. This needs to be his last term in leadership (or, frankly, in the Senate).