His comments come after Nebraska Legislative Leader Sen. John Arch (R) said he was limiting major amendments to bills introduced, most likely eliminating the last best path to the proposed bill. Lippincott.
“The time for adding bills to bills is over,” Arch told members Friday morning.
The state legislative session ends April 18, although members only have four meeting days scheduled after this weekend. Although Nebraska Gov. Jim Pillen (R) could call a special session to consider the proposal, it’s unclear whether the bill would get the votes needed to overcome a filibuster.
“He doesn’t have the votes to get out of committee, and he doesn’t have the votes to close,” said Tony Baker, the legislative aide to Sen. Tom Brewer (R), referring to the process to end an obstruction. “The governor could call a special session. It’s not advisable if you don’t have the votes.”
A supporter of the proposal, says Sen. Julie Slama (R), lamented his fate in an X post on Fridaystating, “High pressure tactics in Nebraska’s nonpartisan unicameral do not work well and usually backfire. »
Nebraska is one of only two states to award electoral votes among statewide and congressional district winners, a system that allowed Biden to win an electoral vote in a swing district in the Omaha area in 2020. Lippincott’s bill would return Nebraska, a solidly red state, to a winner-takes-all system in which the statewide winner is entitled to all of their electoral votes.
Lippincott’s legislation was on hold until Tuesday, when Trump and Pillen came out in favor of it. Hours earlier, Charlie Kirk, a top Trump ally, had asked his major social media followers to pressure Pillen and state lawmakers to advance the legislation.
On Wednesday evening, one of Lippincott’s Republican colleagues — Slama — unsuccessfully sought to add his bill as an amendment to unrelated legislation. The amendment was deemed irrelevant and a vote to overturn the decision failed.
Lippincott was still hopeful Thursday that his proposal could be added to another bill, while Pillen seemed less optimistic.
“Nebraska conservatives need to get in the game and make their voices heard,” Pillen said at an unrelated news conference. “We can’t solve the winner problem in 30 hours. This has been a problem for 30 years. We must win the elections.
Slama said Friday that for those who have recently championed the winner’s proposition, it probably would have been more helpful to pay attention to our elections from a few weeks (or years) ago.
Kirk, the founder and CEO of Turning Point USA, planned to travel to Omaha on Tuesday for a rally to call for passage of the proposal. Church said Friday X that Pillen should call a special session, adding that Trump “needs that electoral vote in November.”
Democrats and some Republicans in Nebraska had been reluctant to have this question imposed on them during the already busy final days of their session.
“This is a tweet,” Sen. Machaela Cavanaugh, a Democrat who represents Omaha, said before Wednesday’s vote. “We’re being led by a tweet, and that’s not how we should make policy.”
Michael Scherer contributed to this report.
correction
A caption accompanying a previous version of this story misstated the title of Nebraska State Senator John Arch. He is the leader of the Legislative Assembly and not the Speaker of the House. The caption has been corrected.
washingtonpost
