(INDIANAPOLIS) — Legislators expect a final vote on Monday on a bill letting them call themselves
into session to review emergency declarations.
Governor Holcomb has warned for weeks he believes the bill to be unconstitutional, and said
Wednesday he’ll veto it if it passes as expected. House Speaker Todd Huston (R-Fishers) says
the veto threat was expected — holding the vote Monday leaves time for an override vote before
legislators adjourn.
Several Senate Republicans accused the administration in a stormy committee hearing last
month of not communicating with legislators last summer about its pandemic response. Huston
says he believes Holcomb has worked well with legislators — he and Holcomb both say the
governor asked last year if a special session was necessary, and Huston told him it wasn’t.
But Huston notes governors and legislatures in other states have had far chillier relations over
emergency actions. He and Senate President Pro Tem Rod Bray (R-Martinsville) say they’re
concerned not with what Holcomb has done or will do, but what a future governor might do in the
next emergency.
House Minority Leader Phil GiaQuinta (D-Fort Wayne) calls the constitutional question “tricky,”
and says he hasn’t decided how he’ll vote. He says he plans to review committee testimony,
including former Indiana Supreme Court Justice Frank Sullivan’s prediction of an “unholy mess” if
legislators pass a bill he says won’t survive constitutional scrutiny. Bray and Huston acknowledge
it’s likely to be the courts that ultimately settle the issue.
Last year’s General Assembly adjourned less than two weeks before the worsening pandemic
prompted a six-week lockdown. Legislators didn’t return to the statehouse for eight months.
