A year after Michigan officials recorded the first two positive COVID-19 tests on March 10, 2020, two state lawmakers who had the virus — one Democrat, one Republican — have recovered. But their views over how to handle the pandemic that has killed almost 16,000 Michiganders underscore the Capitol’s deep partisan divide.
Governor Gretchen Whitmer signed two bills in the COVID-19 relief funding package Tuesday afternoon, but vetoed another — as promised — that would have stripped her administration of key executive powers.
After a delay in Census data threw off the timeline for the Michigan Independent Citizens Redistricting Commission (ICRC) to draw its maps, the group unanimously voted Friday to try to get a deadline extension from the Michigan Supreme Court.
In March 2020, the pandemic hit Michigan, bringing upheaval to schools. When Gov. Gretchen Whitmer closed schools buildings that month due to the climbing number of COVID-19 cases, districts across the state scrambled to craft a plan to meet students’ needs virtually. Over the last year, the pandemic has highlighted the inequities the struggling, underfunded Partnership schools face while they work to make ends meet during this current school year.
The House passed sweeping voting rights, redistricting, campaign finance and ethics reform, late Wednesday night along party lines in a 220 to 210 vote, but the historic package will face an uphill battle in the Senate as no Republicans currently support the bill.
The Michigan Senate passed on Tuesday a new $2.3 billion supplemental funding bill for COVID-19 relief that also contains what Democrats referred to as a “political poison pill.”
Gov. Gretchen Whitmer announced Monday that Great Start Readiness Program (GSRP), Head Start, adult education and young adult special education classroom teachers are now eligible to receive up to $500 grants under a new expansion of the MI Classroom Heroes COVID-19 grant program.
In Michigan, the seven Democrats in the U.S. House voted for and all seven Republicans voted against President Joe Biden’s $1.9 trillion pandemic aid package early Saturday, in a rush to both boost COVID-19 vaccine funding and get legislation to the president’s desk before unemployment benefits expire in mid-March. The package, dubbed the American Rescue Plan, passed 219-212.
The governors of Michigan and Maryland, as well as the mayor of Denver, Colo., debated who gets to control who should oversee new federal transportation money — states or city governments — and how it should be used at a mostly cordial hearing Wednesday with members of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works.
“Discrimination based on hairstyles has long served as a thinly-veiled excuse to discriminate based on race,” Rep. Sarah Anthony (D-Lansing) said. “This form of prejudice is a real problem, one that countless men, women and children are forced to face every day.”
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