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Is Missouri really that far gone? The sneaky progressivism of Missouri - including the state GOP! [1]

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Date: 2023-06-21  

You might be forgiven if you’re scratching your head after reading the title of this article.

Missouri, after all, hasn’t elected a democrat for president since 1996 (though Obama came close in 2008).

As of June 2022, the GOP that controls the state has essentially banned abortion. There are not even any exceptions for rape or incest.

The GOP that controls the state has also recently banned gender-affirming surgery and treatment for minors, and banned transgender people from playing on sports teams for the gender they identify with.

Missourians haven’t elected a democrat for a statewide office since 2018, and there are currently zero democrats in elected statewide offices. We’re talking about the state of Josh Hawley, for crying out loud! This is also the state where former Attorney General (and current US Senator) Eric Schmitt sued St. Louis County to prevent them from implementing certain perfectly reasonable health restrictions during the Covid pandemic. And so on, and so forth. In 20 years, the state has gone from a swing state to one in which every political handicapper automatically categorizes every statewide election as “safe republican.” And with good reason.

Those are all issues which have made the national news. It would be perfectly understandable if you thought Missouri had turned into a hotbed of far-right republicanism.

But once you start delving deeper into some issues, reality is far more complicated. Many of the conservative hot button issues the GOP in this state has been pushing are not really all that popular with Missouri voters. In fact, a few things they’ve tried to push have been downright unpopular. And at the state level, once you strip out all the “culture wars” issues, a lot of what the GOP has accomplished — at least in the last couple years under governor Mike Parson — have been downright progressive.

Read on …

Exhibit #1:

In early 2017, the Missouri state assembly, led by the majority republican party, passed legislation that would make Missouri a right-to-work state. The bill was signed by then-governor Eric Greitens in February 2017 over vociferous objections by labor and democrats.

It didn’t last.

Soon afterwards, labor organizations began collecting signatures for a referendum to overturn the legislation. Just six months after Greitens signed the bill, organizers gathered enough signatures to put it on the ballot, and as a result the law was suspended pending outcome of the vote. The vote was originally scheduled for the November general election ballot, but republicans, doing anything they could to try to defeat it, put it on the August primary ballot instead. It didn’t work. That August, voters overturned the law by a whopping 67% to 33% margin, even though, as of 2017, only 8.7% of the state’s labor force belonged to a union. That has since risen to 9.6% as of last year. Thus, Missouri is now a pro-union state.

Exhibit #2:

In 2018, newly installed GOP governor Mike Parson signaled support for a ballot referendum to raise Missouri’s gas tax by 10 cents/gallon (which had been opposed by Greitens). As soon as I read Parson was in favor of that, I was surprised and began wondering if he might end up not being that bad for a GOP governor? How often do you get a republican supporting a tax increase, even if it’s for the gas tax for road improvements? Not very often. The measure failed at the ballot box, with 54% of voters rejecting it. Interestingly, that still didn’t dissuade Parson and some of the state GOP from pushing for the tax increase anyway. Missouri democrats were, of course, on board with the plan. Finally, in 2021 the GOP-led state assembly tried again and passed a 12.5 cent/gallon gas tax increase spread out over 5 years. The bill included a provision to get a refund on the tax increase once a year by filling out a form with the state Dept. of Revenue. But how many people will actually save their gas tax receipts to get this refund and bother filling out the form? Probably few, so that provision was effectively symbolic. Mike Parson signed the bill in July 2021. Afterward, an attempt to gather enough signatures for another referendum to overturn the tax increase was abandoned. So, we have a republican state assembly and a republican governor in a republican state actually supporting a tax increase!

Exhibit #3:

In November 2022, the voters of Missouri approved Amendment 3 to legalize recreational cannabis. The measure passed by a decent (though not spectacular) margin of 53% to 47%. Medical marijuana had already been legalized by referendum in 2018, when voters approved Amendment 2 by a margin of 66% to 34%. Prior to that, CBD oil and partial marijuana decriminalization were approved by the state assembly and then-governor democrat Jay Nixon in 2014.

It should be noted that on the same day Missouri voters approved the 2022 measure, similar measures failed in Arkansas, South Dakota and North Dakota, and passed in Maryland. Yes, that’s correct: Missouri had the same outcome as the (deep) blue state and bucked the trend of the other three red states!

As an aside, I note that I’m personally against legalization, but I nonetheless recognize the issue is one usually supported by progressives. Recreational use of marijuana is now legal in Missouri.

Exhibit #4:

Possibly the most interesting — and far-reaching — exhibit of this theme concerns the state’s 2022 and 2023 budgets. The last couple of years, Missouri, like a lot of other states, has had large budget surpluses. With republicans in complete control of the state government, you would think there’d be efforts to use all that extra money to give Missourians ginormous tax refunds, spend on anti-woke initiatives, donate money to Texas to “help secure the border,” and all the usual things republicans clamor about these days. Right?

You would be wrong.

Let’s start with the 2022 state assembly session. The state was looking at a huge increase in revenue and a record amount of money to spend, if they so desired. And it turns out, they so desired! The following article from April 2022 is a must-read:

Missouri Senate approves record budget, adds $1.2B to House spending

Hopefully the following quote from a democratic legislator from St. Louis County will catch your attention:

“This is probably one of the most progressive budgets we have ever done,” Sen. Doug Beck, D-St. Louis County, said.

On the flip side, a contingent of GOP members calling themselves the Conservative Caucus — who were actually a minority of the GOP in the Missouri Senate (7 of 24 GOP members) — lamented all these spending shenanigans:

That brought Sen. Bill Eigel, R-Weldon Spring, to his feet to denounce the spending plan as “the death knell of fiscal conservatism” in the state.

After all the debating and back-and-forth between the state House and Senate, a record $49 billion budget was approved which was soon signed by governor Parson. The budget included the following:

$2.5 billion to pay for expanded eligibility under the Medicaid program.

$925 million to increase payments to providers serving people with developmental disabilities, nursing home patients and those who need help to remain in their homes through the Medicaid program.

$461 million for construction projects on 13 four-year university campuses, community colleges and the State Technical College of Missouri, paid from federal COVID-19 aid. Each school is expected to match the state’s contribution to the construction plan.

$411 million for water and wastewater infrastructure upgrades, including projects to eliminate lead service lines.

$250 million to expand broadband internet access for homes and businesses in remote locations.

$214 million to fully fund the state’s share of public school transportation costs.

Almost sounds like a mini-version of Biden’s Build Back Better. Republicans spent years gradually wresting control of the state government from democrats, only to ultimately do all kinds of things democrats wanted to do anyway! Democrats loved the budget so much some spoke of it in nearly ecstatic terms:

“I think this is my first year in the House where I will be voting for all the budget bills,” said state Rep. Peter Merideth, D-St. Louis, who is in his sixth year in the legislature. “This is by far the best budget this state has seen, maybe ever, but certainly my time being aware of it.”

The budget did include a tax rebate, but at $500 million was only half of what some republican legislators in the state House originally wanted. And, given that the budget was some $9 billion larger than the previous year’s budget, the rebate was fairly modest in the grand scheme of things.

But there was still more to come.

Exhibit #5:

Prior to the 2023 budget session, governor Parson gave his State of the State speech in January. In the speech he outlined his priorities for the upcoming budget session. What’s noteworthy here is that his speech was praised by democrats and met with skepticism by some republicans. Here is why:

Parson managed to bring Democratic lawmakers to their feet over and over again during his speech Wednesday, and [House Minority Leader, D-Springfield, Crystal] Quade praised the governor for offering initiatives that she said, “Democrats have been fighting for for decades.” The governor unveiled a plan to spend $78.5 million to increase subsidies that help low-income families pay for child care. He pledged $700 million to public schools, including $56 million to expand pre-kindergarten options to all four-year-old children eligible for free and reduced priced lunch at no cost He promised to spend more than $400 million for higher education and $4.3 million for a new plan to improve Missouri’s maternal mortality rate. He also wants lawmakers to approve an immediate 8.7% cost of living increase for state employees.

All of that is on top of the items passed last year. I ask again — does that sound like the priorities of a republican, or a democrat?

Exhibit #6:

The 2023 budget session featured a number of proposals filed by GOP lawmakers to implement a lot of the hot-button issues conservatives rant about these days. Fortunately, most of those proposals died once they got to the state Senate. A proposal passed by the state House to include in the budget anti-diversity language was defeated on a 14-18 vote in the state Senate when moderate republicans, concerned about the state's ability to attract workers, joined with democrats to kill the proposal. Similarly, another budget proposal passed by the state House to defund libraries in the state because they threatened to sue over a 2022 law that put restrictions on sexually explicit material available in libraries was nixed once it got to the state Senate. While this certainly didn’t overturn the 2022 law, at least it didn’t make things worse (be thankful for small favors — right?). In the meantime, the ACLU has joined in with librarians in a suit to overturn the law.

But back to the budget. After all the bickering over the culture wars issues was over, for a second year in a row state lawmakers passed another record-setting budget that included a host of items democrats have been clamoring for for some time. The $51 billion budget, whose individual spending bills were ultimately approved by large majorities in both houses, included:

$233 million to fully fund public school transportation for a 2nd consecutive year.

$56 million to expand pre-kindergarten programs.

$78 million to increase child care subsidy payments.

Boost funding to higher education including a 7% increase in institutional funding. New projects added include a new veterinary hospital and a research slaughterhouse at the University of Missouri. Every campus of the state university system will receive money for new projects, and $20 million was approved to fund considerable expansion of UM-St Louis.

$30 million to support operations at veterans nursing homes. These had been funded in the past from casino fees, but far fewer people are visiting gambling boats than in the past.

$250 million to boost pay for direct care aides and $32 million to increase funding for area agencies on aging.

$300 million for a new psychiatric hospital in Kansas City.

$13.7 million for 100 new workers at the Department of Social Services Children’s Division.

There were a lot of smaller but still worthwhile projects that were funded as well. Another big project badly needed in the state — and which both republicans and democrats alike could agree on — was a $2.8 billion to add a lane in each direction to I-70 between Wentzville and Blue Springs (which is most of the length of the state). Governor Parson had originally proposed a “mere” $859 million for the project, which was passed by the House, but once it got to the state Senate lawmakers bumped the figure up considerably. Yes, I know this is for roads and not transit and all that sort of thing, but realistically, if you’ve ever driven this stretch of highway you’d probably agree it’s badly in need of an upgrade.

If that weren’t enough, the budget also included a 8.7% raise for state employees, and a new minimum wage of $16/hour for state workers. Base pay for teachers was also upped to $38,000. Still not great, but an improvement nonetheless.

Overall, in spite of all bickering over the culture wars issues — some of which made national headlines — much of that went nowhere and lawmakers ended up focusing on actual projects and programs that will make actual differences to many of the people in the state. Once again, not bad for a state controlled by republicans.

I suspect that, over time, some of these “culture wars” items Missouri republicans have passed will by overturned by the voters, particularly abortion. A poll by the New York Times last year showed Missourians evenly split over whether abortion should be mostly legal, or mostly illegal — 47% to 47%. A similar poll conducted by Pew Research in 2014 showed somewhat greater support for abortion bans in Missouri, 50% to 45%, suggesting Missourians’ anti-abortion views have softened somewhat over the intervening eight years. An even more recent poll from PRRI earlier this year shows Missourians supporting abortion rights in most or all cases at 59%. Missourians might get the opportunity to vote on the issue next year, which definitely bears watching. If the pro-union and marijuana legalization votes are any indication, Missouri might really still have an underlying blue streak waiting to be awoken.

I think what’s most interesting in all of this is, Missouri has actually been here before. In fact, you could almost say it hasn’t changed in 120 years. From 1905 to 1909, the governor of Missouri was democrat Joseph W. Folk. Folk was a Progressive Era politician who simultaneously pursued a bevvy of antitrust prosecutions, investigated machine politicians, was a friend of unions, rooted out corrupt politicians and businessmen and passed slew of typical Progressive Era initiatives while governor … while also passing closing-on-Sunday legislation, made racetrack gambling illegal, and in general had a reputation as a strict moralist. If you can imagine it, think of Bernie Sanders mixed with Jerry Falwell, with the Falwell side dominating the morality issues, and the Sanders side dominating most everything else. I note that that particular combination wasn’t unusual back then … but it almost seems as if Missouri is really still there after all these years. It’s like this weird combination of some progressive desires mixed with some of the “culture wars” issues … though it’s not clear, nowadays, exactly how popular those culture wars issues are among the state’s voters. Maybe it’s just a function of Missouri’s sizeable working class population? As in — economically liberal but socially conservative? Regardless, my guess is that Parson and the more moderate state republicans sense this (consciously or not) and are willing to enact a fair amount of progressive budget initiatives partly out of a sense of practicality but also, perhaps, to steal some of the democrats’ thunder. I have no idea whether this will last or what the state GOP would do if they didn’t have such a large budget surplus to work with. But the fact they did have such a large amount of revenue to work with and did decide to spend it largely on items typically important to democrats is, I think, telling. It seems to indicate that a good chunk of the state GOP is aware that many of democrats’ desires are perfectly reasonable and worthy of implementation. Whether or not this is a fleeting phenomenon that will last only as long as the state has such generous amounts of revenue, or whether this (unintentionally, no doubt) will lead to the emergence of a semi-progressive wing of the GOP, I know not. But it’s worth keeping tabs on.

If the state GOP passes both progressive budgetary items and “culture wars” laws, harking back to the days of democrat Joseph W Folk, but the voters overturn some — or maybe even most — of those culture wars laws, as well as making the state a pro-union one and legalizing marijuana … is Missouri really that far gone?

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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/6/21/2168553/-Is-Missouri-really-that-far-gone-The-sneaky-progressivism-of-Missouri-including-the-state-GOP

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