Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper, right, talks with Pennsylvania Gov.-elect Tom Wolf before a session at the National Governors Association meeting Saturday outside Denver. (Photo by Brendan Neville for The Denver Post)
The nation’s governors say they are as fed up as voters with the gridlock in Washington. And they say the message from the 2014 election is clear: do something.
“The onus is on Republicans to govern,” said Utah Gov. Gary Herbert, a Republican and vice-chairman of the National Governors Association. “There are issues out there that need to be addressed that were kicked down the road for way too long and I think they will do themselves a very significant disservice and make it more difficult for them to win the White House in 2016 if they don’t in fact get some things done. They need to find a way to work together.”
The National Governors Association met Saturday at a hotel outside Denver for a seminar designed to help orient the newly chief executives and find common ground on a number of issues affecting states. Seven governors-elect attended the meeting at the Westminster Westin and five sitting governors.
In response to questions, the chief executives identified a host of issues where the stalemate in Washington is making it harder at the state level, including a bill regarding sales tax for online retailers, money for road and bridge construction and the federal health care law.
Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper, a Democrat, is the bipartisan group’s chairman. He said the new Republican-dominated Congress must find common ground with President Barack Obama on key issues.
“I don’t think it’s necessarily bad from a Democratic perspective,” he said of the new GOP-run Congress. “The Republican Party has a real opportunity here, but they have to negotiate and find some common ground and make sure there are real solutions the president can support.”
Connecticut Gov. Dan Malloy, a Democrat, expressed frustration at the inaction in years past and said Congress needs to take a cue from the states.
“You can’t blame getting nothing done on anyone else if you are a governor,” he said. “It’s a whole different mindset to be governor. If you don’t get something done in a year or two years or three years or four years it’s nobody else’s fault but yours. And let’s hope that approach to getting things done takes over the Congress of the United States and we make progress on very serious issues.”
The governors who attended the seminar included Hickenlooper, Herbert, Malloy, Missouri Democratic Gov. Jay Nixon and Montana Democratic Gov. Steve Bullock. The governors-elect who came to Denver included Arizona Republican Doug Ducey, Arkansas Republican Asa Hutchinson, Hawaii Democrat David Ige, Maryland Republican Larry Hogan, Nebraska Republican Pete Ricketts, Pennsylvania Democrat Tom Wolf and Rhode Island Democrat Gina Raimondo.
