Colorado lawmakers’ choreographed, multiweek budget marathon has hit a sizable speed bump after a Republican triggered the legislative equivalent of the nuclear option — a move made in protest of how the House handled a recent ethics complaint she had filed.
During debate on the state budget Wednesday night, Rep. Brandi Bradley of Littleton asked that the measure — which is so lengthy that it’s known simply as the long bill — be read aloud. Under the state constitution, any lawmaker can request that every line in any piece of legislation be read aloud by a computer.
For the 661-page long bill, that process would take about 15 hours. Just after 6:30 p.m. Thursday, about 24 hours after Bradley first made the motion, a computer program in the House — whose name is Eric — began reciting the bill, line by line and number by number.
The move is among the most significant delay tactics available in the legislature, which runs on tradition and an ironclad 120-day timeline; triggering it this week disrupts the legislature’s budget marathon. Still, the interruption — even if carried through to the full 15 hours — will be temporary: House lawmakers will still have time to send the budget to the Senate early next week, as scheduled, and the House is now expected to work Saturday.
In comments from the House floor Wednesday, Bradley said she was making the request to protest how her ethics complaint against fellow Republican Rep. Ron Weinberg was handled. Last year, Bradley accused Weinberg of making sexually inappropriate comments and of using a copy of a Capitol master key to enter another lawmaker’s office.
“Our own ethical complaint process is broken. It is ripe with abuse, and it must be fixed,” she said from the House floor. “I have been personally victimized both by a member here and by our so-called ethical process.”
A legislative ethics committee, composed of five lawmakers, met to consider Bradley’s complaint. After gathering evidence, the group found probable cause to support two of Bradley’s six allegations.
Weinberg, who has denied sexual harassment allegations in the past, initially requested an evidentiary hearing but later withdrew that request. The ethics committee then recommended that House leadership send Weinberg a formal letter of admonishment and directed him to take sexual harassment training.
In an interview Wednesday night, Bradley said the ethics committee’s recommendations should’ve been brought before the full House for discussion. They were instead sent to House leadership, who sent a letter to Weinberg. Bradley and Rep. Stephanie Luck, a Penrose Republican, said they wanted House rules to more clearly require a chamber-wide discussion for ethics complaints generally, and for Weinberg’s recommendations to come before the full House.
state that the investigative committee “shall make appropriate recommendations to the House of Representatives.” But, the rules say, that clause is triggered only after an evidentiary hearing — which Weinberg ultimately did not pursue.
After Bradley requested the bill’s full reading, House Majority Leader Monica Duran quickly moved to delay the reading until Thursday. The chamber then took up several subsidiary budget bills, about which debate continued on Thursday. The long bill was pushed to the bottom of the queue.
By late afternoon Thursday, lawmakers had dispatched the remaining budget bills. Only the long bill remained, and after a short recess, Eric went to work.
The day had been charged: The other budget bills prompted some contentious debate earlier Thursday, including emotional discussions over cuts to health care coverage for undocumented children and pregnant women. As the budget reading began, lawmakers ate dinner, sat on the balcony outside the House chamber and milled about in the chamber.
Under House rules, Bradley cannot leave the chamber except for brief bathroom breaks. As lawmakers settled back into the chamber, she wiped her eyes and talked with lawmakers from either party. The House’s nonpartisan staff also will stay in the chamber throughout the reading, and Duran said she would need at least 33 lawmakers in the chamber at midnight — part of a quirk of legislative rules — and that she wanted at least that many throughout the evening.
Nearly an hour into the reading, Bradley said she intended to carry the process through the 15-hour duration. She said a last-ditch meeting with leadership early Thursday evening did not satisfy her concerns.
Through spokespeople Thursday, Democratic and Republican leadership declined to comment on Bradley’s criticism of the ethics process.
Other Republican and Democratic lawmakers, including leadership, had been unaware of Bradley’s intent until she made the announcement on the House floor.
Reading the budget bill at length has long served as something of a nuclear option for House Republicans. The budget offers the minority caucus its greatest leverage point because reading it aloud chews up precious calendar time. It also slows and complicates the passage of the rare bill that lawmakers absolutely must adopt, on a prescribed timeline, each and every year.
But triggering that option has always carried the promise of recrimination from Democratic leaders, who hold power over the scheduling of Republican bills. They also can bring lawmakers in to work weekends — a threat that carries extra weight now, as Republicans prepare for their statewide assembly Saturday in Pueblo.
