BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) - Weeks after a divided Louisiana House elected a new Republican speaker whose leadership style was little-known, Clay Schexnayder’s financial and appointment decisions are offering a few hints about how he’ll oversee the fractious, 105-member chamber.
Republicans who worried Schexnayder would give away too much to the Democrats who got him elected say they see encouraging signs of a conservative bent in his first sizable financial decision, involving Louisiana’s income forecast. Democrats sidelined in the decision-making of last term’s GOP House speaker say they are heartened by Schexnayder’s bipartisan committee assignments.
In a chamber where it often seems that no one’s ever happy, Schexnayder appears to be giving everyone a little something to like - so far. Navigating the partisan political minefield in the months ahead, however, could prove difficult to keep it that way, with a contingent of Republicans trying to pull the chamber further to the right and Democrats trying to keep that from happening.
An Ascension Parish car repair shop owner in his third-term, Schexnayder won the speaker’s job with the support of 22 other Republicans, all 35 Democrats and the House’s two independents. Forty-five Republicans voted for a competing Republican, Rep. Sherman Mack.
Democratic Gov. John Bel Edwards urged Democratic lawmakers to vote for Schexnayder, and that set off conservative Republicans on the losing end of the speaker’s vote, who insisted Schexnayder would be tightly tied to Edwards.
Schexnayder started to chip away at claims of a tight alliance with the governor at his first meeting of Louisiana’s income forecasting panel, the Revenue Estimating Conference.
The Edwards administration sought to follow the advice of two nonpartisan economists and boost state income projections. Commissioner of Administration Jay Dardenne backed a proposal to give Louisiana another $170 million to spend this budget year and another $103 million next year.
Schexnayder balked - and instead recommended raising this year’s forecast by $94 million and next year’s projections by only $400,000. He called it a more conservative approach.
Republican Senate President Page Cortez backed Schexnayder. Dardenne objected. With the three leaders unable to reach an agreement, no changes were adopted.
House GOP delegation leader Blake Miguez, who opposed Schexnayder for speaker, applauded his forecasting decision. But Miguez’s praise came tempered with suggestions that Schexnayder had a way to go to win the trust of House Republicans who voted for Mack.
“Fiscal conservative Republicans are very pleased with the attention that (Schexnayder) has given to this very important budget issue,” Miguez said in a statement. “He has taken the first step in a longer journey of building back their confidence. Our Republican delegation looks forward to the opportunity in helping him take the next steps.”
Edwards, meanwhile, downplayed the dispute: “I really believe that we’re going to be able to work through this.”
While conservative Republicans saw promising signs in Schexnayder’s financial decisions, Democrats pointed to Schexnayder’s committee assignments for signs they could fare well under the new speaker.
Schexnayder rewarded his Democratic supporters with chairmanships on five of the 16 subject-matter committees and a similar number of vice chairmanships as well.
“We think he did an admirable job with it. As far as the Democrats are concerned, we have more leadership positions then we’ve had recently,” said Shreveport Rep. Sam Jenkins, head of the House Democratic Caucus. “We feel like the new speaker is somebody we can work with.”
Still, Schexnayder kept key chairmanships on the budget and tax committees and the panel that will redraw the legislative and congressional district maps reserved for GOP lawmakers in a chamber where Republicans hold 68 of 105 seats. Perhaps most importantly, Republicans will have controlling majorities on all committees.
Edwards said he was gratified to see both Schexnayder and Cortez, who followed the same approach as the House speaker, give leadership positions to Democrats in “basic proportions to their makeup of the body as a whole.”
While Democrats did better than some Republicans hoped, Jenkins noted Democrats had concerns about certain committees tilting very heavily to Republican majorities. And Jenkins said Democrats worry about the income forecasting dispute.
Reactions on both sides of the aisle demonstrate Schexnayder’s political tightrope. The new House leader describes his decision-making this way: “My whole objective with being speaker is to be able to find a path where we all work together, moving things forward.”
___
EDITOR’S NOTE: Melinda Deslatte has covered Louisiana politics for The Associated Press since 2000. Follow her at http://twitter.com/melindadeslatte
Please read our comment policy before commenting.