On Saturday, March 12, the General Assembly adjourned sine die. Sine die is Latin for “without any future date being designated (as for resumption).”
Of the 2,141 bills introduced by the House and the Senate this session, 1,096 failed to pass, and 842 are headed to the Governor to either be signed, amended, or vetoed. I am pleased to report that 12 of my bills passed both the House and the Senate, and are headed to the Governor for his consideration.
Session Statistics can be found here https://lis.virginia.gov/cgi-bin/legp604.exe?221+oth+STA
According to G. Paul Nardo, Clerk of the House of Delegates, as of this writing (March 14), the House Clerk’s Office has enrolled 747 bills for the signatures of the presiding officers (Speaker for the House and Lt. Governor for the Senate), and 354 bills have been communicated to the Governor’s Office for his review. The Governor has acted on 30 bills to date; 29 bills have been signed into law (“chapterized”), and one bill has been vetoed. As bills become “chapterized”, you may visit here to view them. https://lis.virginia.gov/cgi-bin/legp604.exe?221+lst+CHP
The Governor’s deadline to recommend amendments or veto legislation from the 2022 Regular Session is Monday, April 11, 2022, at 11:59 p.m. Constitutionally, the Governor has a 30-day window in which he must act on bills sent to him after a Regular Session of the General Assembly concludes.
While I am proud of our accomplishments this session, more work still lies ahead in the coming weeks. As I wrote in my last column, deliberations on the budget continue. As such, the budget bills HB/SB 29 and HB/SB 30 were continued to a 2022 Special Session with HJR 455. The Governor now has the authority to recall the General Assembly to Richmond to complete work on the budget, as well as the bills that remain pending in conference committees, including a measure I oppose which is to help bring the Washington Commanders to Virginia. We also must fill two seats on the Virginia Supreme Court.