Governor Gretchen Whitmer and the Legislature’s Republican leaders met again Tuesday.
They’re trying to reach a truce following the governor’s sweeping budget vetoes.
The vetoes cut money to many popular programs, and outraged Democrats and Republicans. GOP leaders say they’re not ready to return to bargaining on the budget without a promise there won’t be a repeat performance by the governor.
GOP leaders say they’re looking right now for other ways to cooperate.
House Speaker Lee Chatfield says he’s looking for some agreements on policy issues, in particular, criminal justice reforms where he says cooperation seems possible.
“There’s still, there’s still areas that more consensus is needed.”
Chatfield says cooperation on policy questions could set the stage for resuming budget negotiations and going to work on vetoes Republicans and Governor Whitmer all say they’d like to reverse.