Who’s new in the Michigan House of Representatives
Updated Jan 05, 2021;
Posted Jan 05, 2021
The House Chamber pictured at the Michigan State Capitol in Lansing on Thursday, April 25, 2019.Neil Blake
Facebook Share
The new legislative session brings with it substantial turnover for the Michigan House of Representatives, which will have 28 new lawmakers serving their first full terms in office.
Most of the freshman class will fill House seats vacated by members who hit their six-year term limit serving in the state House, although some defeated incumbents or are replacing members who sought other offices last fall.
Speaker-elect Jason Wentworth, R-Clare, and Democratic Leader-elect Donna Lasinski, D-Scio Township, will fill the leadership slots left open by the departures of former Reps. Lee Chatfield and Christine Greig.
The Michigan House on Monday passed a $465 million supplemental spending bill that would push millions of COVID-focused dollars to small businesses, direct care workers, and testing and vaccination efforts.
The bill, which includes $220 million to extend unemployment benefits to 26 weeks through March, will head next to Gov. Gretchen Whitmer s desk for her signature.
The Republican-led Legislature had negotiated with the Democratic governor for roughly three weeks after Whitmer asked for a $734 million supplemental and $100 million in direct financial support for small businesses and families.
The supplemental passed 97-5 by the House includes $55 million in small business survival grants, $57 million for vaccination operations and $22.5 million for testing of vulnerable populations.
LANSING Michigan s Republican-led House on Monday capped its two-year session by finalizing a $465 million spending bill to fund additional COVID-19 testing, vaccine deployment, small business relief and worker assistance.
That’s atop the $900 billion federal relief package Congress is expected to begin voting on later Monday.
The state relief package sailed through the lower chamber in a 97-5 vote, opposed by a handful of small-government Republicans and Democrats concerned by an unrelated provision that would allow trucks carrying hazardous materials to cross the Ambassador Bridge into Detroit.
The House vote ended a week-long negotiation over COVID-19 relief. Talks were complicated by Republican animosity of Whitmer s coronavirus restrictions, including continuation of a ban on indoor restaurant dining, and the pending resignation of state budget director Chris Kolb, who is leaving the administration next month for a job at the University of Michigan.