Y’all, we are hustling. Moving. Grooving.
After a tempered start to Kentucky’s 2026 legislative session, we’re finally breaking into a sprint in Frankfort and my ADHD is beginning to thrive once more.
Oh, and after nearly a year of growing out my hair and returning to my natural hair color, I just chopped off at least seven inches and dyed it as dark as it will go without it being black. And I found a *chefs kiss* perfect black blazer for my Frankfort ‘Fits. And Karen the Kia handles the spiral ramps at the Capitol parking garage like an absolute champ.
Hot girl legislative session energy reactivated!
Just in time, too, because we’ve had a helluva week. Let’s recap.
Houston, we have a budget! (Kinda)
In the latest episode of “See Kids, Sometimes Relentless Online Bullying Works,” the House’s final version of the budget bill …
- “Scrapped the cap” on state employee health benefits
- Proposed small (but still there) increases to SEEK funding for schools
- Restores millions towards school transportation (more state funding there = less local districts and taxpayers need to worry about it) than the initial version of the budget cut
So, basically everything everyone was yelling about regarding the House’s first version of House Bill 500. Because no one organizes better than Kentucky’s public educators.
Is it ideal? No. Does the SEEK amount come close to what is needed to cover for years of inflation? No. But is it better than what was initially proposed? Yes.
The changes were unveiled Wednesday evening in a special House A&R meeting, and passed out of the full House Thursday afternoon on an 81-18 vote. Dem Reps. Tina Bojanowski and Ashley Tackett Laferty joined the Republicans in voting yes, while the rest of the Dems voted no.
Now it heads to the Senate, which is definitely going to have a whole slew of changes. Oh, and the legislature is subpoenaing the Beshear administration for information around the state employee health plan, so expect that to change some things, too.
Sprinting “school choice” through
You can tell March is near because more and more bills — especially big-deal ones — are sprinting through legislative hurdles instead of taking them maybe one week at a time.
House Bill 1 — the bill allowing Kentucky to participate in a federal scholarship tax credit program that would provide FEDERAL tax credits for donating to certain groups providing funding and scholarships for private and public schools — is one of them.
It got filed last Thursday and is now ready for a full Senate vote Friday morning. As in tomorrow.
Yeah, so, we’ll see about this. It should land on Gov. Andy Beshear’s desk by EOD tomorrow if they keep their pacing. I’ll be interested in what Beshear will do with it because some have argued — and I am lowkey inclined to agree with them — that since this doesn’t touch state dollars and instead opens up an avenue to get more education funding to Kentucky kids (including those in public schools), that maybe this thing isn’t all that bad.
But I’ve also seen some asking people to stop settling for “shit sandwiches,” so IDK.
The Fairness Rally returns!
The Capitol closure can’t keep a hot girl down, so the annual Fairness Rally moved into the less beautiful Capitol Education Center this year.
A jam-packed room heard from a star-studded roster of speakers, headlined by everyone’s favorite token straight white boy, Gov. Andy Beshear.
No, seriously, I got there right as Beshear came off the stage and in the short walk from the room to the exit, I watched him stop to take selfies at least three times and shook hands basically everyone but me (one person whispered, “Oh my God, I touched him” the moment he left the building). Those who walked in as he left looked downright starstruck, their faces stuck in a gasp for a solid few seconds upon getting inside. This walk could not have been more than a few yards.
His support of the LGBTQ+ community has been a major talking point recently as his national presence rises amid his presidential aspirations and hopes of making the NYT’s bestsellers list — him bringing it up as part of his conversations around the importance of his faith, and the GOP trying to say he loves “mutilating children” (which isn’t true).
But here’s the thing about that: When the GOP started to go after the event on social media, they mainly went after Beshear — sparing the LGBTQ+ community itself.
Rapid-fire notes from #KYGA26
In no particular order:
- House Bill 468 would, among other things, make it more difficult to enforce local fairness ordinances and strip the state Human Rights Commission of some authority. It cleared a House committee Wednesday and has enough readings to get a House vote Friday.
- After withdrawing his first bill to allow those who have an abortion to be charged with homicide, Rep. Josh Calloway filed a new version of it and Rep. Emily Callaway filed a different bill aimed at stripping pregnant people of protections against criminal prosecution for having an abortion. This was a nonstarter a few years ago when Callaway tried it the first time, and I’m thinking it is the same this time around, regardless of the number of bills they file on the topic.
- Remember how a school district, like, told everyone to vote no on Amendment 2 in 2024 via a school sign or social media and it was a whole thing? Yeah, so a measure aimed at making sure public school districts and their employees don’t use public dollars to advocate for or against a ballot question got significantly weakened before passing out of a Senate committee.
- Now, folks would only get hit with fines and maybe a misdemeanor if they do it enough. (They were initially pushing for harsher criminal penalties, a lawsuit option, and needing to take a decade away from working in schools.)
- It can get a Senate vote as early as Friday.
- The data center bill passed out of committee after getting pulled from the agenda a few weeks ago for some fine-tuning. It basically says data centers’ utility costs shouldn’t be on the local residents to pay, but on the centers’ themselves. And also, maybe we should have enough energy supply to make this happen. This one is looking at a full House vote next week, most likely.
- Interesting new bill: Senate Bill 279 would prohibit public funding from going toward covering higher ed programs that result in low incomes.
- Tis’ shell bill szn, y’all! Be on the lookout for a ton of new bills that currently do nothing except “insert gender-neutral language.” They do not care about gender-neutral language. It is a placeholder to get around the bill filing deadline.
Bookmark these links
As a reminder!
- All of the links to bills, resolutions, votes, and more are here.
- This is the committee schedule.
- This is the session calendar.
- This is each day’s lineup of meetings, agendas and start times.
- Legislative action will be livestreamed on KET and the LRC’s YouTube page.
How to follow my work this session
- Subscribe to The Gallery Pass and read it religiously. (And upgrade to a paid subscription if you can!)
- Follow my social media accounts for more real-time updates:
- Read Queer Kentucky — the home to my full-length reporting this session.
- Help cover some gas or an iced coffee via Venmo. Every little bit helps!
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