The Arkansas Senate on Wednesday approved extracting from a Senate panel stalled bills that would shift the state's presidential primary and the General Assembly's fiscal session.
Senate Bill 8 by Sen. Gary Stubblefield, R-Branch, which would move up Arkansas' presidential primary to join other Southern states previously failed twice in the Senate State Agencies and Governmental Affairs Committee. Senate Bill 5 sponsored by Sen. Jon Woods, R-Springdale, would push the General Assembly's fiscal session in even-numbered years from February to April.
Sen. Joyce Elliott, D-Little Rock, said while speaking against the motion that the body was setting "a very bad precedent" by removing the bills from the committee.
"We have followed a process that we have respected long years in this body," Elliott said. "In less than two months, this will make the second time this body has pulled a bill from a committee to subvert the committee process. We should get used to the fact that we have a process in place and sometimes we don't always win in that process."
No one spoke in favor of the motion.
Senators voted 21-10 to remove those bills from committee and consider them in the full Senate. Extracting a bill from committee requires a majority vote of the 35-member senate.
A vote to suspend the rules and consider the bills in the Senate on Wednesday failed to meet the required two-thirds majority vote. Without suspending the rules, the bills cannot be added to the Senate's calendar for consideration until Friday.
See Thursday's Arkansas Democrat-Gazette for full coverage.