We’ve reached the end of the 2026 legislative session. Sine Die was Thursday, March 12 — and as always, there’s a lot to report.
This is a longer update than usual, but it’s important you have the full picture of what happened this session and what it means for your family. Let me start with the issue that dominated this session: the state’s operating budget.
$80 billion in — Still coming up short
The Legislature approved the 2025–27 supplemental operating budget, pushing total spending to $80.206 billion. To put this in perspective: When Republicans last led the Senate in 2017, the budget was $38 billion. Since Democrats took control, it has grown by an astounding $42 billion.
That kind of growth should deliver results. Instead, we’re seeing the opposite: spending is rising faster than family incomes. And when that happens, the next step is always the same — more taxes. That’s exactly what we saw this year.
In fact, the state expects about $82.3 billion in revenue. But at current spending levels, we’re headed toward roughly $92 billion, a gap of up to $10 billion. We’re spending more than ever, and still coming up short. See the chart below.
Even worse, to balance the budget this year, the majority leaned on one-time fixes: draining reserves, tapping the rainy-day fund, shifting money from other priorities, and assuming hundreds of millions in spending will simply never happen. Washington can’t afford this kind of budgeting.