Media Laments Virginia’s Youngkin Vetoing Near-Record 157 Bills

Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin likely just did the people of Virginia a favor by vetoing 157 out of the 966 bills that came across his desk after the recently ended legislative session. He also sent another 159 back to the General Assembly with amendments.

Not the “record-setting” year he had last year (when he vetoed 201), but if you saw the headlines from AXIOS and other media outlets, it would be understandable to think that he had up and shut the whole state down:

• “With 157 vetoes so far this year, Youngkin has already rejected more bills than every other Virginia governor in the past 30 years” (AXIOS)
• “Democrats push back on Youngkin’s ‘heartless’ vetoes, budget cuts”(Richmond Times-Dispatch)
• “Youngkin vetoes bills that would have raised minimum wage, given paid sick leave to all and more” (MSNBC)
• “Youngkin’s vetoes take another hit on cannabis reform in Virginia” (Virginia Mercury)
• “Virginia’s governor is again at odds with Democrats as he vetoes labor and gun reform” (The Associated Press)

What? He didn’t kick grandma off Medicare, too?

Regardless of the editorial choice to cover these vetoes from the negative perspective rather than reporting that he signed over 599 bills into law, let’s look at what some of these headline-grabbing vetoed bills would actually have done:

Minimum Wage (HB 1928): According to an analysis from the Virginia Institute for Public Policy and Fletcher Magnum (appointed by Virginia Govs. Bob McDonnell, a Republican, and Terry McAuliffe and Ralph Northam, two Democrats, to serve on the governor’s and General Assembly’s Joint Advisory Board of Economists), this would have led to job losses and cost employers their business.

Paid Sick Leave (HB 1921): In the governor’s own words (from his veto), “Small employers may be unable to comply with this mandate, leading to them to cut back on the number of employees or close altogether.” The 13 states that have similar legislation have higher unemployment today than they did before they instituted paid sick leave.

Cannabis Reform (HB 2531): This would have established a framework for the creation of a retail marijuana market in the commonwealth, to be administered by the Virginia Cannabis Control Authority. Years ago, the General Assembly told Virginians that they couldn’t move forward with retail sales of marijuana because they didn’t have “the framework” to collect a retail sales tax without actually explaining how this proposed consumer product would be different from all of the others that Virginia collects taxes on. So, this law would have established that framework.

Since such a large part of the rationale for “decriminalizing” marijuana sales is to collect the taxes on them, let’s look at what’s happening in the first state to do it. In Colorado, the state that pioneered this industry, 10 years after state “legalization” (it is still a Schedule 1 narcotic, according to federal law), the market has dropped 31% since 2022. The state coffers took in just $282 million in cannabis tax revenues in the last fiscal year, down more than 30% from two years earlier. Now, Coloradans are debating whether or not to repeal legalization.

“Gun Reform”: There were 22 bills on the governor’s desk that ran the gamut from HB 2631, which would have created a five-day waiting period from gun purchase to possession under the guise of completing a “background check” on the purchaser (which gun sellers already do in mere minutes)—to SB 880, which would have prohibited the possession of a firearm in a “public place.” This was what New York state had attempted to do that wound up being declared unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court in its 2022 ruling, New York State Rifle & Pistol Association, Inc. v. Bruen.

Even in the case of amended bills like SB 1105/HB 1716, the Right to Contraception Act, the governor asked the supporters of the bill, who often are heard supporting someone’s “right to choose,” to accept his amended version that adds a provision that says that medical providers with a religious opposition to contraception cannot be compelled to offer it.

This caused state Del. Amy Laufer, a proponent of abortion, to state: “We know everyone deserves access to health care regardless of a provider’s religious stance.”

So, you decide. Did this governor veto more bills than any governor in history? Or was he presented with more bills that deserved vetoing than any other governor in Virginia’s 400-year history?

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