The last vote taken late Monday night in the Senate killed a bill that critics said would have sanctioned “racial profiling” in law enforcement.
Senators were heading into their eighth hour of debate after the lunch break and had just spent 30 minutes deciding how to define health care to exclude abortions. Next, they had to decide whether to keep alive the most sweeping immigration enforcement bill introduced this session.
Three pages of amendments were in front of them from the Senate Judiciary Committee, which removed key provisions of Senate File 124, titled “Illegal immigration-identify, report, detain and deport.”
Senate President Bo Biteman, R-Ranchester, stood up at his desk and voiced concern about the quality of the legislation the upper chamber was putting out.
“At what point do we pull the plug on some of these bills that aren’t quite ready for prime time?” he asked. “I know we try our best to accommodate our fellow senators who we care about and we respect and the issues.
“But trying to drag bills across the finish line that are so heavily amended and so in need of a lot of work, I don’t think does this chamber justice.”
Lawmakers were up against a hard deadline Monday to get bills past an initial vote on the floor. Any bill that didn’t get pushed forward to a second reading that day would die. Nine bills met this fate in the Senate when leadership adjourned, and 38 bills met the same fate in the House.
Spanish 
English