2021 Session Highlights

June 8th, 2021

The House of Representatives adjourned sine die on Thursday, May 27, and I wanted to highlight some of the policies passed this session that would be most important to House District 51.

The Legislature sent 600 measures to the governor this session, including a historic state budget and major conservative accomplishments in taxes, education, states’ rights, the economy and public safety.

Our major 2021 accomplishments include:

Tax relief

• Reduced personal income tax by 0.25% for all taxpayers (HB2962)
•  Reduced corporate income tax from 6% to 4% (HB2960, HB2961, HB2963)

Budget

• Gave common education its highest ever budget, an approximately $210M increase from last year (HB2900)
• Replenished state savings to record $1.3 billion to prepare Oklahoma in the event of another economic downturn
• Fully funded Medicaid expansion per SQ 802 (SB1045)
• Restored one-time pandemic changes to pension and transportation funds

Education

• Implemented open transfer policy to expand parental choice (SB783)
• Maximized funding formula by making money more closely follow the student to the school that the student actually attends (HB2078)

States’ Rights

• Established constitutional process to challenge federal government overreach (HB1236)
• Expanded pro-life policies (HBs 2441 and 1102, SBs 918, 778 and 779)
• Protected churches from infringement of constitutional worship rights (HB2648, SB368)
• Named Oklahoma a Second Amendment Sanctuary state (SB631)

Government & Elections

• Modernized civil service system to improve state government workforce (HB1146)
• Addressed issues surrounding driver’s license backlogs (HB1059, SB1057)
• Completed fair, transparent, constitutional legislative redistricting plan (HB1198, SB1066)
• Added extra day of in-person early voting (HB2663)
• Improved state questions by disclosing fiscal impacts, allowing recounts (SB947, HB2564)

Economy

• Set framework, $42M incentives for rural broadband expansion (HBs 1124, 2928, 2040 and 2946, SB802)
• Sent $35 million to economic development funds for new jobs (HB2900, SB1082)
• Protected utility customers from a large monthly winter storm bill via securitization that spreads the cost over many years in much smaller monthly payments (SB1049, SB1050)

Public Safety

• Protected public from rioters, government disruptions (HB1674, SB403)
• Required local jails to comply with immigration enforcement (HB2774)

Now that session is over; I’ll be traveling around the district providing legislative updates and meeting with constituents. This is also the time of the year when we start working on legislation ideas for the upcoming 2022 session, so if there are any issues that you feel should be addressed, please feel free to reach out to me.

A few of the bills I passed this year came directly from my constituents who reached out to me with an issue that I wouldn’t have known about without them telling me about it, which is what I serve for. The 2022 session begins on Feb. 7, 2022, but bill filing deadlines will start in December 2021.

It truly is an honor and privilege to represent House District 51. As always, I hope you contact me about any questions or concerns that you may have at the state level. God bless!