We are back now with overtime with Representative Puri, who's the House Democratic leader.

Jordyn, why don't you start the conversation?

I was just curious again, going back to this roundtable with Speaker Hall yesterday, we talked a lot about transparency.

However, when asked about Freedom of Information Act, extending the governor and legislature to be to public records request, he seemed to really pump the brakes on that, saying that was not an immediate priority of his and instead listed a number of other things like closing the lawmaker lobbyist pipeline.

I was just curious to ge your reaction on him seemingly putting FOIA to the side for right now.

Well, I think that's a mistake.

And I think, you know, when you you are running the show in the Michigan House as a speaker, these are the decisions you have to make.

You can't just kind of rely on messaging anymore.

And so this is something that they've said that they would be supportive in the past.

I know that the Senate is interested in moving this issue.

And so Matt Hall will have a decision on his hand, and I hope he does support the FOIA legislation.

You know, if Democrats are so interested in that, why didn't it happen while Democrat had full control of the process?

Yeah, well, you know, that that is a questio for for for former Speaker Tate.

I know that there's a number of this.

I know there's a number of my caucus, including myself, that are very supportive of the initiative.

Representative, what's your stance on this tip stuff?

Are you guys going to play ball or are the union leaning on you and say, Don't.

You know, look like if I'm, you know, the House Democrats will be ready?

I think, you know, I think the fortunate thing about the situation that we find ourselves as as House Democrats is that prior to different than the prior terms we do have a Democratic Senate, we do have a Democratic governor.

And so we have the luxury of working kind of in uniso and making sure that, you know, the legislation that's comin out of the House is going to be meeting the need of both of those stools of this it legs of the stool.

And so with this issue, you know, I know that there's a number of opinions on our side.

We're kind of waiting to see where the overall negotiation goes.

But, you know, I think obviously there's plenty on our side that are happy with where things are a and don't want to see a change.

But the dynamics of Lansing aren't as such.

And so we will engag in the conversation as needed.

You're an individual lawmaker you represent 90,000 people in the state capital.

What do you think the tip which should be?

You know, I think we should follow the the will of the of the people.

I think that.

You think it should be 100%.

One of the many.

Yeah.

Yes.

I I'm more aligned to seeing it be over there.

We've seen this happen in other states.

I think that some of the talking points aren't completely accurate or in line should say in line with how this is played out in other states.

And so, you know, so yeah, so that for me personally, my politics, that's where I would be one.

Of the levers that minority caucuses have is taking a united caucus position on something.

Do you think that you could get a caucus position on the minimum wage and the earned sick time?

Yeah, you know, the caucu position is something that it's it's it's a lever that we didn't use, to be candid.

We didn't use the whole lot the last two years.

So we have a number of caucu members that just haven't gone through that process with an issue like this.

You know I think we're going to continue to canvass the caucus just to see where they're at.

You know, I would be remiss if I didn't mention tha there is a spectrum of opinions on this.

And so so, you know, I think first and foremost, we would want to talk to our colleagues and kind of just understan broadly where the caucus is at and and then go from there.

But you did actually say that that there was a diversity of opinion.

Do you think that you can come to a caucus position on those issues?

I don't see why we couldn't.

But again, you know, like I'm not I'm not speaking for the caucus on this issue yet.

I you know, I think this is something that would require a level of conversation amongst the 52 of us just to kind of broadly see where we're all at.

You know, I think there's an inkling, there's speculation, but this isn't something that we've talked as a as a group in whole yet.

Representatives Can we fix the roads without raising new revenue?

I don't think that's possible.

Personally, with my understanding of the budget and my time as the chair of the Subcommittee on Transportation, you know, obviously things change, but from the industry experts that I was talking to, the fiscal shortfall seems to be in the rang of about $3.9 billion annually.

I just think that that number is too large to overcome by robbing Peter to pay Paul in the budget.

And so I'm you know if there's a way to do it again, like this is a conversation that I'm intimately familiar with, I would, you know, if there's a way to do it I would love to be part of that.

But in my honest opinion I think new revenue is needed.

Do you have a plan in mind?

Yeah.

I mean, there's a whole bunch o options that are on the table.

You know, we have engaged in conversations of pieces together.

I think it's really just understanding what the political appetite in Lansing is, is for that.

But yes, we are absolutely ready to engage in that conversation.

But you.

Do have a plan in mind?

In the works.

Yes, we are.

We are building out a plan.

But it will not include a gas tax hike.

Is that a fair statement?

I don't think that's the route we will go.

You know, the reality is, is if you want to raise revenue, there's not you know, there's there's nothing unique about Michigan in the sense that there's really only five or six really ways to do it.

And in most of the plans, if you're trying, depending on kind of what number your anchorin at the top of what your goal is, of how much you're trying to to raise or bring in, there really isn't one solution that's going to get you all the way there.

And so I'm just for conversation sake, you know, if we were trying to get to the $3.9 billion fiscal shortfal to fill up that gap completely, you would need multiple levers to get that done.

And so I don't know if the political appetite there is to meet that numbe or meet in the middle somewhere.

So it really just depends on, I guess, you know, where you're trying to go and then a plan then subsequently would would follow based on that.

In vyour speech, you told talking about petty politics and coming together in a bipartisan way last term, Democrats were not shy about using their majority to push through legislation that they backed and frequently didn't hold.

Public comment on committees.

Republicans now have an eve greater majority in the House.

What reason do they have to engage in bipartisanship with you?

You know, I would push back on that a little bit.

I wouldn't say by and large that we didn't hold public comment in the last term.

I think for an overwhelming majority of the bills that were voted out of the House, they went through the committee process, the big ones.

Right to work.

We're not given any kind of public comment.

Those were just pushed through respectfully.

Because it was they're not a committee hearing and right to work.

The public comment section, though, there was pretty pretty quickly done over with that.

And I know that was a point that Speaker Hall brought up yesterday in the roundtable, as well as the letting the committee proces go through with public comment and giving people thei their time to say their piece.

Just again, curious, having gone through that.

You talk about bipartisanship the last two years were a little rough for that.

What why now do Republicans need to engage with the Democratic caucus, considering it wasn't necessarily reciprocal the last two years?

I you know, I again, I'm not an institutional this has been around for 20 years, but in my limited time, I don't think that th last two years under Democratic control were far different from previous terms that have been around.

And so I think that there was a great deal of precedent and tradition that was honored.

And I think that there was a good amount of respec that was given to the minority caucus last term.

And so, you know, I just kind of expect the same here.

As always, it's always been, you know, the majority has changed, obviously, in the flip.

And as you brought up the numbers and the gap has expanded, bu it expanded by a couple seats.

And so it's not like, you know, we're 70-40 here.

It's still very much a close electorate.

I think it still represents where Michigan's at.

It's still a very divided and purple state.

And so I think that the way that we govern should we should respect and honor that.

Representative, thank you for your time and for being on off the record.

We appreciate it, sir.

Who's your candidate for governor?

Let' wait till the filing deadline.

Yeah, that's a punt.

I will give you a one Representative, good to see you.

Have a good weekend.

Okay.

Thank you.

Everyone.

Thank you.

Okay.

See you next week, folks.