Political fallout of new state budget, end of Title 42

Chuck Coughlin, CEO and President of HighGround Inc., joined Arizona Horizon to discuss political fallout over the end of Title 42 and Governor Hobbs participation in the new state budget negotiations.

Hobbs got a lot of her priorities included in the budget, but chose not to include some of her minority colleagues in this discussion, according to Coughlin.

“It was really a three-way negotiation between the president, the speaker, mostly the speaker, and her. I think some of those Democrats felt left out,” Coughlin said.

It’s really unusual so much money was allotted to each lawmaker to figure out their own priorities with regards to spending, Coughlin said.

“This was unprecedented in the amount of spending that took place. The irony of ironies is that there’s more Republicans that voted for this budget than the last two Republican budgets,” Coughlin said.

Concerning the vouchers, Coughlin suggested it might have been too complicated to address this in the current budget, so it was set off to the side, and the focus was directed on projects and items that everyone knew would be figured out.

State Response to Title 42

“It seems like, at least in the early going here, that there’s not pandemonium,” Coughlin said.

There are pictures of the Texas border and other places where there are giant groups of people moving over the border and camping out in these areas, but we aren’t seeing a lot of that in Arizona.

“I assume the programs that the President and the Department of Homeland Security put into place have at least absorbed some of that surge,” Coughlin said, adding that there were also warnings sent out to people providing alternatives for making the initial crossing along the border.

If this successful outcome continues for the next couple of weeks, this will be considered a huge managerial success, according to Coughlin.