News & Brews March 3, 2022
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Poll results: Wolf approval, Senate race, liquor privatization, & more
A new Franklin & Marshall survey of 490 registered voters shows about 52% favor getting government out of the booze business, 53% of Republican voters are undecided when it comes to the U.S. Senate GOP primary election, and just 37% think Gov. Wolf is doing an “excellent” or “good” job as governor (while 22% think he’s doing a “fair” job, and 38% think he’s doing a “poor” job). See the summary of findings here and the topline report here. (F&M has a B/C rating from FiveThirtyEight based on historical accuracy and methodology.)
Takeaways from yesterday’s House budget hearings
House Appropriations Committee Chair Stan Saylor (York County) released several takeaways from his committee’s sixth day of budget hearings. Among the takeaways: An update on what the Department of Labor & Industry has (or has not) been doing the past year and how much Pennsylvania has paid out in fraudulent unemployment benefits. Read (and watch) more here.
SOTU, Ukraine, and U.S. elections
The Erie Times-News gives its take on what Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and President Biden’s State of the Union Address may mean for this year’s elections in Pennsylvania. The piece looks at the GOP’s advantage in the mid-terms and how a few select candidates on both sides of the aisle are approaching this year’s races. Read more here.
Op-Ed: American energy is key to undermining Putin’s war
Republican Sen. Gene Yaw (Bradford, Lycoming, Sullivan, Susquehanna, and Union counties) writes in Broad + Liberty that Gov. Wolf is among those “standing in the way” of the western energy independence that would undermine Putin’s ability to wage war against Ukraine. Yaw calls on Wolf to “abandon policies meant to hamstring the [energy] industry, like his devotion to RGGI or his alignment with New York on halting infrastructure that could supply New England with cleaner, cheaper Pennsylvania natural gas instead of—you guessed it—Russia’s inferior product.” Read Yaw’s piece here.
House and Senate budget hearings continue today
The Senate Appropriations Committee will continue its series of budget hearings today, with the Department of Agriculture scheduled to testify at 10am and State-Related Universities taking center stage at 2:30 pm. Both hearings will be live-streamed here. Meanwhile, the House Appropriations Committee will hold a 10am hearing with the Department of Health/Department of Drug & Alcohol Programs. That hearing will be live-streamed here.