State House Spotlight: Advocates flood Beacon Hill
BOSTON (WWLP) – This week at the State House in Boston, state leadership focused on big picture items like federal funding and a legislative audit, while advocates fought for budget funding for their causes.
Following a Monday afternoon leadership meeting, the governor addressed the impact of losing federal funding on Massachusetts' economy.
She says there is no possible way for the state to fill in the gaps. 'Are you kidding?' said Governor Healey. 'The numbers are so huge that there is no way the state can begin to fill the void.'
State leadership addressed the state auditor's voter-approved audit of the legislature. They say they will not be taking their constitutional concerns to the Supreme Judicial Court.
'You have to understand, why would we ask for an opinion from the SJC? Because she's the one that's driving the question. She's the one that campaigned for the question. She was the one out knocking doors for the question,' said House Speaker Ron Mariano.
On Friday morning the Fiscal Alliance released a poll of likely voters, and they say it's clear that Massachusetts residents support the auditor, with over 80% of those polled saying the attorney general should get involved.
'If I was the attorney general, I'd be pretty careful with this one…if she has any future aspirations in politics, even if she's suing Trump five days a week, this could be something that could come back and haunt her,' said Mass Fiscal spokesperson Paul Craney.
Advocates continued to hold State House events to fight for funding in the fiscal year 2026 budget.
This week, lawmakers heard from supporters of the earned income tax credit, students and teachers fighting for civics education, and organizations advocating for multilingual access to social services.
WWLP-22News, an NBC affiliate, began broadcasting in March 1953 to provide local news, network, syndicated, and local programming to western Massachusetts. Watch the 22News Digital Edition weekdays at 4 p.m. on WWLP.com.
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