After political debacle, 84 bills die in House without a vote

It’s a cherished State House maxim in New Hampshire: Every bill gets a public hearing, and every bill gets a vote on the House or Senate floor.

But a series of scheduling woes, time constraints, and partisan machinations just upended that tradition.

Facing the need to pass 344 bills over two days — and a midnight Thursday, March 12, calendar deadline to do so — House Republicans made a decision: They structured the calendar so that bills recommended to pass by committees would receive votes in the floor first. Bills that committees recommended to be killed or shelved would be taken up afterward.

The effect: The bills favored by Republicans, the majority party, jumped to the front of the line. And after two days of voting, and some Democratic obstruction, House leadership chose to adjourn the chamber on Thursday afternoon with 84 bills still waiting for a vote.

Those 84 bills, many from Democrats, died automatically when the Thursday deadline struck, without any debate on the floor.

The parliamentary fiasco sparked notable moments of frustration. Democrats blasted Republicans, arguing they intentionally deprived their opponents’ bills of a chance of passage and that better scheduling ahead of the deadline could have provided time for all of them. 

Republicans fumed over a series of moves by individual Democrats Wednesday that slowed down the voting process, accusing them of dilatory obstruction. 

In the end, the House adjourned around 4:30 p.m Thursday leaving dozens of bills in an unusual fate: No chamber vote in favor, no vote against, their outcome officially labeled under the puzzling category “miscellaneous.”

Below are a few of the bills that fell through the cracks. 

The list featured health-related bills, such as:

• A Democratic effort to compel the state Department of Health and Human Services to prepare a report tracking how recent Republican-led changes to Medicaid are impacting Medicaid enrollees in the state, House Bill 1794;
• A move by Whitefield Republican Seth King to prevent transgender and nonbinary people from listing their sex as “X” for “other” on their driver’s licenses and other state IDs, House Bill 1165;
• A Democratic attempt to set minimum staffing standards for nursing homes, House Bill 1179;
• A bill by Manchester Democratic Rep. Lily Foss to prevent state agencies from collecting data on who in the state is autistic beyond what is necessary for state services and compliance with state law, House Bill 1316; and
• House Bill 1235, a push by Bethlehem Democratic Rep. Jared Sullivan to legalize possession of small amounts of cannabis for people over 21.

Some bills concerning education also died suddenly, including:

• A constitutional amendment, CACR 24, establishing the rights of parents to direct the education of their children;
• Two bills that sought to add restrictions on the education freedom account program: House Bill 1334, which would have removed the approval power of EFA expenses from the Children’s Scholarship Fund, the private company that operates the program, and House Bill 1513, which would have mandated stricter reporting requirements over spending;
• A Republican bill, House Bill 1804, to consolidate the state’s 107 school administrative units down to 12 and make superintendents elected officials;
• A bill to require school districts to conduct annual audits, House Bill 1823; and
• A Democratic effort, House Bill 1708, to raise business taxes in order to reduce the statewide education property tax (SWEPT).

Housing-related bills that died included:

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• A bill to tighten the requirements to build accessory dwelling units, House Bill 1136, proposed by critics of the 2025 expansion of ADU rights;
• House Bill 1218, a bill to require clearer communications between sellers of manufactured homes and buyers; and
• A bill to prohibit landlords from charging more than one application fee a year per tenant, House Bill 1375. 

The deadlines killed off a number of proposed constitutional amendments affecting the judicial branch, including:

• CACR 9, which would have raised the minimum retirement age for judges from 70 to 75;
• CACR 23, which would have established legislative oversight over the courts by creating a commission to explore complaints against judges and recommend suspension or removal; and 
• CACR 20, which would have abolished the judicial system as a separate branch of government and put all courts under control of the Legislature 

Election law bills that died without debate included:

• CACR 21, a Republican proposed constitutional amendment to require residents to “actually reside” in their stated domicile to vote;
• A Democratic bill, House Bill 1201, to require tax-exempt political committees to disclose the identities of their voters; and
• A bill, House Bill 1391, that would create a commission to explore creating a nonpartisan primary with candidates of all parties on one ballot.

The list also included environmental bills. House Bill 1389 sought to apply federal standards for hazardous waste cleanup to facilities that emitted PFAS, or “forever chemicals,” pollution above a certain threshold. 

Proponents said it would force polluters to clean up after themselves. But Rep. Donald McFarlane, an Orange Republican, wrote in the House Calendar that the bill would be too broad-reaching given the “ubiquity” of PFAS use. It could have a chilling effect on the redevelopment of brownfields by raising cleanup standards, he said. 

The legislative deadline also killed House Bill 1258, an effort by Nashua Democratic Rep. Suzanne Vail to improve accessibility of the PFAS contamination data maintained by the New Hampshire Department of Environmental Services. 

The department conducts PFAS monitoring of drinking water wells across the state and has also tested wildlife, vegetation, and more for the toxic pollutants. Some of those results are public, such as on the state’s sampling dashboard. But not all of it is available, Vail wrote in the minority report on the bill, such as the results of PFAS tests run on biosolids used in agriculture.

The bill sought to require the department to make the data readily searchable and exportable. But in testimony, representatives from NHDES said that would pose an administrative burden.

Smoother sailing ahead?

The House’s failure to meet its deadlines — and collapse of tradition — is unusual; the last time bills were left behind without a floor vote came in 2021, when COVID-19 kept lawmakers away from Representatives Hall and complicated meeting logistics. Recent speeches and conduct suggest a major decline in trust between the parties.

But there is hope of a better near-term future. Thursday’s legislative deadline required the House to pass all single-committee bills, which constitute the vast majority. The next major deadline is March 19, “Crossover Day,” when the House must pass all remaining bills it intends to send to the Senate. But that deadline, and future legislative deadlines, are less daunting. There will simply be fewer bills that need a vote. 

The 84 bills marked “miscellaneous” made sure of that. 

(Bulletin reporters William Skipworth and Molly Rains contributed to this report.)