McKoon speaks against 3rd District ‘censure’ of Gov. Deal

West Georgia Republicans voted Saturday to censure Gov. Nathan Deal for his recent veto of “religious liberty” legislation passed by the General Assembly, according to a report by the AJC’s Political Inside blog.

The governor found an unlikely ally as Third Congressional District Republicans during a Saturday meeting voted to censure the governor. State Sen. Josh McKoon, a Columbus Republican who has been at odds with the governor, took the floor and asked that the governor not be censured.

“I said first that I understood the level of frustration that many in the hall felt regarding the religious freedom veto,” McKoon said Sunday via email. “I pointed out that we had expressed in a prior resolution support for religious freedom legislation and disappointment in the veto which was appropriate.”

But that is where McKoon said he drew the line.

“I said that condemning the governor in the inflammatory terms of this resolution would do nothing to advance any of the policy priorities of the Republican Party,” he said. “It would only anger the governor's office and make it more difficult to pass priority legislation. The only way to do that, I argued, was to make a positive case for legislation, like religious freedom measures, that we wish to see become law.

McKoon said he would have reacted the same way even if there had not been all of the fallout at the end of the recent session.

McKoon’s issues with the governor have been well publicized since the end of the General Assembly session last month.

Rep. Richard Smith, R-Columbus, said McKoon’s actions have cost Columbus State University $8 million in funding in the final phase of the state budgeting process and another almost $2 million for the National Infantry Museum was not forthcoming. Smith said he was told by Gov. Nathan Deal that the Infantry Museum money would not be available because of McKoon. He said the speaker’s top aide told him McKoon was the reason the Columbus State funding was being pulled, despite the fact that it had been approved in the first versions of the House and Senate budgets.

McKoon, 37, said his Senate colleagues on the conference committee that pulled the Columbus State construction funding told him it was being done because it was not all needed in the next fiscal year. Smith was shifting the blame for the lost funding because it was Smith’s role in the Columbus delegation to protect those funds, McKoon said.

This story was originally published April 17, 2016 at 5:34 PM with the headline "McKoon speaks against 3rd District ‘censure’ of Gov. Deal."