As we move into 2026, all we can say about the 2025 Michigan Legislative session is that it was unusual in many ways.  Even with a small flurry of activity in the last weeks of the year, it was not enough to avoid having 2025 be the year with the lowest production of legislation in Michigan history. 
 
Some might argue that low legislative activity is actually a good thing for Michigan citizens.  There have always been political minds who feel that most legislation is either unnecessary or even harmful to various interests.  In the average year, the Governor will sign into law two- or three-hundred public acts.  Only a small number are typically controversial, with most being tweaks to current laws to reflect some new wrinkle.  In 2025, that total number of new public acts stands at 38 (although there will be a few more signed into law after the new year).   
 
That low level of production has created a massive backlog of bills that are mostly non-controversial and in that same “tweaks to current laws” vein.  Among the bills that have managed to become law this year, several were related to the 2025-6 fiscal year budget deal; a handful renamed highways; a few dealt with tuition, child care and health care assistance for members of the Michigan National Guard; two created criminal and civil liability for the creation of “deep-fake” sexual images; and two altered the Michigan Minimum Wage Act and Earned Sick Time Act. 
 
Going into 2026, there are differences of opinion on whether or not the slow pace of legislative activity will change.  On the one hand, it will be an election year, which usually slows down legislative output for two reasons:  1.  The Legislature takes more breaks so its members can hit the campaign trail; and 2. Lawmakers become more skittish about supporting legislation that could possibly come back to bite them in the campaign. 
 
On the other hand, most politicians are loathe to go into a reelection campaign with few legislative achievements to report.  Even voters who are the most unenthusiastic about politicians in general like to believe that their own lawmakers are bringing home the bacon.  This could lead to more pressure on Speaker of the House Matt Hall and Senate Majority Leader Winnie Brinks to increase the legislative output level.
 
The other incredibly unusual part of 2025 was the budgetary bomb the Michigan House dropped in December.  Using an arcane law, the House Appropriations Committee retroactively cancelled up to $645 million in state spending with no concurrence from the Senate or the Governor.  Policy experts in Lansing are still sorting through the practical impact of this move, and whether or not it is even constitutional.  See below for more on this story.
 
 
Michigan House Stuns Lansing with Budget Move
 
In early December, the House Appropriations Committee held a hearing to receive reports from the House Fiscal Agency regarding budget spending items.  It was a routine event where annually the House and Senate Appropriations Committees review spending items from the previous year that were not completely spent before the September 30 end of the fiscal year.  This is especially common for construction and infrastructure projects that often take over a year to complete.  Normally, the Appropriations Committees accept the report and the spending is allowed to continue into a new fiscal year until the total appropriation amount is exhausted. 
 
Appropriations that last beyond a single fiscal year are called “work projects,” and they are very common in state budgeting.  In some cases, when a budget bill is passed, language is inserted identifying particular spending as a multi-year work project.  In many instances, however, for a multitude of reasons, single-year appropriations are not able to be fully expended before the end of the fiscal year.  In those cases, Michigan law specifies that the state automatically make those items “work projects” and allow them to be expended over multiple fiscal years, provided that a report is made to the House and Senate Appropriations Committees.  The law allows either of those committees to reject specific items from becoming “work projects” should they feel them to be no longer necessary or relevant. 
 
Prior to December 2025, rejection of work projects has only happened once in recent memory, and it was for a specific project that was unanimously agreed upon as being no longer necessary.  What the House Appropriations Committee did in December, however, went well beyond a targeted recission of state spending.  Instead, the House Appropriations Committee voted to reject the entirety of potential work projects, canceling up to $645 million in state spending. 
 
Speaker of the House Matt Hall (R-Richland Twp.) held a press conference after the hearing proclaiming that the move was saving Michigan taxpayers from “waste, fraud and abuse” that was rampant in the budget.  He stated that worthy projects could be funded again in a supplemental budget bill.  However, many of the projects were time dependent, and a delay in spending of potentially several months could put an end to many of them.  The projects spanned most of the state, and included a broad array of programs and infrastructure grants ranging from road and bridge projects to health care and social programs. 
 
Senate leaders immediately expressed their horror at the House action and responded by passing a bill restoring the entirety of the slashed funding.  However, for the funding to be restored, the House must also agree to do it, and since they were the ones who instigated the funding cuts, there is no likelihood of them relenting.  Instead, it is possible that a new mid-year budget supplemental bill could be used as the House identifies funding they deem “worthy” to be restored. 
 
Another possibility is that of legal or executive action.  Several recipients of the lost funding, including a number of local units of government, are contemplating legal action against the House for the loss of the funds.  Although Michigan law grants the authority of either House or Senate Appropriations committee to deny work project status to state funding, there is a growing question of whether that law is in itself constitutional.  Michigan courts could possibly strike down the law as a violation of the separation of powers clause of the Michigan Constitution.
 
Governor Whitmer has been relatively silent on the issue so far, but the Governor’s office could also take some action on restoring the funding.  It is possible that the Governor or Attorney General Nessel could rule that the action taken by the House is unconstitutional and continue to expend funds as originally intended.  If this were to happen, it would provoke a very hostile response from the Michigan House, and possibly provoke litigation to defend the actions of the House.  Moreover, it would make the 2026 budget negotiations even more difficult than they have been.  However, after the actions taken by the House to create this standoff, a very difficult 2026 budget process is already a certainty.