June 27 (UPI) -- The Michigan legislature is nearing its July 1 deadline to approve its budget bills but the state House and Senate are at odds over anti-transgender and diversity, equity and inclusion provisions.
Earlier this month, the Republican majority in the Michigan House of Representatives passed budget bills that would penalize schools, universities and community colleges for allowing transgender girls and women to participate in girls' and women's sports.
Democrats, with a slim majority in the Senate, passed a different version of a budget proposal late last month. It does not include any such provisions or references to DEI initiatives and girls' and women's sports.
Michigan's school aid budget bill will establish how much state funding public schools and institutions of higher learning will receive in the fiscal year beginning on Oct. 1. Since the two chambers passed different versions of the bill, they must find a compromise to send a final version to Gov. Gretchen Whitmer's desk.
"Ultimately, education funding bills need to be passed," Jonathan Hanson, lecturer in public policy at the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy at the University of Michigan, told UPI.
