Oregon Senate passes bill to move gas tax vote to May, heads to House

What a difference a weekend makes.

Three days after they failed to cobble together enough support to bump up a vote on the unpopular gas tax and fee, Democrats in the Oregon Senate found the necessary 16 votes on Monday.

After hours of debate, the chamber passed Senate Bill 1599 by a 17-13 margin. If the bill can pass the House by Wednesday, it will ensure Oregon voters decide on the transportation tax and fee increases in May, rather than November as currently scheduled.

One key difference between Friday and Monday appeared to be Sen. Chris Gorsek, D-Gresham.

He told OPB that he was worried last week about the message moving the gas tax vote would send to voters who had signed a petition demanding the matter be decided on the Nov. 3 general election ballot.

Gorsek said he was convinced over the weekend that holding the vote sooner would help give certainty to the Oregon Department of Transportation and its employees about the agency’s funding picture moving forward. Gov. Tina Kotek and her allies have been keen on passing SB 1599.

Democrats also benefited Monday from the presence of state Sen. Janeen Sollman, D-Hillsboro, who was absent Friday.

While the gas tax and fee hikes are widely expected to fail regardless of when voters are asked to decide, Democrats argued Monday that having that certainty sooner will be helpful.

“When voters say they want a vote in how transportation is funded, we should not delay that conversation,” Senate Majority Leader Kayse Jama, D-Portland, said Monday.

Republicans dispute that, and say SB 1599 is a cynical political maneuver designed to ensure Democrats don’t have to seek reelection on the same ballot as the unpopular tax increases they passed.

“You are doing this because you can,” said state Sen. Christine Drazan, R-Canby, who is also running for governor. “You are denying the voices of Oregonians because you can.”

With SB 1599 now headed to the House, Democrats’ eyes are on the calendar.

State election officials issued a memo last month that said the bill would need to be passed by both chambers and signed by Gov. Tina Kotek by Feb. 25 in order to be sure the state could meet statutory election deadlines.

It was unclear Monday whether that timeline would be possible. Republicans in the House oppose the bill and have plenty of options available to them to attempt to waylay it. One GOP House member, Rep. Greg Smith of Heppner, said on social media that Republicans would walk away from the Capitol “until the majority party will begin to work with us on this gas tax referral.” If enough Republicans follow through with that threat, it would block Democrats from introducing SB 1599 in the House.

Senate Republicans refused to attend a floor session last week because of concerns about the bill.

But whether or not the Feb. 25 date is a meaningful deadline has also been the subject of debate in the Capitol. House Speaker Julie Fahey, D-Eugene, declined to directly answer when OPB asked last week if she believed the bill could succeed if it was passed after Feb. 25.

“The Secretary of State has said that that gives us the best chance of meeting all of the deadlines that lead up to an election, so that’s what we’re shooting for,” Fahey said.

Following passage of SB 1599 in the Senate, a spokeswoman for the Secretary of State’s office told OPB that the Feb. 25 recommendation is “not a hard and fast rule or law.”

The spokeswoman, Tess Seger, said it was possible lawmakers could pass the bill as late as March 8, though election officials “strongly recommend they stick to the current timeline” in order to allow time for voters to submit statements to the May voters’ pamphlet.

While Democrats largely support bumping up the gas tax decision, they weren’t unanimous.

State Sen. Mark Meek, who has repeatedly bucked his party on transportation issues, announced last week that he would not support the move.

Gorsek has had a major role in the transportation saga for the past year. In the 2025 session, he helped craft an ambitious transportation funding proposal that died on the regular session’s final day.

Gov Tina Kotek ultimately called a special session to address road funding in late August. It lasted weeks longer than planned because health problems prevented Gorsek — whose vote Democrats were relying on — from coming to the Capitol.

Lawmakers ultimately passed a more modest funding proposal, including a six-cent hike to the state’s 40-cent-per-gallon gas tax, big increases to vehicle registration and titling fees, and the temporary doubling of a payroll tax that helps fund public transit. A Republican-led campaign quickly gathered around 250,000 signatures to force a vote on the tax and fee portions of the bill, far more than required. But Democrats have scrambled to avoid holding a November vote.

First, Kotek called on lawmakers to simply repeal the overarching transportation funding bill, House Bill 3991, theoretically rendering a vote unnecessary. Legislative attorneys eventually concluded that was illegal, so Democrats have instead focused on moving the vote.

Kotek, who is seeking reelection in November, has supported that move. So has Service Employees International Union Local 503, an influential political donor that represents many ODOT employees.

Gorsek’s reticence to support the bill last week left its proponents scrambling to change his mind over the weekend. Sen. Kim Thatcher, R-Keizer, railed against that effort on the floor on Monday.

“When the majority wants a bill bad enough, the full weight of the institution comes down,” she said, suggesting members who bucked Democratic leadership and their allies are subjected to political threats. “This is not how a healthy legislature operates.”

There is little doubt that both parties based their stance on the bill at least partly on possible electoral outcomes. Republicans and Democrats alike believe the bill could boost turnout in November by people who are unlikely to support Kotek and other Democrats.

“Both parties want the Election Day they want for partisan political reasons,” state Sen. Jeff Golden, D-Ashland, said on the floor Monday. “Everyone in this chamber knows it. Most Oregonians who are paying attention know it.”

Golden, who is not running for reelection, said he ultimately supported the date change, saying that — absent political motivations — there was no reason to delay voters’ decision.

GOP senators disagreed. They argued moving the election amounted to a betrayal of voters. And they attacked provisions in SB 1599 that would alter how an explanatory statement on the measure is created. The bill ensures that lawmakers in a special committee approve the statement that will appear in the state’s voters’ pamphlet, not a citizen committee as is typical practice.

“It tells the process of input by citizens you are no longer needed, you are no longer wanted and the citizens are no longer heard,” said state Sen. Mike McLane, R-Powell Butte.

Republicans drew out Monday’s debate by proposing, and speaking at length about, a number of motions that had virtually no hope of passing — one to move a vote on the bill to March 8, and two others to move the bill back to committee. Those failed along party lines.

Should SB 1599 pass in time to move the date of the gas tax vote, legal challenges may follow. Republican leaders sent a letter to Secretary of State Tobias Read earlier this month suggesting the bill violates election-related timelines laid out in state law.

Sen. Bruce Starr, the Republican Minority Leader who helped lead the campaign to refer the tax measures to voters, said Monday he and others involved in that campaign would file a lawsuit if Democrats pass the bill.