In an effort to help Idahoans follow major bills, resolutions and memorials through the legislative process, the Idaho Capital Sun will produce a “legislative notebook” at the end of each week to gather information in one place that concerns major happenings in the Legislature and other news relating to state government. To receive the full extent of our reporting in your inbox each day, sign up for our free email newsletter, The Sunrise, on our website at idahocapitalsun.com/subscribe/.
Here is our quick rundown of the major happenings during the second week of the Idaho Legislature’s 2026 session.
Forgive us if this is starting to sound familiar, but the state budget continued to drive major decisions by the Idaho Legislature this week – decisions that will affect state agencies and Idaho residents for years to come.
On Friday, the Legislature’s budget committee voted to enact state budget cuts that will affect most state agencies, many state employees and the public’s access to government services.
The Joint Finance-Appropriations Committee voted 14-6 to cut the state budget by 1% – or a $131 million reduction – for what is left of the 2026 fiscal year, and voted 13-7 to cut the state budget by 2% – or a $143 million reduction – from fiscal year 2027. That’s on top of a 3% budget holdback ordered by Gov. Brad Little last summer to deal with a projected budget deficit.
That means most state agencies will be faced with total cuts equaling 5%. Some state budgets, like those for K-12 education, Idaho State Police and the Idaho Department of Correction, will not be affected by the additional 1% and 2% cuts.
JFAC’s co-chairs, Sen. Scott Grow and Rep. Josh Tanner, both Republicans from Eagle, said the new cuts are necessary to make room in the budget to comply with the tax cuts President Donald Trump and congressional Republicans championed in the federal One Big Beautiful Bill Act. Grow and Tanner also said they want to make cuts to provide long-term structural balance to the state’s budget, to leave a positive year-end budget surplus and to guard against additional financial uncertainty.
Also on Friday, the Idaho Senate voted, largely on party lines, in favor of conforming to those federal tax changes in the “big, beautiful” bill, which include things like removing taxes on a worker’s tips or removing taxes on a worker’s overtime.
The tax conformity bill is something that happens annually, but this year’s process is particularly impactful because conforming to the federal tax code changes means the state will lose out on an estimated $155 million in revenue for fiscal year 2026 and $175 million for fiscal year 2027.
“Republicans are pretending this is about balancing the budget. It’s not,” said Senate Minority Leader Melissa Wintrow, D-Boise, in a statement. “These permanent cuts are the playbook for future rollbacks of services Idahoans value, including our schools, public safety, and health care. They know they can’t openly repeal Medicaid expansion because Idahoans already decided that question. So the plan becomes death by a thousand cuts, starving it through the budget until services fail by design and families pay the price.”
A number of state Senate Republicans said during floor debate on the bill that they would rather see tax cuts go to Idahoans than for the state to have the revenue.
“Even though there is a cost of $155 million projected for (fiscal year 2026), there is a huge benefit to our Idaho taxpayers,” said bill sponsor Sen. Doug Ricks, R-Rexburg.
The tax conformity bill, House Bill 559, now heads to the governor for consideration. The governor could sign it into law, let it become law without his signature, or veto the legislation.
How will the budget cuts affect Idaho’s state agencies?
The state budget cuts and less revenue for state government due to tax conformity have real implications for state services.
Last week, state agencies submitted a list of potential cuts to the budget committee and described the impact those cuts would have on the state. State officials worried the cuts could lead to furloughs for state employees, could stop the development of a new family medicine obstetrics fellowship in Pocatello and could jeopardize graduate medical education programs at a time when Idaho ranks 50th in the country for the number of physicians per capita.
Higher education could especially be affected by the cuts. In the list of potential cuts submitted to the Legislature by the state’s universities and colleges, education leaders said the cuts would mean the schools would have to delay or freeze hiring for future employees, furlough current employees, reduce programming and online class offerings, increase student-to-staff ratios, cut student recruitment dollars and increase tuition and fees for students.
The University of Idaho, for instance, said in its plans that UI has already made “significant permanent budget reductions in prior years to right-size operations and has experienced record enrollment growth for ten straight semesters without adding employees to serve the increased number of students.”
As a result, university officials wrote, “additional permanent reductions would no longer reduce discretionary capacity.”
Instead, 1% and 2% permanent reductions would permanently reduce UI’S ability to:
- “Educate students statewide in fields critical to national security and Idaho’s economy, including mining, cybersecurity, and nuclear engineering
- Respond to industry workforce needs and emerging opportunities.
- Sustain applied research and Extension services supporting agriculture, natural resources, health care, and economic development.”
“These impacts represent long-term capacity losses that cannot be quickly restored and would materially affect Idaho’s workforce, industries, and communities,” the university wrote in its cuts plan.
The newly approved ongoing budget cuts totaling about 5% will be built into the fiscal year 2027 maintenance of operations budgets for state agencies and departments, which JFAC will begin working on next week.
State budget analysts said JFAC will vote on maintenance budgets Feb. 13 at the Idaho State Capitol in Boise.
Legislation of interest during the fourth week of the 2025 session
House Bill 557: Sponsored by Rep. Bruce Skaug, R-Nampa, the bill would prohibit Idaho cities and counties from passing anti-discrimination ordinances based on sexual orientation and gender identity. The bill passed the House on a 53-16 vote and now heads to the Senate State Affairs committee for further consideration.
House Joint Resolution 8: Sponsored by Rep. Britt Raybould, R-Rexburg, the resolution would amend the Idaho Constitution to remove the requirement that state-owned endowment lands be managed for the maximum financial return for beneficiaries. It would allow the state to manage the land for ongoing revenue generation through things like timber harvest and mining or grazing leases, followed by preserving public access for recreation, hunting, trapping and fishing. The bill received an introductory hearing on Wednesday, and could be heard by the House State Affairs Committee in the coming days or weeks of the session.
House Concurrent Resolution 25: Cosponsored by Reps. John Shirts, R-Weiser, and Josh Tanner, R-Eagle, the resolution calls for a never-before-used method of amending the U.S. Constitution to balance the federal budget, called a constitutional convention of states. The resolution narrowly passed the Idaho House on a 36-34 vote on Friday. It now heads to the Idaho Senate for further consideration.
What to expect next week at the Idaho Legislature
Public valentine writing event to be held at Idaho Capitol
Five statewide women’s organizations are inviting members of the public to a free event at the Idaho State Capitol to write valentines to Idaho and America.
The event will run from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. Mountain time Feb. 12 in the first floor rotunda of the Capitol in Boise.
Valentines will be collected and sent to Idaho’s congressional delegation, state legislators and executive officers to remind them of what Idahoans love and value about the state and the country, according to a press release from the League of Women Voters of Idaho. Participants may choose to remain anonymous or share their names on the cards, according to the release.
Co-sponsors of the event include the League of Women Voters of Idaho, the American Association of University Women, United Women in Faith, Mormon Women for Ethical Government, and Idaho Solutions.
Legislation on committee agendas
Quick note: Committees, especially at the beginning of the session, have agenda items known as an RS (which stands for routing slip). That’s legislative talk for “draft legislation.” An RS is not a public record until a committee considers it at an introductory hearing. Many of those agenda items are only listed by subject matter, so it’s impossible to ascertain what the RS is specifically about, other than the few words used to describe the RS until the introductory hearing takes place.
Idaho House of Representatives
House Education Committee
9 a.m. Monday: The committee is scheduled to hold introductory hearings for an RS relating to “public charter school admissions,” an RS relating to “students, immigration data,” an RS relating to “Public Schools Facilities Cooperative Fund” and Senate Bill 1225 as amended relating to university president job searches.
House Revenue and Taxation Committee
9 a.m. Monday: The committee is scheduled to hold introductory hearings for an RS relating to “ homestead exempt, religious mission” and “tax exemptions, data centers.”
House Judiciary, Rules & Administration Committee
1:30 p.m. Monday: The committee is scheduled to hold introductory hearings for an RS relating to “detention, involuntary admission” and an RS relating to “disturbing the peace, churches.”
Idaho Senate
Senate Resources and Environment Committee
1:30 p.m. Monday: The committee is scheduled to hold introductory hearings for an RS relating to “cloud seeding.”
Senate Education Committee
3 p.m. Monday: The committee is scheduled to hold introductory hearings for an RS relating to the “Parental Choice Tax Credit.”
Senate Agricultural Committee
8 a.m. Tuesday: The committee is scheduled to hold an introductory hearing for an RS relating to “abatement of rats.” It is scheduled to hold public hearings on Senate Bill 1241, which aims to “clarify and protect the lawful use of working animals in commerce and service” and on House Joint Memorial 10, which urges Congress to join Health and Human Services Secretary Robert Kennedy Jr.’s push to move away from artificial sweeteners in children’s school lunches and replace them with natural sources of sugar.
Quote of the week
“It is time to acknowledge our growth in Idaho. We aren’t trying to grow government. We should, however, maintain our quality of life. If you are frustrated with traffic now, it is only going to get worse with the decisions we are making.” – Sen. Jim Woodward, R-Sagle, on the budget cuts passed by the Legislature’s Joint Finance-Appropriations Committee
Social media post of the week
NEW: An Idaho advisory panel is developing a bill to require autopsies in circumstances including unexplained child deaths.The state would help fund autopsies for coroners who get national certification, to address underfunding and bolster standards.[image or embed]— ProPublica (@propublica.org) February 4, 2026 at 7:30 AM
How to follow the Idaho Legislature and Idaho Gov. Brad Little’s work during the session
Here are a few tools we use to track the Legislature’s business and how to let your voice be heard in the issues that matter most to you.
How to find your legislators: To determine which legislative district you live in, and to find contact information for your legislators within that district, go to the Legislative Services Office’s website and put in your home address and ZIP code. Once you’ve entered that information, the three legislators – two House members and one senator – who represent your district will appear, and you can click on their headshots to find their email address and phone number.
How to find committee agendas: Go to the Idaho Legislature’s website, legislature.idaho.gov, and click on the “all available Senate committee agendas” link and the “all available House committee agendas” link on the right side of the website.
How to watch the legislative action in committees and on the House and Senate floors: Idaho Public Television works in conjunction with the Legislative Services Office and the Idaho Department of Administration through a program called “Idaho in Session” to provide live streaming for all legislative committees and for the House and Senate floors. To watch the action, go to https://www.idahoptv.org/shows/idahoinsession/Legislature/ and select the stream you’d like to watch.
How to testify remotely at public hearings before a committee: To sign up to testify remotely for a specific committee, navigate to that committee’s webpage, and click on the “testimony registration (remote and in person)” tab at the top.
How to find state budget documents: Go to Legislative Services Office Budget and Policy Analysis Division’s website https://legislature.idaho.gov/lso/bpa/budgetinformation/.
How to track which bills have made it to Gov. Little’s desk and any action he took on them (including vetoes): Go to the governor’s website https://gov.idaho.gov/legislative-sessions/2026-session/. You can scroll down to the bottom of the site and enter your email address to get alerts sent straight to your inbox when the page has been updated.
Idaho Capital Sun reporters Clark Corbin, Laura Guido and Kyle Pfannenstiel contributed reporting to this story.
Idaho Capital Sun is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Idaho Capital Sun maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Christina Lords for questions: info@idahocapitalsun.com.