How the Budget Repair Bill Passed →
Minority Leader Miller made it quite clear, in a letter to Majority Leader Fitzgerald, that the Democrats had no intention of returning until and unless the collective bargaining provisions were stripped from the bill.
Senator Taylor requested an absentee ballot for the April 5 spring election.
Republican senators were convinced that the Democrat 14 weren't interested in true negotiations, only in posturing and obstruction. So they voted to pass the bill anyway, after making sure that the slightly altered bill was legal.