Line-Item Veto

The line-item veto is a power enjoyed by Oklahoma’s Governor that allows him or her to veto one or more sections of a bill involving appropriations.  Line-item vetoes, like regular vetoes, can be overridden by a two-thirds vote of both chambers of the Legislature. If overridden, the bill becomes the law as originally passed by the Legislature. If a line-item veto is not overridden, the rest of the bill becomes law.

Oklahoma is one of forty-four states that confer line-item veto authority to the Governor. At the federal level, Congress passed a bill in 1996 that granted the President the power to line-item veto budget bills, but it was ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in Clinton v. City of New York.

The line-item veto has been used intermittently by Oklahoma governors in recent years:

• In 2025, Gov. Stitt line-item vetoed HB 2235 that would have conferred new public benefits to victims of wrongful convictions.
• In 2024, Gov. Stitt line-item vetoed two sections of the General Appropriations bill, SB 1122 (s. 15 &16), that would have constrained the spending of funds by the State Department of Education, and portions of a section of  SB 1399 related to the Oklahoma Capital Assets Management and Protection Board.
• In 2022, Gov. Stitt line-item vetoed sections of a Department of Corrections bill, SB 1052, that funded increases in private contractor per diems at two facilities, and a section of bill, SB 429, providing $20 million in pandemic relief funding to the Oklahoma Water Resources Board. The Legislature subsequently overrode the veto to SB 1052.
• In 2020, Gov. Stitt line-item vetoed a $1.2 million appropriation intended to provide pay raises to employees at private prisons.

Prior to Governor Stitt’s tenure, the line-item veto was used by Gov. Fallin during the 2017 first special session to veto all but five sections of a General Appropriations bill passed by the Legislature.