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2025 Kentucky legislative session

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2025 Kentucky legislative session
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General information
Scheduled session start:    January 7, 2025

Scheduled session end:    March 28, 2025

Leadership
Senate President
Robert Stivers (R)

House Speaker
David Osborne (R)
Majority Leader
Senate: Max Wise (R)
House: Steven Rudy (R)
Minority Leader
Senate: Gerald Neal (D)
House: Pamela Stevenson (D)

Elections
Next Election:    November 3, 2026

Last Election:    November 5, 2024

Previous legislative sessions
2024 • 2023 • 2022 • 2021 • 2020 • 2019 • 2018
Other 2025 legislative sessions


In 2025, the Kentucky General Assembly was scheduled to convene on January 7 and adjourn on March 28.

The legislators serving in this session took office following the 2024 elections. Republicans won a 31-7 majority in the Senate and an 80-20 majority in the House. The Democratic Party controlled the governorship, creating a divided state government. At the start of the 2025 session, Kentucky was one of 20 state legislatures where Republicans had a veto-proof supermajority in both chambers.

At the beginning of the 2025 legislative session:
  • Republicans held a majority in the Kentucky state House and state Senate.
  • Kentucky was one of 12 divided state governments.
  • Kentucky's governor was Democrat Andy Beshear.

    • Leadership in 2025

    See also: Leadership positions in state legislatures

    Kentucky State Senate

    Kentucky House of Representatives

    Partisan control in 2025

    See also: State government trifectas

    Kentucky was one of 12 divided state governments at the start of 2025 legislative sessions. A state government trifecta occurs when one political party holds the governor's office, a majority in the state Senate, and a majority in the state House. For more information about state government trifectas, click here.

    Kentucky was also one of 20 state legislatures where Republicans had a veto-proof supermajority in both chambers. Veto overrides occur when a legislature votes to reverse a veto issued by an executive such as a governor or the president. If one party has a majority in a state legislature that is large enough to override a gubernatorial veto without any votes from members of the minority party, it is called a veto-proof majority or, sometimes, a supermajority. To read more about veto-proof supermajorities in state legislatures, click here.

    The following tables show the partisan breakdown of the Kentucky General Assembly in the 2025 legislative session.

    Kentucky State Senate

    Party As of January 2025
         Democratic Party 7
         Republican Party 31
    Total 38

    Kentucky House of Representatives

    Party As of January 2025
         Democratic Party 20
         Republican Party 80
    Total 100

    Regular session

    The list below shows up to 25 pieces of legislation in the 2025 legislative session that most recently passed both chambers of the legislature, were signed by the governor, or were approved by the legislature in a veto override. If no bills are displayed below, no legislation has met these criteria yet in 2025. This information is provided by BillTrack50.

    Legislation trackers

    See also: Legislation Trackers

    Ballotpedia’s legislation trackers are your go-to resource for staying on top of key legislative topics. We capture any bill introduced on the topic across all of the 50 state legislatures, and we track the movement of the bill every step of the way. We provide real-time updates and translate legislative legalese into easily understandable language. As of the 2025 session, Ballotpedia provided tracking on the following topics. Click on the links below to view related bills from the 2025 session:

    Standing legislative committees

    See also: Standing committee and List of committees in Kentucky state government


    A standing committee of a state legislature is a committee that exists on a more-or-less permanent basis, from legislative session to session, that considers and refines legislative bills that fall under the committee's subject matter.

    At the beginning of the 2025 legislative session, there were 36 standing committees in Kentucky's state government, including 16 state Senate committees and 20 state House committees.

    Senate committees

    House committees

    Legislatively referred constitutional amendments

    In every state but Delaware, voter approval is required to enact a constitutional amendment. In each state, the legislature has a process for referring constitutional amendments before voters. In 18 states, initiated constitutional amendments can be put on the ballot through a signature petition drive. There are also many other types of statewide measures.

    The methods by which the Kentucky Constitution can be amended:

    See also: Mode of Revision, Kentucky Constitution and Laws governing ballot measures in Kentucky

    The Kentucky Constitution provides two mechanisms for amending the state constitution—a legislative process and a state constitutional convention. Kentucky does not feature the power of initiative for either initiated constitutional amendments or initiated state statutes.

    Legislature

    See also: Legislatively referred constitutional amendment

    A 60% vote is required during one legislative session for the Kentucky State Legislature to place a constitutional amendment on the ballot. That amounts to a minimum of 60 votes in the Kentucky House of Representatives and 23 votes in the Kentucky Senate, assuming no vacancies. Amendments do not require the governor's signature to be referred to the ballot. The Legislature cannot add more than four constitutional amendments to one election ballot.

    Convention

    See also: Convention-referred constitutional amendment

    According to the Kentucky Constitution, the state Legislature can vote to refer a constitutional convention question to voters. A simple majority vote is required during two successive legislative sessions of the Legislature to place a constitutional convention question on the ballot. Turnout for those voting 'yes' at the election must be equal to at least 25% of the qualified electors who voted at the last general election.


    Historical partisan control

    The table below depicts the historical trifecta status of Kentucky.

    Kentucky Party Control: 1992-2025
    Eight years of Democratic trifectas  •  Three years of Republican trifectas
    Scroll left and right on the table below to view more years.

    Year 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 00 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25
    Governor D D D D D D D D D D D D R R R R D D D D D D D D R R R R D D D D D D
    Senate D D D D D D D D R R R R R R R R R R R R R R R R R R R R R R R R R R
    House D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D R R R R R R R R R

    Historical Senate control

    Republicans won control of the Kentucky State Senate in 2000. In 2024, they won a 31-7 majority.

    The table below shows the partisan history of the Kentucky Senate following every general election from 1992 to 2024. All data from 2006 or earlier comes from Michael Dubin's Party Affiliations in the State Legislatures (McFarland Press, 2007). Data after 2006 was compiled by Ballotpedia staff.

    Kentucky State Senate election results: 1992-2024

    Year '92 '94 '96 '98 '00 '02 '04 '06 '08 '10 '12 '14 '16 '18 '20 '22 '24
    Democrats 25 21 20 20 18 17 15 16 15 15 14 12 11 10 8 7 7
    Republicans 13 17 18 18 20 21 23 21 22 22 23 26 27 28 30 31 30
    Other 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 1 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 1

    Historical House control

    Republicans won control of the Kentucky House of Representatives in 2016. In 2024, they won an 80-20 majority.

    The table below shows the partisan history of the Kentucky House following every general election from 1992 to 2024. All data from 2006 or earlier comes from Michael Dubin's Party Affiliations in the State Legislatures (McFarland Press, 2007). Data after 2006 was compiled by Ballotpedia staff.

    Kentucky House of Representatives election results: 1992-2024

    Year '92 '94 '96 '98 '00 '02 '04 '06 '08 '10 '12 '14 '16 '18 '20 '22 '24
    Democrats 72 64 64 66 64 65 57 61 65 58 55 54 36 39 25 20 20
    Republicans 28 36 36 34 36 35 43 39 35 42 45 46 64 61 75 80 80

    Analysis

    Adopted legislation, 2018-2024

    See also: The State Legislative Decade - Kentucky

    In 2024, Ballotpedia released analysis of bills enacted in each state in the preceding decade. The charts and table below detail legislation passed each year by party sponsorship.

    See also

    Elections Kentucky State Government State Legislatures State Politics
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    External links

    Footnotes

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