Who Gave You That Award Again?

(Source: MIRS.news, Published 03/18/2026) House Speaker Matt Hall (R-Richland Township) doubled down on having received a sunshine award from a publicly invisible entity for having successfully pushed for transparency in the legislative earmark process last year.

On Tuesday, Hall said during his regular weekly press conference that his Hall Ethics, Accountability and Transparency (HEAT) legislation -- which created public hearings for the special projects lawmakers want for their district – caught the eye of something called the Michigan Sunshine Transparency, Accountability for Taxpayer Expenditures, or (STATE), which gave him their Sunshine award.

However, no non-profit labeled as STATE has been located through search engine inquiries, raising questions about whether the entity exists at all.

“This group of transparency advocates reached out to give me an award, and thank me for the work I did to shine a light on state funding,” Hall said. “People are sick and tired of business as usual in Lansing, and I'm putting a stop to it.”

On Wednesday, a reporter asked Hall during a press conference if the award is “real or fake.”

"Well, of course it's real. I mean, just like we get contacted by organizations, and we're grateful. I am the leader of the Hall Ethics, Accountability and Transparency plan. I just wish that, you know, every week we come up here, we win awards. And I wish you guys would cover them, but you don't. I'm appreciative that this one is receiving so much attention, but, you know, they reached out to us, we received the award, or we got the notification. I read it to you guys up here. I stood up here and read the letter, and I'm looking forward to receiving it from him.

“I'm very appreciative of the fact that this group of people, who care a lot about accountability and transparency, are notifying me that I'm receiving this award. So I'm very grateful to that. I know a lot of you in the press didn't want me to receive an award, so you're probably upset. I wouldn't take away from the other organizations that are giving awards, and I think you should cover all the awards we get. I think there, and I'm grateful for all of them,” he said.

In response, Michigan Democratic Party Chair Curtis Hertel said he was now giving Hall the SAD award or the "Speaker's Asinine Decision" award.

"We made up an award, too," Hertel joked.