TRENTON - Hustling up a hallway out of a press conference with Governor Mikie Sherrill, outstretched hands on all sides amid entreaties of people wanting to talk to him, Speaker Craig Coughlin fielded a couple of questions about the 2027 Budget.

Can leadership hammer out a deal?

"We're working through the budget," Coughlin told InsiderNJ. "It's a process, and we're going to get this done."

Will they meet the end-of-month deadline?

"We always do - we always have," said Coughlin.

There's year's no different.

Is he prepared to give on StayNJ?

Coughlin kept moving.

The Speaker's presence beside the Governor at a press conference to combat food insecurity came against the backdrop of another meeting scheduled for later today.

Sherrill wants the Speaker to significantly reduce the annual qualifying threshold for the StayNJ program.

Sources say he's dug in, with one eye on legislative elections next year.

If he scraps StayNJ in a substantial way, caucus members may find themselves in harder than usual primaries. Battleground members may find themselves more vulnerable in the general.

Sherrill wants the $1.2 billion program curbed, as budget-watchers express fears about the long-term insolvency of StayNJ as the Republican-run federal government continues to club away at New Jersey.

Senate President Nick Scutari reportedly has his own concerns about earmarks, otherwise pejoratively known as "Christmas Tree items."

Complicating matters is that this is the Sherrill Administration's first budget, during a season already crunched by Delaney Hall and the World Cup. Plus, Sherrill and the lawmakers don't naturally see eye-to-eye.

The guys who try to rule the roost down here want Team Sherrill to work for it, the same way they tried to rough up then-Governor Phil Murphy back in 2018.

Murphy was a Goldman Sachs guy who somewhat initially looked down on Statehouse types. Sherrill's former military and brings an officer on-deck attitude. Some of the longer-termers gripe about feeling like unappreciated deckhands.

Sherrill wants to reprioritize - foreign concept coming up - public service.

Bringing that to life in a budget in a draconian state like New Jersey is tough - to say the least.

But amid some sources intent on drama with time ticking down, Coughlin today made it seem like it's all so much noise amid a basically on-track process.

Sources said expect another budget meeting among the principals later today.

More later.