She must enjoy pain, because Suzi LeVine “loved every minute” of her disastrous tenure as Governor Jay Inslee’s appointed leader of his Employment Security Department.  In her January 21^st resignation letter, LeVine fails to mention that her management allowed foreign criminals to steal $600 million from taxpayers, and that her actions forced hundreds of thousands Washington State residents to wait months before receiving their promised benefits.  While everyone else would be fired for such catastrophic results, LeVine’s skill set of knowing many wealthy potential Democrat donors (and knowing how to get them to write big checks) allowed her to obtain a high-paying federal government job in the Biden Administration.  LeVine displayed one last piece of arrogance in her letter, when she equated her new job at the U.S. Department of Labor with the actions of actual heroes in the military, law enforcement and fire departments across our country.  LeVine claimed she is now “an economic first-responder for our country.” (Click her to read complete Shift Article)

The Washington State Economic and Revenue Forecast Council revealed this morning that projected state revenues will be more than $3.2 billion greater than previously estimated.   In a normal world, this projection, when coupled with the $7 billion that state and local governments will receive from the latest federal bailout, would squelch any discussion of additional taxes.  Unfortunately for Washington State taxpayers, Democrats do not live in “a normal world,” they live in a world where their selfish greed rules their decisions.  In order to reward government employee unions for their continuous financial support of Democrat campaigns, liberal lawmakers still desire even more taxpayer funds to expand the size and power of state government. This cyclical greed (since Democrat politicians’ campaigns will receive even more financial support from the union bosses) is the driving force behind the unconstitutional state income tax on capital gains bill (SB 5096) being rammed through the legislature.  While the IRS and all 49 other states define a capital gains tax as an income tax (thus making it unconstitutional in Washington State), this bill’s fate if passed will likely be determined by the Washington State Supreme Court, after an expected legal challenge.  And Democrat lawmakers are relying on the liberal members of the court – which is all nine of them – to understand that their campaigns would also benefit from the same circle of greed.  (Washington State Economic and Revenue Forecast Council, Washington Legislature Bill Summary, and Washington Policy Center)

A bi-partisan bill that will slightly toughen drunk driving laws has finally passed the Washington State Senate, and is now before the House Public Safety Committee.  The bill (SB 5054) extends from 10 years to 15 years the period in which obtaining three DUIs  would be categorized as a felony .  Felonies carry harsher penalties if convicted.  Seven Democrat senators voted against the measure on the bill’s final passage, because, well, we are sure they had a good reason for standing somewhat steadily with those earning three DUIs. (KGMI and Washington Legislature Bill Summary)

In discussing her bill allowing felons the right to vote immediately upon release from prison, State Representative Tarra Simmons (D – Bremerton) stated she believes “we over-punish people” convicted of crimes when we ask them to complete the legal terms of their punishment.  Simmons’ bill (HB 1078) would restore felons to vote again before finishing their community service or paying back financial restitution owed to victims or to the courts.  Despite Rep. Simmons herself being an example of someone who reformed her life following incarceration, to become a lawyer and a legislator, she does not believe others should be required to meet their obligations before having their right to vote restored.  There are currently 26,000 Washington State felons who would benefit from this bill.  Last year Senator Patty Kuderer (D – Bellevue) attempted similar legislation, but it lost momentum soon after it became known that two suspects in a deadly downtown shooting would have qualified to vote despite not having completed their community service or paying their financial restitution. (KUOW, Washington Legislature Bill Summary, and Seattle Times)

While Washington State Attorney General Bob Ferguson was always first in line to file a lawsuit against the Trump Administration, he is nowhere to be found in a lawsuit which might save Washington State residents some money.  Some 21 states have filed a lawsuit against a Biden Administration mandate, in the recent $1.9 trillion-dollar federal bailout package, which forbids local governments from lowering tax rates while receiving the federal money. (See story below that many communities had an increase in tax revenue during this past year – shouldn’t residents of these cities see some of that additional revenue returned to them?) Thus while this lawsuit could result in lower tax bills for many of his constituents, Ferguson has decided to suddenly stop filing lawsuits against the federal government.  AG Ferguson is demonstrating that he is more than willing to waste state resources on lawsuits when it meets his partisan political purposes, but he does not believe it is worth any of his time to fight for issues which might benefit Washington State citizens.    (Washington Post)

The Puget Sound Indexer points out that the federal method for determining how much cities receive from the latest federal bailout does not factually reflect how much each lost in sales tax revenue due to the COVID-19 pandemic.  The federal dollars will be dispersed by a formula based on population. Yet, using King County as an example, cities especially dependent on tourism were impacted far greater than others, while a few communities actually generated more sales taxes revenue in 2020 than they did in 2019. (Puget Sound Indexer)

The Seattle Times believes that only schools open for in-person instruction should receive any of the $1.85 billion dollars designated for Washington State schools in the recent $1.9 billion federal bailout.  Both Governor Inslee and Superintendent of Public Instruction Chris Reykdal have said that schools need to reopen to in-person instruction, yet current state policy states that districts just need to submit a plan to reopen to receive federal money.  Basically, the Times is saying that Inslee and Reykdal should put the feds’ money where their mouth is. (Seattle Times)

Currently Franklin County is slightly above the number of new COVID-19 cases allowed for the county to stay in Phase 3.  The county’s 14-day average is 230 new cases a day, per 100,000 people, and the figure needs to be below 200 to stay in Phase 3 (if such guidelines are even to be followed any more).  The state will be reassessing each county’s figures every three weeks, commencing next Monday.  If the numbers are not reduced, then a county could be pushed back to Phase 2 as soon as April 12th. (KEPR)

Senator Perry Dozier (R – Waitsburg) said that he is concerned about legislation raising the cost of fuel, which will increase the cost of farming in Washington State . Sen. Dozier, who is a wheat farmer in real life, said he is most concerned about the Low Carbon Fuel Standard and cap and trade legislation.  Dozier said current transportation measures are “going to add an array of added costs on to agriculture, increasing gross weight fees, obviously fuel taxes going up, a lot of these are going to hit us at a bad time as we’re getting into our busy season and it’s going to just start draining whatever gains we were hoping to make this year.” (Pacific Northwest AG Network)

LAST DAY to make your second-round selections in Shift’s “Madness in Olympia” Tournament.  After thousands of Shift readers participated in the first round, the top eight bad ideas the Democrats have proposed in Olympia this year have been whittled down to the final four disasters-in-the-making.  Make your selection for the top two whacky liberal measures you want to see in next week’s championship match.  In the “More Taxes” bracket, you can select between “State Income Tax on Capital Gains” and “Low Carbon Fuel Standard.”  In the “Less Public Safety” bracket, your choice is between “Eliminating Police Resources” and “Retroactively Release Prisoners.” Make your selections today (and share with your friends) to help us crown the “Worst Idea of 2021” Champion.  (Shift’s Madness in Olympia Tournament)

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