The often “truth challenged” Governor Jay Inslee said he would support making it illegal for candidates and elected officials to knowingly lie about election results. This disturbing and unconstitutional proposal from the governor was made Thursday, during the annual Associated Press legislative preview. Fortunately there is no pending legislation proposed to make this totally irresponsible and dangerous idea a reality.

As a lawyer and a career politician, Governor Inslee is well aware that it is not uncommon for people to knowing tell lies to seek public support or to deflect criticism.  Inslee has repeatedly done himself to advance his own career.

• When Jay Inslee ran for governor in 2012, he knowingly lied when he responded to a question at a candidate debate regarding raising state taxes. He said, “I would veto anything that heads the wrong direction, and the wrong direction is new taxes in the state of Washington.” As we well know, that has proven to be a lie, as the governor has himself proposed new taxes in every budget he has submitted since making that statement and has failed to veto the dozens of taxes he has raised during the past nine years.
• During the initial months of the pandemic, the governor kept proclaiming that his decisions on shutting down businesses and restricting activities were based on data and released a series of “dashboards” he said he was using. Yet many of the dashboards were not tied to actual data, while other dashboards did not reflect known statistics.
• When many lawmakers were seeking a special legislative session to deal with initial budget shortfall expected by the pandemic, the governor knowingly lied when he said he opposed this idea because Republicans would take away health care plans of cancer patients. (Governor Inslee well knew that even IF the Republicans wanted to take away health care plans of cancer patients, [which they clearly do not, and it is irresponsible for the governor to say so] the minority Republican legislators would need support of Democrat legislators in both chambers to pass the bill and the governor would have to sign the legislation to make this lie accurate.)
• When liberal activists rioted and illegally seized control of a Capitol Hill neighborhood, the governor was afraid to condemn the political violence of his supporters. So during a press conference when he was asked to comment on these events which were making national headlines, the governor knowingly lied when he said, “That’s news to me” as he irresponsibly ducked the question and refused to condemn liberal political violence.

These are just four of the dozens of times Governor Jay Inslee has knowingly lied.  Why are his lies OK, while other lies could result in jail time? If the governor is successful in making it illegal for politicians to lie on important subjects, then he had better hire a really good defense attorney.

While time has proven that the governor has lied, the same is already occurring with those who are making false accusations about our election system.  This is why free speech is a vital aspect of a democracy.  While the governor seeks to place (unconstitutional) restrictions on free speech, our democracy is better served by allowing the people to decide what information to believe.  Yes, this can be frustrating and messy, but we are sure Governor Inslee would not like to see many of his Democrat colleagues put in jail for their lies they stated about the 2016 elections. (Centralia Chronicle/Spokesman-Review, The Stranger, Washington Policy Center, KIRO News, and Rebecca Perry Twitter)

Reports from Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) road crews reveal that due to Governor Inslee’s vaccine mandate (which cost 400 WSDOT employees their jobs), crews are being forced to work seven days a week to clear mountain passes, in crews half the normal size, and that they are forced to act as first-responders to accidents since the Washington State Patrol is short-staffed as well.  This has resulted in all four Washington State mountain passes being closed, a rare occurrence.  Road crew members report a high level of burnout amongst the WSDOT workers who have been working during the heavy snowfall in the mountains the past couple of weeks.  Said one former road crew member, “Even if we had a full crew, we would still struggle of course, but there would be more resources to maintain so we’re not burning out our remaining employees at 7 days a week. To put all the burden on the few that are left behind to maintain these roads and to have media negate what is being done to these employees, chalking it up to a weather issue, when the mandate is a part of the problem, is a slap in the face.”  (Washington Policy Center blog and Seattle Times)

Governor Inslee’s Department of Health (DOH) has completely failed in its “contact tracing” program, and completely dropped the ball as the Omicron variant spread through the state during the holidays.  In May 2020, Governor Inslee and DOH officials announced the creation of a contact tracing team with nearly 1,400 state employees and National Guard members.  The state goal was to reach 90% of those who came in contact with an individual who tested positive for COVID.  During the past 20 months, the state effort has fallen well below the stated goal, with just 20% – 30% actually being contacted.

Of course, this figure is unacceptable, but it is nothing compared to the failure which occurred over the holidays.  With the Omicron variant causing yet another spike in COVID cases, new data reveals that only 11% of people were contacted by the DOH about contact tracing.  Thus when the contact tracing effort was most needed, Jay Inslee’s team failed.

To use Governor Inslee’s infamous Super Bowl metaphor (remember he said last July that he alone had “won the Super Bowl” against COVID and there was no need to allow other state and local officials to be involved in the decision-making process), no team has ever won the Super Bowl by having just 11% of its plays being successful. (Todd Myers Facebook post/DOH Statistics, Governor Inslee media release, and Brandi Kruse Twitter)

Republican House Leader JT Wilcox sent a letter to Democrat House Speaker Laurie Jinkins to let her know of his caucus’ intentions to amend state laws regarding the governor’s emergency powers.  Representative Wilcox said the Republicans will be supporting the reforms contained in the bipartisan bill HB 1772.  Leader Wilcox mentioned Democrats repeatedly killed efforts during the 2021 legislative session to publicly discuss and debate the issue.  Representative Wilcox pointed out that since then some seven Democrat House members have either co-sponsored emergency powers reform legislation or stated they support it. Two more Democrats have publicly criticized Governor Inslee’s use of emergency powers and even the Speaker stated the governor’s emergency actions “had stopped making sense.” (The speaker made those comments after the governor kept businesses closed in Representative Jinkins’ own legislative district in Pierce County, while allowing businesses in more the even more liberal King County to remain open).

Today at the Seattle City Club legislative preview, Speaker Jinkins responded to Representative Wilcox’ letter stating her aim for the 2022 legislative session is to seek balance and that Democrats will finally allow some discussion and public hearings on emergency powers legislation. (Republican House Caucus media release, Washington Legislature Bill Summary, and WPC Center for Government Reform)

There will be no public hearings on a Democrat bill to reduce the sentences of those convicted of drive-by shootings. Thanks to public outrage over the Democrats’ 2021 “police reform” legislation, and the number of Democrats in swing districts who are vulnerable in the 2022 elections because they supported these “reforms” rewarding the political violence committed by liberal activists in Seattle in 2020, this latest idea may be toast. The Chair of the House Public Safety Committee Representative Roger Goodman (D – Kirkland) has already received much criticism for the irresponsible “reform” bills which he and Representative Jesse Johnson (D – Federal Way) wrote and ushered through the legislature last year.  Representative Goodman scurried away from this latest proposal, said his committee would not have time to hold public hearings on the legislation (HB 1692) proposed by Representative Tarra Simmons (D – Bremerton) and Representative David Hackney (D – Tukwila) to reduce penalties for shooting guns randomly at innocent victims. (MyNorthwest, Shift, and Washington Legislature Bill Summary)

King County Prosecutor Dan Satterburg stated he will not be seeking re-election later this year. Satterburg began his career as a Republican under the highly regarded Norm Maleng, but changed his party affiliation to being a Democrat to keep his job as the county became more liberal.  He has deservedly drawn considerable criticism during the past few years as repeat criminals were either not prosecuted or given very light punishments for their illegal activities.  One has to wonder if former Seattle City Attorney Pete Holmes’ defeat in the 2021 primary had any impact on Satterburg’s decision, since they both share similar soft-on-crime policies. (Seattle Times)

The principal for Kirkland’s Lakeview Elementary is even being criticized by Washington State Superintendent of Public Instruction Chris Reykdal for forcing students to eat their lunch outside during the recent cold weather.  Principal Heather Frazier upset many parents when she instituted the outside eating procedure as a method to slow the spread of COVID. Superintendent Reykdal said, ““I would not have kids outside in freezing cold to deliver meals if I had another alternative, and I suspect 294 districts didn’t do that.” (MyNorthwest)

Republican legislators are seeking to amend the expensive agriculture overtime laws written and passed by urban liberal legislators during the 2021 session.  Representative Larry Hoff (R – Vancouver) has sponsored legislation (HB 1750) to allow more flexibility in the wage scale for agriculture workers.  The Democrats passed legislation which ignored the reality of a farm schedule, which is more labor intensive during both the planting and harvesting seasons.  Representative Hoff’s legislation, which has seven co-sponsors (including two Democrats), would provide farmers with 12 weeks a year where they would not need to pay overtime wages until an employee has worked 50 hours. The Democrats’ bill likely would have reduced the paychecks of farmworkers and could have forced many small family farms out of business. (Capitol Press, Washington Legislature Bill Summary, and Shift Newsmaker Interview)

Democrat lawmakers continue to stumble along attempting to save their poorly developed Long-Term Care payroll tax (which is supposed to fund their latest big government entitlement scheme).  Democrats ignored for three years the legitimate concerns brought up by Washington workers and employers over their tax plan, but waited until the very last minute to delay its implementation (after more than 400,000 Washington workers purchased private plans to avoid being stuck in the government program).  It will be interesting to watch if vulnerable Democrats in swing districts will do what is right by voting to repeal this disastrous program, or if they will cave into the desire to receive large campaign donations from the Service Employees International Union bosses who will financially benefit if the Long-Term Care payroll tax is forced on Washington workers. (Click to read full Shift Article)

BABYLONBEE FRIDAY!

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