Democrat legislators, who have lorded over the current legislative session without consulting their Republican counterparts and have ignored constant bipartisan overtures for meaningful reform of the governor’s emergency powers for the past two years, now laughably blame Republicans for their failure to pass any reforms of the governor’s powers.  Representative Sharon Shewmake (D – Bellingham) posted a tweet on Friday evening stating that a “Republican filibuster killed SB 5909 on emergency powers reform.” The (laughingly) obvious problem with this false statement is that there is no filibuster in the Washington State legislature.  The (unfortunately) real story is that House Democrats, especially those like Representative Shewmake who are facing tough re-election battles due to their far-Left voting records this November, did not want to go on record voting against the Republican’s real reform amendments to SB 5909 (the Democrats’ fake reform legislation which already passed the Senate).  Thus, House Democrats suddenly stopped debate (which Democrats allowed to start at 1:00 AM) on the bill once Republican Chris Corry (Yakima) offered amendments which would have brought real reform to the state’s emergency powers law.

The sad story is that while Democrats have totally controlled the Washington Legislature they have passed – strictly along partisan lines – measures to increase the cost of gas by at least 50 cents a gallon (the “Inslee fuel standard”), an unconstitutional state income tax on capital gains, rioter-friendly “police reform” laws which have caused crime rates to skyrocket, and budgets which more than doubled the size and cost of state government under Jay Inslee’s reign (from $32.1 billion to over $65 billion). That’s why it is so hypocritical and very disingenuous for Democrat legislators to suddenly blame Republicans for their failure to pass their own party’s fake reform bill. If they had the ability to jam through all these other liberal measures which the public opposed, then they certainly have the ability to pass real emergency reforms which the public is demanding.

Evidently Democrat legislators are taking their cue from Governor Inslee, who last week actually said with a straight face that it was the Republicans’ fault for why he is not ending his 2+ years of undemocratic one-man “emergency” rule despite never once consulting with Republican lawmakers over his unscientific partisan mandates and orders. Democrats love to be in complete control of government, yet they just don’t want the accountability which goes along with the power. (Representative Shewmake Twitter, Washington Legislature Bill Summary, TVW, and Shift Article)

Senator Lynda Wilson (R – Vancouver) provides an excellent overview of what is currently taking place during the final days of the disastrous 2022 legislative session, and she states her belief that Democrats will continue to refuse any input from Republicans members as the Senate and House seek to reach agreements on final passage of bills.  As a public service, Senator Wilson describes the options available during the “concurrence” stage of the legislative calendar in her latest message to her constituents. She points out there are various methods legislators can use to reach agreement, and that usually there is a “conference committee” made up of members from both the House and Senate to works out the differences in the budget.

Both the House and Senate Democrats have passed supplemental budgets which spend nearly all of the state’s $15 billion in unexpected surplus tax revenues to advance the far-Left agenda of making state government bigger and more expensive (again the state budget has more than doubled in less than a decade!!!). Neither the House nor the Senate Democrats believe that taxpayers, especially those who are lower income or on a fixed income, deserve assistance from any tax break during this time of record-breaking surpluses even as grocery prices and energy cost skyrocket due to the Democrats’ inflationary policies and higher taxes. The one break the Democrats have given taxpayers is free parking at state parks (if you can afford the gas to get there).

Senator Wilson, who is the Senate Republican budget leader, said she expects the Democrats will again totally ignore Republicans if a conference committee is called to resolve the differences between the House and Senate budgets. “I should be at the table on the supplemental operating budget, being the Republican budget leader, but, judging from last year’s experience, I won’t expect to be invited until the day AFTER everything has already been negotiated.” (Senator Wilson Bulletin and WPC Center for Government Reform Facebook)

It is interesting to note the difference between when the Democrats control the legislature and when Republicans control the proceedings.  Consider current history. The Democrats are completely locking out any Republican input on legislation and don’t even allow public hearings on minority-party bills. Yet when Republicans had control, they were not afraid of diversity of thought. We dug up this quote from then-freshman Senator John Braun (R – Centralia) from 2013, when Republicans, along with a three Democrats, formed a majority coalition which ran the Senate. Instead of squelching minority views, the Republicans allowed public hearings on Democrat bills. Senator Braun said, “We refuse to act like the bullies of the past, which means we will allow hearings on minority bills and welcome open dialogue on all issues of importance.” Guess which party is the one which prefers the bully approach? (Washington State Wire 2/18/2013)

Last week was not a good one for Democrat Washington State Insurance Commissioner Mike Kreidler, as it was finally publicly reported that he verbally abused many of his staff members, forcing a semi-apology, and a Thurston County Superior Court judge halted the implementation of a bad policy he has sought to impose for years.  While the 78-year-old career politician issued a vague statement instead of an actual apology for his multiple transgressions towards his staff, he wasn’t able to dodge as quickly Judge Indu Thomas’ orders to stay the implementation of his policy to eliminate credit ratings from determining insurance rates.  This measure would have increased the rates for many low- and middle-income households. The judge delayed implementation until she could decide the merits of the lawsuits brought by insurance organizations. (CenterSquare and Northwest News Network)

Those of us at Shift were heartbroken over the sudden passing of former Washington State Republican Party Executive Director Lance Henderson. Some of us had known Lance for over 30 years, but even political newcomers knew Lance from his work for party organizations, candidates, and later as a political consultant. He passed away in his hometown of Walla Walla on Saturday following a cardiac arrest episode earlier in the week. There is a GoFundMe account set up to help his family pay for funeral expenses.  Our thoughts and prayers are with Lance’s family and close friends. (Facebook and GoFundMe)

Seattle now makes national headlines for its increase in violence due to radical liberal public safety policies at the city, county, and state level.  The Wall Street Journal today ran a short story about doctors at Harborview dealing with the increase in shooting victims as violent crimes continue to skyrocket (612 shooting incidents last year) in the city.  Remember when Seattle drew national attention for being the country’s most livable city or because one of its major businesses (Microsoft, Boeing, Amazon, Starbucks, etc.) was leading and changing its industry?  That was back when diversity of thought was still allowed in local government and politicians weren’t irresponsibly caving into the latest radical Left-wing political demand. (Wall Street Journal)

City of Seattle public safety officials have now implemented a “whack-a-mole” strategy to combat the city’s skyrocketing crime rate.  City police units were out in force in the 12^th Avenue South and Jackson Street neighborhood to deter crime there before they were forced to move patrols down to 3^rd Avenue and Pike Street last week following two murders. The Seattle Police Department, which is already short-staffed by at least 500 officers, is forced to pull officers from throughout the city to serve on these “hotspot” patrols. Thus precincts throughout the city are further hampered by more staffing challenges to support this random policy. (MyNorthwest)

Courts in Walla Walla and Columbia counties are representative of the substantial backlog of cases due to the pandemic and subsequent emergency orders from Governor Inslee.  Both counties believe they are now two years behind in their caseload. Both Walla Walla and Columbia have actually seen a reduction in the number of criminal cases due to the Washington State Supreme Court’s Blake decision which threw out the state’s drug possession laws and the Democrat majority in the legislature refused to fix the laws which now allow individuals to carry limited amounts of crack, meth, and heroin. (Walla Walla Union Bulletin and Crosscut)

Shift’s Newsmaker Interview was with straight shooting Representative Joel Kretz (R – Wauconda) who has served the 7^th Legislative District in Northeast Washington since 2005.  The Deputy Leader of the House Republican Caucus is well-known for his strong views as he advocates for farmers, ranchers, rural communities, and basic conservative principles like smaller government.   Representative Kretz is very direct in his criticism of Governor Jay Inslee’s latest attack on the state’s agricultural community, when he surprised them with an expanded river and stream buffer scheme (HB 1838) which would have caused many Washington farmers to go out of business.  He also says that his constituents “want to know how the governor can get away with what he’s doing” as he continues to abuse his emergency powers for more than two years.  Representative Kretz candidly shares his views on how his Democrat colleagues have irresponsibly failed to fix the many problems with both their “police reform” package and their disastrous Long-Term Care payroll tax. We trust Shift readers will appreciate Representative Kretz’ views on the 2022 legislative session. (Click to read full Newsmaker Interview)

It is curious that Washington State reporters have chosen to report on only one of the two Democrat politicians who have recently faced allegations of running dysfunctional offices due to their mistreatment of employees.  Six-term Democrat Insurance Commissioner Mike Kreidler was accused by over a dozen current and former staff members of mistreating his employees. The Northwest News Network ran a lengthy report detailing the allegations of Commissioner Kreidler verbally abusing staff members and not being able to control his temper. Yet there has been virtually no mention in the local media over the national news story featuring 14 current and former employees of Democrat U.S. Representative Pramila Jayapal alleging she berated staffers in public and randomly fired employees. In fact, just a couple of weeks after Buzzfeed posted the staffers’ charges, the Seattle Times ran a puff piece on the Congresswoman and failed to mention the accusations. (Click to read full Shift Article)

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