Republican lawmakers in Oregon are fleeing for Idaho in an attempt to torpedo Democrats’ attempts to pass a climate bill that conservatives in the state believe will hollow out rural parts of the state.
Eleven GOP lawmakers walked out of the state capitol, preventing the majority party from reaching a quorum on a cap-and-trade bill, The Washington Post reported Monday night.
Republicans say making tracks for another state was one of their only options.
Republicans employed a similar tactic in 2019 when they walked out in June to prevent a quorum in protest against HB 2020, a cap-and-trade climate bill.
They stayed away even after Gov. Kate Brown, a Democrat, authorized Oregon State Police to return the lawmakers to Salem.
Brown accused Republicans of taking a “taxpayer-funded vacation” in a statement addressing the walkout Monday.
“We were all elected by the voters to represent our communities, and to be the voice of our constituents in the capital,” she said in a statement. “Republicans signed up for this. If they don’t like a bill, then they need to show up and change it, or show up and vote no.”
Republicans are painting a different picture. “Pay attention Oregon — this is a true example of partisan politics,” Oregon Senate Republican Leader Herman Baertschiger Jr. said in a statement.
“Denying quorum is one of the only tools that the minority party has right now,” Senate Republican spokeswoman Kate Gillem told WaPo, noting that the bill is too divisive to move forward during the legislature’s 35-day “short session.”
Democrats won a supermajority in the House and Senate in 2018. The election’s results leave Republicans out in the dark while some conservatives say the Democratic policy will increase the cost of living for people in rural parts of the state.
But Republicans have said the centerpiece of that policy, the cap-and-trade legislation, will increase the cost of living for rural residents, disproportionately harming their constituents.
Republicans promised ahead of the bill to do “whatever it takes” to stop it.
Oregon’s quorum rules are written into its constitution, a move the state’s founders hoped would prevent “secret meetings of the legislature running roughshod over people,” Greg Dotson, a professor of environmental law at the University of Oregon, told WaPo.
Read rest at Daily Caller
How about Hot Air Tax to be paid by the biggist producers of Hot Air like Liberal Democrats, Hollywood Idiots, and the Eco-Freaks
Seems like the proposed state of “Greater Idaho” is looking pretty good right now
This is a perfect example of what happens when small geographic but large population centers filled with totally oblivious SHEEPLE have enough votes to dominate the legislature and disenfranchise the smaller distributed population residing in the much larger geographic area. It is another reason why the founders created an electoral college for the President so such tyranny by mob rule could not occur to choose the president of ALL the states, not a FEW large cities.