This Week in Statehouse Action: Choose Your Own Freakout edition
If you'd like to yeet yourself into the sun, turn to page 49
Yeah yeah, I know: You don’t need bad news today.
Well, in the big but sparsely populated state legislative cave in which I reside, the news is pretty much always bad, so the needle fell off my freakout meter a LONG time ago (... on or around Nov. 2, 2010, actually).
So I’m here to maybe remind you that there are other things to fret about (and get involved in, maybe? Anyone?) besides, say, a Thursday night debate in June.
Fret item 1: Iowa Supreme Court abortion ruling
While many of us were waiting with bated breath for SCOTUS rulings on Friday, the Iowa Supreme Court ruled 4-3 to allow a so-called “fetal heartbeat” law – effectively a six-week abortion ban – to go into effect.
Legal proceedings are ongoing, but the 2023 statute will be enforced while state courts continue to sort things out.
Fun fact! All of Iowa’s Supreme Court justices were appointed by Republican governors.
If you’re upset about this ruling, there’s actually sorta something to be done.
One of the justices who joined the majority decision, David May, is up for retention this year.
I mean, if he’s booted, GOP Gov. Kim Reynolds gets to appoint his replacement, but hey, it’s something!
Fret item 2: The fall of the “Chevron deference”
SCOTUS gave the Iowa Supreme Court news some serious competition on Friday by also dropping a huge ruling.
… okay, there were several, but I don’t think you come here for legal news (Chris Geidner’s excellent Law Dork is all over that isht, and you should definitely subscribe if you’re into that kind of thing!), so I’m just going to talk about the ones that just took a boatload of power away from the federal government.
The cases I’m talking about are known as the “Chevron deference” cases: Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo and Relentless, Inc. v. Department of Commerce.
After oral arguments in January, it seemed pretty obvious that the conservative Court majority planned to trash a 40-year-old ruling requiring courts to defer to executive branch agencies’ interpretations of law when that interpretation is “reasonable” (aka the “Chevron deference”).
By tossing the Chevron deference on Friday, SCOTUS completely blew up federal admin law as we know it, giving that power instead to courts – courts now stacked by Trump appointees with lifetime gigs.
Instead of deference to agency experts, the courts now have expansive authority to second-guess regulations.
As federal regulatory power becomes diminished, states will rush to fill the regulatory gap.
And with the current composition of state governments, this could mean the rollback of consumer, environmental, and health protections, just for starters.
Other troubling stuff:
I was a little Arizona-d out by the end of my last missive, but the state’s legislative session wrapped up earlier this month, and it’s worth noting some of the other bad stuff the legislature’s GOP majorities did and/or tried to do (but were stopped by Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs) in addition to the bad stuff I’ve already gone on about.
Republicans not only killed a measure that would give Arizonans a right to access contraception and prohibited any effort to infringe on that right, but they did it in a spectacularly shitty way.
First, neither the House nor the Senate version of the bill received a single committee hearing.
Smart of Republican leadership to protect any vulnerable incumbents from having to go on the record opposing contraception, tbh.
But then the Senate majority leader volunteered a humdinger of a quote when asked if he’d oppose future efforts to restrict access to emergency contraception.
And by “humdinger of a quote” I mean Sen. Sonny Borrelli called women who need emergency contraception sluts:
“Bayer Company invented aspirin. Put it between your knees.”
By the by, Borrelli’s not running for reelection to the legislature, but he is seeking a spot on the Mohave County Board of Supervisors.
… and he’s still going on about how the 2020 election was stolen, plus he boasts a Trump endorsement, to boot.
Some other bad stuff Arizona Republicans tried to pull but, bless, were unsuccessful:
The House GOP passed (on party lines) a bill that would have ended no-excuse early mail-in voting – a method known locally as “early voting” and used by 75% of Arizonans in 2022.
Republican Sen. Anthony Kern (a Jan. 6 participant fake presidential elector in 2020) introduced a measure that would empower state lawmakers – and only state lawmakers – to determine how the state’s Electoral College votes are assigned.
A GOP House member introduced a measure declaring that the legislature already has the power to “pre-appoint” Arizona’s Republican presidential electors.
Rep. Rachel Jones is running for reelection this fall.
Sen. Jake Hoffman – another former fake presidential elector – introduced a bill that would trigger an automatic do-over of any election in which 1,000 voters in Maricopa County (or 250 voters in any other county) had to wait in line for more than 90 minutes.
Hoffman, by the by, is running for reelection.
GOP lawmakers in both chambers actually passed legislation that would have let ranchers in southern Arizona legally kill undocumented immigrants crossing their land.
Thankfully, Hobbs vetoed that racist vigilante garbage.
I’ll wrap with a quick dip into my favorite state for absolute trash.
Democratic lawmakers in Tennessee are demanding that GOP Secretary of State Tre Hargett explain why he sent over 14,000 letters to voters early this month warning them that they might not be eligible to vote in the 2024 election and demanding that they verify their citizenship.
“At its core, it is voter intimidation,” said Rep. Gloria Johnson (of Tennessee Three fame).
Democrats are questioning whether it was lawful to send the letters, and they’ve requested that the state attorney general (Republican Jonathan Skrmetti) investigate whether the letters constituted a voter intimidation tactic (I mean, duh).
Welp!
That’s quite enough nonsense for this week.
As always, I appreciate you hanging in (on?)!
And I appreciate you.
So take care of yourself out there.
You’re important.
We need you.