In a press release, Oregon Senate Majority Leader Rob Wagner (D-Lake Oswego) chided Oregon Senate Republicans and Senator Brian Boquist (I-Dallas), saying that they have "walked out on their responsibility to serve their constituents when they refused to show up to work for [the] floor session." Senator Wagner himself has been a no-show, when the Lake Oswego School Board -- which he chaired at the time -- failed to take action against students who racially attacked a student of color.

Senator Wagner continued, “Senate Republicans continue to sabotage Oregon’s democracy and undermine the will of voters. They have abdicated the oaths of office many of them took just weeks ago. They continue to accept pay, benefits and daily expenses from Oregon taxpayers all while completely obstructing the business before the Legislature -- the people’s work.

It's hard not to cringe at the sound of Democrats trying to call out Republicans for using procedure to stop policy when much of the Democrat agenda has been passed with emergency clauses so as to prevent the people from exercising their constitutional right to do a referendum, tax bills that have been declared by Legislative Counsel to not be taxes, so as to avoid the three-fifths super-majority requirement, and chamber rules that allow anonymous bills.

Senate Republicans -- and Senator Boquist -- are just using Article IV, Section 12 of the Oregon Constitution as a perfectly legal procedural tactic to defend their agenda. Just like the Democrats.


--Terese Humboldt

Post Date: 2021-02-26 18:53:50