October 30, 2021.
The residents of the state got a brief glimpse at how members of the legislature actually view each other, or how at least some of them view each other, yesterday when news broke that Rep. Harshman twice used the "f" word in describing Rep. Chuck Gray. Both men are from Casper.
Harshman was attending remotely and had his computer "mic" on. He didn't realize that.
Harshman is a long-serving member of the House who was once its speaker and who is employed as a high school coach and educator. Gray is what is now termed a "conservative" in most circles and is even sometimes referred to as "most conservative", even though some of the things he's presently backing wouldn't have been regarded as conservative in prior times (telling employers who they can and can't hire and fire isn't traditional conservatism). Gray was recently running against Liz Cheney but failed to secure much support, and he spent part of the fall involving himself with the conspiratorially minded Arizona recount.
To put things in sharper focus, Gray and Anthony Bouchard have been in the forefront of the Trump populist movement although beyond that the two men share little that's obviously common and Bouchard was taking shots at Gray recently due to their being competitors in their respective doomed efforts to replace Cheney as the GOP nominee. That effort is now obviously centered on Harriet Hageman, and Gray's funding didn't seem to extend much beyond himself and his father, the latter who also owns the radio station where Gray is employed as a commentator. He has drawn a group of "conservatives" around him, at least locally. It didn't go much beyond Natrona County, however, in spite of his being scandal free, well-spoken and media savvy, which isn't surprising given his occupation.
In backrooms of the GOP and out on the street you'll hear little rumblings about the populists, but you have to really be listening to pick them up. Truth be known the GOP here is splitting into two parties and may already really function that way. One party is made up of the traditional Wyoming party, and the other is the populists. Out on the streets, some longer standing regular workaday Republicans are pretty frank that they think the populists are nuts, whereas the neo firebrand populists seem to think anyone who doesn't think just like they do is a traitor.
This broke fully out with comments about Gray, which actually closely expresses the views held by more than a few workaday Republicans. In the comment section at Oil City, this immediately became apparent with some populists figures, including some local ones of note, expressing shock and taking the extreme party loyalty position against Harshman ("how could he take a shot at one of the most conservative members. . . ), and others coming back and slamming them for doing so ("he's allowed to have a view. . ."). A couple of probable Republicans not only excused Harshman's comments but endorsed them.
Harshman drove to Cheyenne to apologize and Gray hasn't commented on it. Harshman may face censure and has lost the right to appear remotely, but if the House censures him (some street populists are calling for resignation) they'll have to implicitly answer why another recent country Republican figure was allowed to say terrible things about Sen. Naracott with no real penalty ensuing.
Meanwhile, this explains what we've seen in Cheyenne. The regular GOP has been sidetracking the extreme unconstitutional bills and instead dealing with the less unconstitutional bills. Some variant of those will probably be passed, rather than the real firebrand ones. Just as it is nationally, the GOP is really waiting for the Trump era to pass and is hoping it does so soon, so such obvious discord ends before too many of the rank and file are disenchanted for good. The legislature voted to hold the special session, but chances are that most of the members felt compelled to do so, rather than enthusiastic about it, and now they'll pass something, as they reluctantly feel obligated to do that. There's a strong sense that an elected majority fears the populist branch of the party, which is controlling it right now, so it goes along with it, but only to the extent it absolutely has to.
October 4, 2021
The legislature passed a single bill, HB 1002.
The bill provided a compromise $4,000,000 to fight Federal mandates in courts, although this provision is odd in that the Attorney General's office is already staffed, so why $4,000,000 would be needed is unclear.
The bill itself does very little. It expresses the legislature's discontent with mandates and provides that public entities in Wyoming shall not enforce the, unless required to do so by the Federal government. It provides a time-out for that if things are in court.
All in all, the bill is surprisingly moderate and sensible, setting aside anyone's views on the policy behind it, as it recognizes the Supremacy Clause. This bill is one that a person didn't have to violate their oath of office in order to vote for. It demonstrates that the Republican Party in Wyoming is still made up of more of its traditional rank and file than populists, who wanted to take some fairly obviously unconstitutional acts in regard to mandates.
The bill can be read here.
In passing the bill, Representative Nicholas, who is a lawyer, noted that the legislature's "hands were tied" as the legislature "can't override Federal law", which is exactly correct, given the Supremecy Clause of the US Constitution. It turns out that the Supremecy Clause provided the basis for Rep. Harshman's harsh words on Rep Gray, at least according to a statement he released, which stated in part:
Last Thursday, we had a debate on the Federal preemption issue. And Bill 1001 has this statement, and it is still there; the statement that the Bill goes away if a Federal mandate is ever in place. And I think that's very disturbing. I mean, a Federal mandate is clearly unconstitutional, outside of the powers granted to the Federal government in the United States Constitution. It is also clearly an unconstitutional delegation of congressional authority to the Executive Branch. It's just unconstitutional in a variety of ways.
For this state bill to have this statement, that the bill just goes away if there's a federal mandate, and just to concede the Federal government preempts (which is wrong; they don't)...the media can claim they do all they want, but it's not true because it's not a constitutional action. So to have that statement in there that the bill goes away with the Federal mandate is very troubling...it wasn't needed and it was wrong.And so I brought an amendment to discuss it. I think it was important that we try to remove that, that we remove it and that we have that discussion, and then I called for a recorded vote. Now, amendments do not receive recorded votes, which I am very troubled by. I've been troubled by it since I became a member. I think it's an important issue, I called for a recorded vote, and there are many members that don't like that. And that was the context for the wrong comments. I think there's a larger story here. It just shows that this reaction to recorded votes totally wrong. Members should be on the record on issues that come before the legislature. We need accountability. I've called for recorded votes in the past, I called for it there, and I stand by that because it's important for members of the legislature to be on the record.
So, I was very troubled by the comments. I think it was very unfortunate.
Gray, who is not a lawyer, is incorrect on the mandates being facially unconstitutional. You can make a constitutional argument regarding them, but it would have to do with there being no correctly worded enabling act, a pretty sophisticated legal argument that nobody has made so far, in so far as I'm aware.
Calling for recorded votes is another matter, and a person can have separate views on that. This is of course Gray's view on what occurred, and might not be Harshman's.
No matter, it was the correct view of the majority of the legislature that trying to override Federal law would violate the Supremacy Clause, which it would. So the bill sent to the legislature seeks to avoid that.
November 4, 2021, cont:
So, after all of that, the Federal Government's new rule came out, and it mandates vaccines or masks. In other words, it doesn't make anyone actually get vaccinated.
So, there is no actual Federal "vaccine mandate" as the Federal government isn't mandating anyone to get vaccinated save, probably, for its own employees. The new statute, then, if signed into law may actually apply to nothing in existence right now, unless a court was to interpret the new rules as a "vaccine mandate" as it mandates that people get vaccinated, or wear masks. That's an open question.
Prior editions:
No comments:
Post a Comment