Friends,

Happy Easter! We hope you are spending time with your friends and family this holiday weekend for so many people of faith. And as always, we here at Shift WA have you covered with some of this week’s most read stories and insights into what is going on in your own political backyard! Read on…

This week’s OP-ED…
Greg Lane, the Executive Vice President of the Building Industry Association of Washington, wrote an insightful piece evaluating House Bill 1628 – a proposal to raise the real estate excise tax (REET). As Lane explains, the bill would “raise our state tax from a tie for the highest in the nation into the dubious position of having far and away the costliest REET in the land.” And it’s all in the name of affordable housing. But will the bill actually make our housing crisis worse? Read more.

This week’s Newsmaker Interview…
Third-term Republican Representative Jenny Graham (LD-6, Western Spokane County) joined us for this week’s Newsmaker Interview. Graham discussed her role in holding a rally at the Capitol Building last month, as the legislature debated fixing many of the Democrats’ failed 2021 anti-police laws. Among other topics, Graham also discussed her frustration with Democrats’ failure to make a rather simple fix to Washington’s drug laws which would encourage addicts get the help they desperately need. Read more.

This week’s can’t miss story…
The Department of Ecology “basically screwed it up” – to use the words of Democrat Senator Mark Mullet – in the state’s implementation of the costly cap-and-trade tax program. But the Democrats’ new bill intended to fix the mistakes which are hurting farmers sneakily includes a clause that – simply put – allows Ecology and the state to hide the staggering consumer costs of the scheme. The legislation attempts to “forbid fuel suppliers or distributors from listing cap-and-trade surcharges on invoices.” In other words, a gag order on how much the program is costing Washington consumers. Read this story and more.

In case you missed it…
It took Democrat State Senators almost 10 full days to use the State Supreme Court’s bizarre decision to allow an unconstitutional state income tax – just as long as it’s called an “excise tax” – to create a new tax approach. Democrat Senators Christine Rolfes and Emily Randall recently introduced Senate Bill 5767, a new 7.5% “excise tax” on the “excess compensation” of hospital administrators. Apparently, Democrats are now targeting groups of people they do not like with “excise taxes”… a.k.a. income taxes. Isn’t that special. Read this story and more.

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P.S.S. To get early insight into what might make Shift’s next Daily Briefing worth reading, tune in to 570 KVI on your AM dial weekday mornings at 8:05, to hear John Carlson talk Washington State legislative politics with Shift co-founder Randy Pepple. And you can always stay for the rest of the Commute with Carlson by tuning in here.