The 2023 legislative session is careening into its last week with Democrats repeatedly meeting in the dead of night to hide their unpopular policies from voters.
Shift Washington
Friends,

The 2023 legislative session is careening into its last week with Democrats repeatedly meeting in the dead of night to hide their unpopular policies from voters. But as always, we here at Shift WA have you covered with insights into what is going on in your own political backyard! Read on…

This week’s Newsmaker Interview…
Senator Ron Muzzall (R – Oak Harbor) joined us for this week’s Newsmaker Interview. Senator Muzzall is the Ranking Republican on the Senate Agriculture, Water, Natural Resources and Parks Committee. Sen. Muzzall informed us of the Inslee Administration’s many “broken promises” and failure to follow the law by not providing an exemption for farmers from the skyrocketing fuel prices thanks to the Democrats’ expensive “Cap and TradeTax” energy policies. He blamed the urban Democrats’ “downright disrespectful views of agricultural workers” for the radical overtime wage policies which are financially hurting both the state’s farmers and farmworkers. Read more. 

This week’s top story…
Democrats’ latest pro-criminal legislation – House Bill 1324 (HB 1324) – literally prohibits a court from including juvenile court convictions when considering sentencing crimes committed as an adult. For Democrats, if you don’t actually kill anyone when you are under 18 years old, the crime cannot be included as part of the “Three Strikes, You’re Out” law passed by the voters back in the 1990’s. But that’s not the only pro-criminal bill under consideration this legislative session. Read more.  

In case you missed it…
It appears that Sound Transit ignored all warnings about the perils of running electrified rail across a floating bridge only to run into some reality. Continuing the long-established pattern of overpromising and underdelivering, Sound Transit is once again delaying the target opening of the I-90 light rail project across Lake Washington. 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.