He sure seems to put them into any bill that he proposes that might otherwise be considered decent.
For example, he's proposed SCR1005, which, if approved by the voters, would index compensation for legislators to inflation. The biggest issue with that? He specifically exempts other state-level officials from that.
His phasing - "B. The salaries of those holding elective state offices OTHER THAN THE OFFICE OF STATE LEGISLATOR..."
Note - ALL CAPS is his proposed new language.
Still, while bad, that pales next to the depravity of his SB1038.
That includes language that would classify assaults of certain public transit employee, railway workers, airport workers, employees of law enforcement agencies, animal control officers, and all elected officials as aggravated assaults (not the "depraved" part).
Nope. The depraved parts (and *yes*, I said "parts") -
"D. IF A PERSON IS CONVICTED OF COMMITTING AGGRAVATED ASSAULT ON A PEACE OFFICER PURSUANT TO THIS SECTION AND THE TRIER OF FACT DETERMINES THAT SECTION 13-701, SUBSECTION D, PARAGRAPH 17 APPLIES, THE PERSON SHALL BE SENTENCED TO TWO YEARS MORE THAN WOULD OTHERWISE BE IMPOSED FOR THE OFFENSE. THE ADDITIONAL SENTENCE IMPOSED UNDER THIS SUBSECTION IS IN ADDITION TO ANY ENHANCED PUNISHMENT THAT MAY BE APPLICABLE UNDER THIS SECTION OR CHAPTER 7 OF THIS TITLE. THE PERSON IS NOT ELIGIBLE FOR SUSPENSION OF SENTENCE, COMMUTATION OR RELEASE FROM CONFINEMENT ON ANY BASIS, EXCEPT AS SPECIFICALLY AUTHORIZED BY SECTION 31-233, SUBSECTION A OR B, UNTIL THE SENTENCE IMPOSED IS SERVED THE PERSON IS ELIGIBLE FOR RELEASE PURSUANT TO SECTION 41-1604.07 OR THE SENTENCE IS COMMUTED."
This seems to be the "all animals are equal but some animals are more equal than others" part.
"H. AGGRAVATED ASSAULT PURSUANT TO SUBSECTION A, PARAGRAPH 1 OR 2 OF THIS SECTION COMMITTED ON AN EMPLOYEE OF A LAW ENFORCEMENT AGENCY IS A CLASS 2 FELONY...."
Class 2 felonies include (but aren't limited to) things like manslaughter, rape, sex trafficking, and child molestation, and Kavanagh wants to equate some assaults of police officers to those acts.
My guess is that if this one is approved by the legislature (possible, given the composition of the state legislature), and makes it past the governor's veto pen (unlikely, but she could have a bad day), this one may run into Constitutional issues.
Something that Kavanagh has run into before with his pro-police/anti-society legislation.
2 comments:
You have it completely wrong. The only addition that my bill makes to the law is to add animal control officers and elected officials to the list of people who, if assaulted, generated an enhanced penalty for the assailant.
Voter-approved initiatives already added the language you cite as bad and added the transportation workers. Legislative counsel is merely using my bill to add those voter-approved provisions that you criticize to the laws text. If you do not believe me, look at the existing statutes. Those voter-approved issues appear in existing law under different versions in the law's text.
Also, I only address legislators because we are the only ones whose pay increase must come through via a commission and voter referral. The last two governors have effectively eliminated that commission by not filling the needed vacancies.
Finally, I passed the law a few years ago that allowed pay increases for county elected officials, and I am running a bill this year to allow sanitary board members to get increases. So that's three strikes for you, Craig.
Senator John Kavanagh
Correction: The commission also refers other statewide-elected officials salaries, so I may add them to my bill. I have to look into that. Deduct one strike, Craig.
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