Each potential bill goes through a 5 step journey once the committee has approved it for printing. Our special session opened today with the RS introduction and voting on which bills would be heard for this session.
TODAY’S SPECIAL SESSION UPDATE: TOMORROW IS A BUSY DAY FOR THE HOUSE: They have several bills to debate and vote on.
These 3 bills below will be on STEP 2 of 5 of their journey to becoming law. They were heard at the committee level and will now go to the floor for a vote by ALL the Representatives.
Here’s the EMAIL LIST to make comments on these bills/resolutions
These 4 similar bills are still being discussed and the meeting that will continue tomorrow after the House Floor Session. PUBLIC TESTIMONY to continue tomorrow a.m. (If you want to hear some FREEDOM LOVERS testify tune in midmorning tomorrow. *We will update when they provide a room number.)
There are 3 bills to be considered at the Special Session which begins Monday rumor has it that the committees are meeting to discuss all the bills on SUNDAY. The bills can be read at the bottom of the Governor’s proclamation.
WE NEED TO ACT NOW. The state didn’t mandate masks, rather, they had local cities and counties do it for them. It’s not hard to see that the same thing will happen with a vaccine. This Special Session of the Legislature beginning August 24th will provide cover to allow the government to enact such orders.
JOIN THE CITIZENS MARCH AGAINST GOVERNMENT IMMUNITY @ 7:30 a.m. Monday at the Capitol
Attend the Hearing for RS28049 10:30 A.M. Room EW42
RS28046 – the first bill attached at the bottom of the proclamation states. “An emergency existing therefor, which emergency is hereby declared to exist, the act shall be in full force and effect on and after it’s passage and approval.” This bill makes it a LAW that an emergency exists but there is no end date for it.
Translated: This means the Governor or any other entity like a health department can use emergency powers whenever they want.
RS28049 is the last bill attached at the bottom of the Governor’s proclamation. It says that all businesses and persons will have immunity from liability for actions taken related to a “coronavirus-related pandemic or epidemic” as long as they make a “good faith effort to comply with a statute, rule, or lawful order of a government.”
Businesses that do not comply with every edict of government WILL HAVE LIABILITY. This is not about protecting small businesses, it is about compelling behavior of businesses.
Said another way, it is using society to control and exclude those who choose another path. Just as with the mask mandates, any government entity can “order” businesses to require proof of vaccination with a coronavirus vaccine in order to enter their business once the vaccine is available and there will be nothing we can do about it. And even if you are injured or killed by this brand new, experimental vaccine, you will be on your own. Interestingly, this bill will sunset July 1, 2023.
EMAIL NOW. Attend In-Person or Virtually Regarding RS28049
Per the Meeting Announcement: Limited public seating will be available in the committee room. Committee meetings will be live-streamed in designated overflow rooms throughout the Capitol.Please wear a mask and maintain physical distancing while in the Capitol.********************************************
HOUSE JUDICIARY, RULES & ADMINISTRATION COMMITTEE 10:30 A.M. Room EW42 Monday, August 24, 2020 There is a POSSIBLE OPPORTUNITY FOR PUBLIC TESTIMONY. *Limit your comments to 3 minutes.* Provide written copies for public record.
PLEASE EMAIL AND CALL OUR LOCAL LEGISLATORS AND EMAIL ALL IDAHO LEGISLATORS AND ASK THEM TO STOP THESE BILLS.
WE NEED AS MANY FOLKS AS POSSIBLE TO CALL AND EMAIL NOW!!!
TALKING POINTS – please write your own or choose from below:
1) Please oppose RS28049 which opens the door for businesses to require medical procedures to enter their premises. In the same way masks are now required, vaccination could be required, even though federal law recognizes vaccines injure and kill some recipients. 2) Please oppose RS28049 which will effectively do away with businesses that do not want to do the bidding of the government by exposing them alone to liability. 3) Please oppose RS28049 which is not about protecting businesses but compelling behavior of businesses, said another way, it is using society to control and exclude those who choose another path such as not wanting to inject a vaccine. 4) Please oppose RS28049 as a business that might require a vaccine to enter would have no liability for the damage that vaccine might cause nor would the vaccine makers which are protected under the Prep Act. Individuals will be left to fend for themselves if they suffer a catastrophic injury resulting in losing their job, excessive medical costs, and even loss of life. 20% of the formerly healthy individuals in the high dose group of the Moderna phase II trials had to be hospitalized and this vaccine will permanently alter the recipient’s DNA. 5) Please oppose RS28046 as the language of this bill is outrageous. No legislature may codify into law the existence of a state of emergency but this bill does exactly that by never providing an end date for said emergency.
6) Please support legislation that protects all businesses from liability for a customer contracting Covid in their establishment.
Our state has been placed under a ‘state of emergency’ going on 90 days June 23, 2020. The people of Idaho have requested that our Legislators convene a special session to handle the situation representing their constituents whose rights and freedoms have been violated numerous times by our Governor. There are three obvious reasons why legislators could convene at the Idaho Capitol on June 23, 2020.
1. ONLY THE LEGISLATURE CAN APPROPRIATE MONEY
The US Treasury has deposited $1.25 billion into the Idaho treasury pursuant to H.R. 748, known as the Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security Act, or CARES Act. Article VII, Section 13 of the Idaho State Constitution says “MONEY –HOW DRAWN FROM TREASURY. No money shall be drawn from the treasury, but in pursuance of appropriations made by law.”
The Governor’s use of a financial advisory committee to distribute the CARES funds violates the intent of the Idaho Constitution. The Governor usurps legislative authority by appropriating this sum of money — over $1 billion — and treating it as if it is “non-cognizable funds.” Typically, treating money as non-cognizable funds is the statutory provision for spending small sums of federal grant money made available after a legislative session.
2. THE LEGISLATURE IS NOT INFERIOR TO THE GOVERNOR – AN EMERGENCY DECLARATION BY THE GOVERNOR CAN’T BE USED TO CREATE AN INDEFINITE SHIFT IN THE BALANCE OF POWER IN FAVOR OF THE GOVERNOR
On March 13, 2020, Governor Little issued a proclamation, citing Idaho Code 46-1008, declaring a disaster emergency. The code section that describes the length of the emergency reads as follows: “the governor shall terminate the state of disaster emergency by executive order or proclamation; provided, however, that no state of disaster emergency may continue for longer than thirty (30) days unless the governor finds that it should be continued for another thirty (30) days or any part thereof. The Legislature by concurrent resolution may terminate a state of disaster emergency at any time. Thereupon, the governor shall issue an executive order or proclamation ending the state of disaster emergency.”
The Governor has maintained this disaster emergency (which ran concurrently with the Extreme Emergency declaration, which began on March 25 and ended on June 11) since March 13, and on June 11 issued another proclamation maintaining the disaster emergency. Therefore, the Governor has signaled he is not bound to the 60 day limit and may continue to govern Idaho by executive action without input from the Legislative branch.
It is unconstitutional to claim that the Governor can operate the state under a disaster emergency indefinitely, yet maintain that the Legislature must be in session to “terminate a state of emergency at any time.” The words “at any time” are clear. Acceding that the Governor can usurp full power, to change laws and appropriate money, without any power on the part of the Legislature to act as check is to accept the notion that the Executive and Legislative branches are not equal branches of government. Was the Idaho Constitution written to make the Legislature the inferior branch, by allowing only the governor to call a special session? This allows the same governor to effectively serve as two branches of government, and to prevent a Legislative check on this action, except for the period of roughly January through March?
3. EXECUTIVE ACTIONS BY THE GOVERNOR HAVE BEEN ARBITRARY AND IN CONTRAVENTION TO AMERICA’S FOUNDING PRINCIPLES
Much has been made of the decision by the Governor to allow state liquor stores to remain open, for which there is no constitutional protection, but to restrict constitutionally-protected religious worship.
Similarly, the notion that one person can arbitrarily determine which businesses are “essential” and can operate and which businesses are “non-essential” and can’t operate flies in the face of the very notion (contained in the Declaration of Independence) that all … “are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”
*Thank you Fred Birnbaum Vice President of Idaho Freedom Foundation and Idaho Freedom Action for sharing these points.
Convening in a special session
Unconstitutional Action or Legislative Duty?
Several legal opinions have been written on the matter of the Legislature ‘calling itself into session’ to do the work of the people. Many Senators have responded to citizen’s requests claiming that they have to await the Governor’s request in order to convene which is traditionally in January. What if our Governor, doesn’t call the legislators back into session in January? Under this ‘perpetual’ state of emergency, he could very well say we have to wait until sometime later next year.
There is a serious issue as of RIGHT NOW our state is not operating as a representative government.
In this video lawyer, Colton Boyles discusses with Miste Karlfeldt and Sarah Clendenon of Health Freedom Idaho the opposing legal opinions.
There are some Idaho legislators coming to the Capitol on June 23, 2020. (This date is 90 days after the extreme emergency declaration by the Governor.) No longer should the executive branch go unchecked while our legislators wring their hands claiming they can not represent us without permission of the Governor.Our legislators are convening at the request of the people. The question we ask is “Why aren’t ALL our legislators eager to do the job we hired them to do? We the People want our representative government back. No longer should the executive branch modify Idaho law, as happened in the Idaho primary elections. No longer should the executive branch appropriate funds, as that is a clearly defined task of our elected representatives.
Representative Vito Barbieri shares why he will be at the Capitol ready to represent the people who hired him for the task of representing them, especially in times like these.
“Since the Magna Carta, through the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution, to today’s Idaho Constitution, the purpose of each was to secure, under the law and with the assent of the people, the mutual well being of that people.
To suggest that the Idaho Constitution contemplates requiring permission from the executive branch for the legislature to convene is to deny the fundamental premise upon which our Republic stands: Each branch equal, independent, and separate from the other.
The executive branch asks not of the legislature permission when to act; the judicial branch asks not when it may convene; how then does the Idaho Constitution purport to require the legislative branch to appeal to a ‘higher power’ than itself? Certainly, the staunchest democrat, and even Idaho senators, recognize the inherent peril of failing to reoccupy the vacuum, failing to exercise our responsibilities, failing, even, to attempt a check on centralized power, because some opinions from some (high priced) attorneys say ‘you aren’t allowed’.
Where in that document is such a restriction specifically addressed? There is no restriction because the fundamental premise of a Republic was taken for granted by the drafters: No individual, no governor, no court, no extra-constitutional body was ever envisioned by them to control the voice, the representatives, of the people.
The power to convene, when to convene, and for what purpose to convene, fundamentally rests with the legislature, alone.
If it were otherwise, that is, that the Idaho Constitution specifically requires the people’s representatives to seek permission to convene, would not the citizens of the state rightly conclude that they have been duped into believing that Idaho government was of them, by them, and for them? (And “Was it all a lie, to keep the pitchforks at bay, as the institutions gradually but steadily encroached?”)
The Idaho Constitution is created by the people of the state to limit the power of government over its citizens. To argue that it limits the ability of the representatives of the people to convene only upon permission from the governor is to argue that Idaho has a King and that the people’s representatives must first be blessed with Imperial Grant. Such an argument, in yesterday’s America, would be absurd.
OPEN IDAHO RALLY DRAWS 1000’s
Idaho citizens are clamoring for a voice in the decisions being made by an executive branch that appears to have no check against its power. Decisions that have thrust people into unemployment after determining arbitrarily that their financial security is ‘not essential’, which in turn, evidences a gross disregard by the government of their personal wellbeing.
Decisions banning freedom to associate, freedom of religion, freedom to travel, and more, come from institutions brazenly disregarding personal liberty, the essential element of America’s founding, in the name of an ‘emergency’ that is not evidenced by the facts.
Seeing that the draconian actions were not founded upon fact, nor upon science, but upon imperfect and shifting data, rash action, and defective ‘models’,
Idaho citizens suspect that the legislature is complicit with the governor’s power grab. (The messaging, the continued farcical warnings and cautions spewing from official sources evidence to the people an inability, or likely a deliberate failure, to reexamine the facts, to admit a mistake, and to alter course.)
If not complicit, then surely, given the facts ‘on the ground’, the legislature is disenfranchised, marginalized, gutted, powerless. Such suspicions will be well-founded if the legislature shrinks now from its representative obligations.
If the legislature fails to convene prior to the January 2021 Session, it fails to exercise its responsibilities to the very people to whom the members ultimately owe their place in office: the voters, the citizens, the taxpayers. Each legislator must ask whether their loyalties lie with an Imperial Governor or with the people from whom that legislator derives his (or her) authority.
It is axiomatic that only from the people of the state is the power of a legislature to act. Not from the governor or the judiciary. It is therefore anathema to a representative government, not less to liberty and justice, for the people’s representatives to request permission, from anyone, to convene.
How can anyone argue otherwise, of a sovereign state, in America? To seek counsel, request opinions, and otherwise deflect the responsibilities inherent in elected office, is to reject the privilege granted by the franchise and to abdicate the power of the citizenry to a king or a black-robed oligarchy, or both.
This I cannot do. I will be sitting in my chair on the floor of the House of Representatives at 9 a.m. on Tuesday, June 23, 2020 to participate in and promote the legislative responsibilities granted me by the voters of District 2. I urge every other Idaho legislator to do the same. It’s time to convene for an extraordinary session.”
It’s time for the People’s Representatives to come together in a Special Session! The people’s voices, through our representation, must be considered. Call to Action: Contact your Senator and 2 Representatives.
With federal money coming into our state that needs to be appropriately allocated, as well as our Executive branch acting tyrannically and far outside their authority, it is long past time for our Legislators to reconvene in Idaho’s Capitol.
The people’s representatives are responsible for instructing our state government on behalf of the people. We request and instruct our Representatives and Senators to immediately begin planning to return to the Idaho Capitol for a special session to address the issues surrounding the current inappropriate use of the Idaho Code to impose martial law on the people. The Executive branch of Idaho state government is violating the Idaho Constitution, the US Constitution, and the people’s unalienable rights.
Our Constitutional Republic is comprised of three co-equal branches. It is the duty of each branch to be a Constitutional check on the other two. We call on every Idaho State Representative and State Senator to plan, coordinate and execute a special session of the Legislature. We expect and instruct you to uphold your oath to protect and defend the Idaho and US Constitutions.
Tell your two Representative and one Senator that you expect them to actively participate in the planning, and be present for, an immediate special session of the Legislature in Idaho’s Capitol. The people’s voices, through our representation, must be considered. Find your Representatives’ and Senator’s contact information here:
