Washington
Passing bills, bills, bills: Highlights from Week 5 in Washington state Legislature
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FILE – The House chambers are viewed with most members attending remotely on the first day of the legislative session, Monday, Jan. 10, 2022, at the Capitol in Olympia, Wash.
Ted S. Warren / AP
The week started off with more cutoff deadlines looming — and more notable pieces of legislation were left behind Monday, before Washington state lawmakers in both the House and Senate chambers hit the floor for the rest of the week.
Policies on the move
In the House, lawmakers approved House Bill 1579, which would create a new prosecution office in the state with the authority to charge police for deadly use of force.
Legislation that could change the way cities approach their general elections, House Bill 1932, passed after lengthy debate on the proposal. Right now, cities and towns elect local officials in odd-numbered years, but the bill would allow local governments to switch their general elections to even-numbered years, when voter turnout is higher.
House lawmakers were split on the idea. Critics worry voters in cities that might make the change will be more focused on national campaigns and become fatigued with lengthy ballots.
But supporters say the change could spur civic engagement, and prompt more voters to weigh in on local issues. Only about 36% of Washington voters across the state filled out their ballots for last year’s general election — compared to a much-higher turnout of 63% in 2022.
Meanwhile, the Senate sent a few notable measures across the rotunda too.
First cutoff deadline, rent bill complications: A quick look at week 4 in the Washington Legislature
Senators signed off on Senate Bill 6009, which bans police from hog-tying people in their custody.
They also passed Senate Bill 6298, which would make members of the clergy mandatory reporters of child abuse or neglect. A similar version stalled out last year over disagreements on whether or not clergy should be required to report abuse they hear about in confession, and this year’s version attempts to strike a balance between concerns on either side.
The Senate also approved a bill that would create new safety rules for workers at strip clubs and other adult entertainment establishments, Senate Bill 6105. Interestingly, the chamber added language into the bill requiring the state’s Liquor and Cannabis Board to repeal its lewd conduct rules, in response to recent citations at gay bars in Seattle.
Lawmakers also spent a lot of time debating a controversial bill about regulating hospital mergers, Senate Bill 5241, before it passed 28 to 21. The bill would require the Attorney General’s office to oversee proposed mergers and ensure that they don’t limit peoples’ access to end-of-life, reproductive, or gender-affirming health care.
And Senate Bill 5444, which would ban the open carry of guns in some zoos, libraries and transit centers, also gained Senate approval along party lines.
Natural gas, opioids and DUIs: Highlights from week 3 of Washington’s legislative session
Nearly all the bills passed off the floor this week now go to the opposite chamber for further consideration, but the first bill of the session to make it through both sides of the Legislature also gained final approval. House Bill 1964 aims to improve enforcement of the state’s fuel tax, and passed both chambers with broad bipartisan support.
And even though Seattle’s NFL team won’t be playing during this weekend’s Super Bowl, the Senate spent a few minutes praising former Seahawks Head Coach Pete Carroll Friday morning.
The Senate passed a resolution formally congratulating Carroll for his accomplishments across his career in the NFL — including leading the Seahawks to the franchise’s first Super Bowl win in 2014. It was announced in January that Carroll would no longer be head coach after 14 years in the role. Carroll wasn’t in attendance, but Sen. Ann Rivers (R-La Center) wore a Seahawks jersey on the floor as she spoke on the resolution.
What fizzled
Republicans held a press conference Thursday condemning a proposal to raise the 1% cap on annual hikes to local property taxes. The following day, Democrats made clear that Senate Bill 5770 wouldn’t be moving forward this session. The bill would have allowed local governments to raise the amount of money they make from property taxes.
The bill’s sponsor, Sen. Jamie Pedersen (D-Seattle) told the Washington State Standard that the decision to leave the bill behind this year was in part due to “the voter mood” as several initiatives, mainly targeting taxation, are almost certain to go to ballots in November.
A proposal pitched in response to the frustration over fuel costs, Senate Bill 6052, seems to have stalled.
The measure was a priority for Gov. Jay Inslee — especially to help defend his signature Climate Commitment Act, as critics blame it for changing gas prices. The bill aimed to create more state oversight for gas companies and the way they set prices. But the bill didn’t get a hearing or a vote in the Senate Ways and Means Committee before Monday’s cutoff, with proponents of the bill attributing its demise to the policy’s complexity and financial cost.
AI, guns, and initiatives: highlights from Week 2 of Washington state’s 2024 legislative session
Another bill that would have expanded on lawmakers’ 2023 effort to provide more kids with free school meals also didn’t make it. This year’s bill, House Bill 2058, would have required any public school to offer kids free lunch and breakfast — but it also didn’t get a vote.
Lawmakers also didn’t take action on a solitary confinement reform bill, and advocates say with the lapse of House Bill 1087, the Legislature missed a critical moment to make some meaningful changes before a massive shift in leadership in the state next year.
Also of note, Rep. Spencer Hutchins (R-Gig Harbor) announced he won’t seek reelection later this year. Every member of the House of Representatives is up for reelection this fall, as well as about half of state Senators. Hutchins said in a statement announcing his decision that the demands of being a lawmaker have “taken a heavy toll” on his family and livelihood.
Lawmakers will spend more time on the floor at the beginning of next week — most bills have to make it out of their chamber of origin by Tuesday, Feb. 13, in order to keep moving forward this session. Next week lawmakers will also get a new look at the state’s revenue forecast and begin releasing their plans for changes to the state’s current two-year budget.
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Washington
Tim Walz has 'gilded his record for political gain,' Washington Post columnist says
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Washington Post columnist Kathleen Parker criticized Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz for exaggerating elements of his career for “political gain” in an op-ed published on Friday.
“I’m not saying that Walz lies, precisely,” Parker wrote in an op-ed headlined, “Tim Walz isn’t exactly what he seems.” “But he tends to gild his résumé for political gain.”
Walz has been forced to defend a number of controversies that have emerged following Vice President Harris’ announcement that he would be her running mate. In particular, Walz has had to explain his record in the National Guard and his 2006 congressional campaign’s statements on his 1995 drunk driving incident.
‘MASTERFUL SHAPESHIFTER’ WALZ GETS POINTED MESSAGE FROM MINNESOTA VOTERS AT STATE FAIR BOOTH
Washington Post columnist Kathleen Parker criticized Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz for exaggerating elements of his career for “political gain” in an op-ed published on Friday. (Scott Eisen)
Parker called out Walz’s statements about his 1995 arrest for drunk driving.
“Walz, then a 31-year-old high school teacher, was clocked at 96 mph in a 55-mph zone in Nebraska,” Parker wrote. “He was pulled over by a state trooper, who, upon smelling alcohol, asked Walz to take a field sobriety test, which he failed. Walz then submitted to a hospital for a blood test, which revealed his blood alcohol level to be 0.128, well above the state’s legal limit.”
While that info is verifiable by police records, Walz’s 2006 congressional campaign staff told the press that the candidate was not drinking and actually failed to understand the police officer’s directions because of hearing loss, blaming an injury relating to his time in the National Guard.
Parker also responded to Walz’s interview alongside Harris with CNN.
WALZ ON ABORTION, RELIGIOUS FREEDOM IS ‘ON PAR WITH CHINA AND NORTH KOREA,’ SAYS PARENTAL RIGHTS ADVOCATE
![Tim Walz speakimg](https://a57.foxnews.com/static.foxnews.com/foxnews.com/content/uploads/2024/08/1200/675/403ad5f5-tim-walz.jpg?ve=1&tl=1)
Veterans who served alongside Walz in the same battalion when he was in the National Guard have spoken out against his honesty about his service record. (Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)
“Morning show softballs may give comfort to the ill-prepared, but they deny viewers the content they need to be better-informed voters,” Parker wrote. “Nothing about the pair’s first (taped) interview Thursday night, with CNN’s Dana Bash, satisfied that imperative. Although Harris handled the interview relatively well, Walz seemed to be a mixed-up mess.”
“He answered none of the four questions he was asked, including whether he had misspoken when he said he had carried a gun ‘in war’ when he never was deployed to a combat zone,” Parker wrote. “A simple ‘yes’ might have sufficed, but instead he sputtered evasive nonsense and, to be rhetorically accurate, gobbledygook.”
Veterans who served alongside Walz in the same battalion when he was in the National Guard have spoken out against his honesty about his service record.
The Harris-Walz campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Fox News Digital.
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Washington
Top prospects for Washington Capitals | NHL.com
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How acquired: Selected with No. 20 pick in 2022 NHL Draft
2023-24 season: Washington (NHL): 21 GP, 2-4-6; Hershey (AHL): 47 GP, 9-16-25
Miroshnichenko adapted well in his first season in North America, getting experience in the NHL and American Hockey League. After playing one game in the Stanley Cup Playoffs with Washington, the 20-year-old native of Ussuriysk, Russia, helped Hershey win its second consecutive Calder Cup championship with 12 points (seven goals, five assists) in 20 AHL playoff games.
Miroshnichenko (6-1, 185) will compete for an NHL roster spot in training camp but could return to Hershey to begin the season.
“We would like to see ‘Miro’ become a quality, well-rounded player,” Capitals coach Spencer Carbery said, “but also someone that can produce in the NHL and can be a potential 25-, 30-goal scorer. So you want to make sure we’re taking the necessary steps to enable that inside of him, and not putting him in a scenario where he’s playing 10 minutes and playing on the fourth line.”
Projected NHL arrival: This season
Washington
Tim Walz’s political origin story does not add up – Washington Examiner
![Tim Walz’s political origin story does not add up – Washington Examiner Tim Walz’s political origin story does not add up – Washington Examiner](https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/Tim-Walz-2004-Bush-rally.webp)
Gov. Tim Walz (D-MN) has long described the moment in 2004 that inspired him to run for public office. In Walz’s telling, the “folksy” high school teacher and two of his students attended a campaign rally for President George W. Bush as an educational experience. However, Walz says, all three of them were denied entry upon event staffers noticing a John Kerry sticker on one of the students’ wallets — an exchange that the Atlantic dubbed a “KGB-style interrogation.”
There’s just one problem: This version of the political origin story for the Democratic vice presidential nominee, who is already facing “stolen valor” accusations over claims about his military service from combat veterans, contains significant inaccuracies.
For one, Walz was admitted into the Bush rally, according to a source familiar, who insisted on anonymity to discuss the August 2004 event. The two teenagers Walz arrived with, Matt Klaber and Nick Burkhart, were not his students, the Washington Examiner confirmed.
Moreover, the teenagers were barred from the event after a confrontation that made local news earlier in the week — leading to them initially being denied tickets.
And while Walz framed the squabble as the “moment that I decided to run for office” since he had “never been overly involved in political campaigns,” evidence suggests that Walz was already politically active by that point: He participated days earlier in an anti-Bush protest before the 2004 Bush rally in Mankota, Minnesota, on Aug. 4, an image confirms.
This report is based on public records, including Walz’s prior comments, documents obtained by the Washington Examiner, archived local news reports, and information provided by two sources with direct knowledge of the 2004 Bush event.
“He was looking for an origin story,” Chris Faulkner, a former Bush campaign staffer in Minnesota in 2004 who worked the August rally, told the Washington Examiner. “And he made one up.”
Walz, the governor of Minnesota and 2024 running mate of Vice President Kamala Harris, has said Burkhart and Klaber were his own students. This is untrue.
“I wished to hear directly from the President and my students, regardless of political party, deserved to witness the historical moment of a sitting president coming to our city,” Walz posted on social media in 2020. Walz said in an interview with a Minnesota news outlet in 2022 that he told the Bush event’s staff he was “their teacher,” referring to Burkhart and Klaber, upon the trio being questioned to get into the rally.
Burkhart did not attend Walz’s school. He went to Mankato East High School, according to records obtained by the Washington Examiner. He would later volunteer for Walz’s successful campaign in 2006.
Klaber, the other teenager, was not a student at Mankato West Senior High School, where Walz taught, at the time of the 2004 event. He never even took a class with Walz while attending the school, according to a source familiar.
A then-active Democratic activist, Klaber was part of the Gustavus College Democrats and would later volunteer for Walz’s congressional campaign in 2006, according to college meeting minutes reviewed by the Washington Examiner.
Walz has also said the Bush event staff’s discovery of the Kerry sticker prompted the moment of hostility. Important context is missing from his retelling of the events of that day.
That’s because Klaber and Burkhart had a public confrontation with the Bush campaign days before the 2004 rally. The teenagers were heard making “unfavorable comments” about Bush as they waited in line and were initially denied tickets, according to an archived news report.
After the story was reported by local news, because Klaber called the press, the Bush campaign contacted the teenagers and offered them tickets. In the lead-up to the 2004 election, there was heightened protest activity as police made arrests at campaign events. Klaber’s parents knew Walz and asked him to chaperone the teenagers to the event, expecting they may run into a problem.
They did: That day, as the trio waited in line, Bush campaign staffers told them that the Secret Service deemed Klaber and Burkhart a threat. Walz, in his retelling of the matter in 2006, said he was indignant. “As a soldier, I told them I had a right to see my commander in chief,” Walz said at a 2006 campaign event in Minnesota.
![](https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/tim-and-gwen-walz-real.webp)
The Bush campaign staffers interrogated Walz and wanted to know if he supported Bush, according to Walz. But while the students were barred from the event, Walz was not, and walked right inside, one source said.
The sequence of events, as Walz tells it, inspired Walz to become politically involved. Days before the rally, Walz was already engaged in political protest.
A photo taken by then-Minnesota GOP aide Michael Brodkorb shows Walz clutching a sign before the rally that read, “Enduring Freedom Veterans for Kerry.”
The Enduring Freedom title is known to refer to people who served in Afghanistan — something Walz never did. Walz spent time in Italy and Norway supporting NATO forces. The 24-year Army National Guard veteran did not see combat.
“It’s clear he was politically involved before that moment,” Faulkner told the Washington Examiner. “He was protesting in front of the ticket distribution center. It’s all bulls***.”
In the fallout of the 2004 rally and Kerry’s loss, Klaber and Burkhart helped Walz sail to victory and earn a seat in Congress, according to a 2006 blog post.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
But as Walz ascended to the governor’s mansion in Minnesota and, now, to the vice presidential nominee slot, his factually inaccurate telling of the Bush story has continued to be told by media outlets. Aside from Walz’s characterization of his military service, the Democrat has faced scrutiny on the 2024 campaign trail over other claims about his background, including his wife’s fertility treatments and his relationship with a Muslim cleric who promoted antisemitic content on social media.
The Harris-Walz campaign did not return a request for comment.
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