The Oregon GOP Walked Out… Because the Bill Summaries Are Too Hard To Read?

It’s Friday, and I’m up early at a conference on the West Coast without a lot of time to explore a big in-depth story before the sessions begin. But a quirky one out of Oregon caught my eye this morning that felt like a perfect Friday piece. It made me both snortle and shake my head in a mix of disbelief and exasperation. 

Here’s why.

The walkouts

Yesterday, the members of the Oregon Senate GOP, along with one independent, walked out of the legislative session for a second day in a row, making it clear that they intend to deny the body a quorum to conduct business. This isn’t all that unusual for the Oregon legislature, which under the state constitution rather bafflingly requires two-thirds of the state senate to be present for it to conduct any business. Democrats control 17 of the 30 seats—enough to pass laws, but not enough to form a quorum. 

The Oregon Senate GOP has a history of blocking progress by simply refusing to show up. They did so in 2019 to halt a sweeping climate change bill, in 2020 to again block climate change and a score of other bills, and in 2021 to protest the governor’s coronavirus restrictions.

Not so fast this time

With the current walkout, the stakes are much higher. Tired of the walkouts and obstruction of legislative business, Oregon voters overwhelmingly passed Measure 113 last November. It bans lawmakers who have 10 or more unexcused absences from running for reelection. It looks like the GOP is aiming to test the limits of that law.

Oregon Senate President Rob Wagner isn’t going to make it easy on the absent senators. He scheduled Senate sessions over the weekend to begin racking up those unexcused absences for the GOP senators, drawing howls from the absent GOP members.

The bills at risk

Democrats are trying to pass some important bills. One expands abortion rights by lowering the age needed for parental consent and extends gender affirming care for youth. Another addresses gun safety by increasing the age limit for the purchase of an AR-15.  

All of this is deeply opposed by politicians representing more rural, conservative parts of the state. But, they claim, that’s not why they’re walking out.

Too hard to read

Instead of focusing on their opposition to these bills, the GOP have seized upon a rather obscure law from 1979 to justify their protest and absence—one that requires summaries of laws be written so that an eighth or ninth grader could read them. The summaries of the bills are too hard to read, GOP Senate Minority Leader Tim Knopp told a news conference on Wednesday, so his caucus shouldn’t have to vote on them.

Knopp was asked if the GOP walkout was due to the subject matter of these particular bills. “It’s about every bill,” he responded. “But those bills specifically also don’t qualify under this law, and they refuse to fix them.”

This is quite the position. The Oregon GOP wants us to believe that the laws at issue are too complicated for even its own leaders to vote on. Yet they plainly understand what the law does. I took a look at their own Twitter feed, which was busy blasting these laws before they decided they were too hard to understand. It turns out, the Oregon Senate GOP even tweeted out an oversimplified fact sheet on April 25th about that very law, with their own particular twists on the facts, ostensibly to show that it’s too extreme for most Oregonians.

See, it’s not hard to understand at all! Maybe they should read their own tweet then come back in to vote? Just a thought.