Gun control advocates push again for permit-to-purchase
Plus a MAGA mom hubbub, more Re-Wire takeaways, Orwall gives up the gavel for the Senate, and some recommended reading/viewing/listening
Look for Olympia’s big Democratic majorities to fire even more gun control shots in 2025.
Among other ideas, look for the majority to try to slap an excise tax on bullets and firearms, per a press release from the Alliance for Gun Responsibility. Also on tap is a reprise of the permit-to-purchase bill from Rep. Liz Berry, D-Seattle. That proposal would fingerprint would-be gun owners and require them to pass a gun safety course.
Another item on their list is banning open-carry in parks and public buildings.1 Open-carry has been banned on the capitol campus ever since a gunman occupied the lawn of the governor’s mansion on Jan. 6.
We should note that a permit-to-purchase bill died twice in committee back in 2023. The House version never made it past Civil Rights & Judiciary and the Senate version died in Ways & Means. Neither bill saw any action in 2024.
Still, Democrats’ gun control shots have hit their mark more often than not these past two sessions, which saw the party strip AR-15s from gun store shelves and heap stricter obligations on gun owners to report stolen firearms.2
Also on that issue, Governor-elect Bob Ferguson has floated the pricey idea of a gun buyback program aimed at taking high-powered weapons out of more homes. Several Democratic lawmakers we’ve talked to see that as an expensive ask facing an uphill battle ahead in the budget committees.
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MAGA moms slam GOP-backed school attendance bill
A conservative parental rights group spared little time before opposing a bipartisan bill from Senate Republican caucus leader John Braun, R-Centralia, and Senate Education and Early Learning Chair Lisa Wellman, D-Mercer Island, that aims to support chronically absent students in Washington public schools at risk of not graduating.
Braun and Wellman’s Senate Bill 5007, which was prefiled earlier this month, would create an early warning system in schools for students deemed chronically absent—defined as missing more than 10% of school days—and at risk for dropping out of the education system entirely.
The bill would build on support systems to better connect families, students, and schools by offering wrap-around services that range from mental health support, food and nutrition, and transportation to help students and their families stay connected to the education system. The bill prioritizes vulnerable student groups, such as foster youth, kids in the juvenile justice system, and students with disabilities. Students who struggle to stay engaged in the classroom may be connected to online learning opportunities.
The Conservative Ladies of Washington, a Moms For Liberty-type group, aren’t having it. The bill represents a “problematic collaboration between Republicans and Democrats to further erode parental rights and criminalize children for not fitting into a rigid educational framework,” the group wrote in a recent blog post. Who knew the right to skip school was a conservative value?
The Conservative Ladies’ rhetoric is charged—referring to standard wrap-around services in public schools as government overreach and visitors from school employees to a students’ home, something like a welfare check or home visit, as a violation of the Fourth Amendment.3 The blog post also slams the bill for failing to connect at-risk students with options such as private school and home school, both of which are generally outside the purview of the public school system.
The parental rights faction of the Republican party scored some victories last year when the Democratic majority passed a “parental bill of rights” that was likely to pass by initiative. It was a largely symbolic victory for the GOP since the rights enumerated in the bill were mostly already on the books.
The far-right wing of the Republican party has grown ever more distrustful of public education in recent years, a phenomenon accelerated by COVID-19 bringing classrooms into living rooms. The MAGA moms’ backlash against a bipartisan bill whose lead sponsor heads up the Senate Republican caucus may point to further fissures on the right.
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Takeaways from our new-school direct democracy panel
Direct democracy delivered the goods for local activists in 2024. If you made it to our Re-Wire shindig in Tacoma, you know there’s likely more where that came from.
All politics is local, or so the saying goes, but November’s down-ballot measures did punch above their weight.4 In Everett, minimum wage workers got a $4 hourly raise. In Snohomish County, folks will pay a .02% sales tax—two cents on every $10 spent— toward a drug detox center, plus a suite of court services including public defense, per Measure 1.
But this year’s slate of local ballot measures was short of a total victory lap for progressives. On the flip side, Spokane County voters paved over progressive opposition and approved a .01% sales tax hike—one penny for every $10 spent—for youth jails per that county’s Measure 1.
Hosted by Michael McPhearson, executive director of the South Seattle Emerald, our New-School Direct Democracy panel dove into the nitty gritty of what boots-on-the-ground activism looks like in 2024 and how to build bridges with unlikely voters.
The panel featured Cleveland Harris II of Community First Whatcom and co-chair of Whatcom County’s Democratic Socialists Party; Mónica Mendoza-Castrejón of the Seattle University School of Law and co-chair of Kent for Districts; Director of Rural People’s Voice Elana Mainer; and Justice Forrall with Justice Not Jails and the Spokane Community Against Racism.5
Community First Whatcom earned a spotlight in 2023 as the force behind the dollar-an-hour raise for minimum wage workers in Bellingham last year. That election also saw voters give tenants 120-day notice for yearly rent hikes of 8%, another recent crusade of the Community First Whatcom.
The latter measure also requires landlords to shell out three months' worth of rent in relocation aid should they hike rents past that amount. Worth noting that 8% is in the neighborhood of the ill-fated rent cap the statehouse killed this year, which would have capped most rent hikes statewide.
Harris said next up for Community First Whatcom is beefing up enforcement strategies behind the voter-backed measures.
If you want to catch the panel in its entirety, TVW has you covered.
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A TVW-familiar face gets Keiser’s seat
All you nerds who can’t look away from TVW when the Legislature is in session will readily recognize the newest addition to the state Senate.
House Speaker Pro Tempore Tina Orwall, who frequently wields the gavel when the House is in session, has been appointed to succeed Sen. Karen Keiser, who is retiring after three decades representing the 33rd Legislative District.
Orwall, D-Des Moines, was chosen by the King County Council over her seatmate, Rep. Mia Gregerson, D-SeaTac, for the seat. The council also appointed Edwin Obras, who works for the city of Seattle’s Human Services Department, to Orwall’s House seat.
Both offices will be on the ballot next year in special elections for the remainder of Keiser’s and Orwall’s terms, and then again in 2026. The 33rd is solidly Democratic.
Orwall and Deputy House Speaker Pro Tempore, Rep. Dan Bronoske, typically shoulder the bulk of the presiding-over-the-House duties, as Speaker Laurie Jinkins tends to step in for high-stakes moments. Orwall usually brings a soothing tone to the proceedings, although there’s occasionally a stinging smackdown of an unruly member. No word yet on whether she’ll get a similar role in the Senate, where Lt. Gov. Denny Heck usually handles the gavel.
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Recommended Reading/Listening and Viewing
King County youth-violence prevention mired in scandal
Ann Dornfeld and Amy Radil have a juicy exposé on the latest scandal engulfing King County’s troubled youth violence prevention effort. The program stems from County Executive Dow Constantine’s decision in 2020 to close the county’s youth jail and plow millions of dollars into community-based programs aimed at reducing gun violence among young people. Lax oversight, embezzlement, and kickbacks ensued.
A civics-education take on Re-Wire
Along with their regular crew who broadcasted the main room at our recent Re-Wire Policy Conference, TVW sent their Teach With TVW team to do a piece aimed at younger viewers. Because we know all of you treasure civics education, especially in fun, user-friendly formats, you should go take a look.
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Jackie, courtesy of her human, Corey Paulsen, who runs civics education and development for TVW. Want to see your pet in this space? Drop us a photo and some caption material.
Washington is an open-carry state, though concealed carry requires a permit
The latter law also came from a bill of Berry’s in 2023
Home visits have been part of the work of public school teachers and staff for many years now. It’s literally an episode subplot on the ABC sitcom, Abbot Elementary. In that episode, a teacher reengages with a chronically absent student by inviting him back to school and to join the school gardening club.
The New-School Direct Democracy panel was sponsored by the Inatai Foundation, a social justice nonprofit and one of the many orgs that make the journalism you read here possible by sponsoring Re-Wire.