President Lincoln created Idaho Territory on March 4th, 1863, and we now celebrate March 4th as Idaho Day. Our capitol building was first dedicated to the people of the Gem State on January 3, 1921, making this its 100th year. This year legislators closed out the day by singing "Here We Have Idaho”.
Abe Abrahamson and I presented SJM101, which is a formal request to the President of the United States asking him to initiate a State Funeral to honor World War II veterans. This would be in honor of all WWII veterans, and would be held when the last WWII Medal of Honor recipient passes away (there are two remaining). You can read more about the effort here.
Representative Nate (an economics professor from District 34) and I were invited to provide a budget update during the Lt. Governor's Capitol Clarity event on Thursday. There were also excellent presentations given regarding COVID remedies and pending sex education legislation. I highly recommend you watch the entire presentation linked here.
Each February Blue Cross of Idaho sponsors a legislative walking program. This year legislators who walked 5,000 steps daily received $500 and those who walked 10,000 daily received $1000 for an elementary school in their district. Over the past 5 years I have earned $5,750 for elementary schools in District 7 and this year I was happy to earn $1000 for Saints Peter and Paul School in Grangeville.
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On Tuesday morning Bill Colley interviewed me on KLIX 1310 (Twin Falls). We discussed the problems with public television in Idaho, my bill on stopping mandatory vaccinations, and the liberal attacks against me. I appreciate Bill's willingness to provide a platform to discuss a conservative perspective of legislative issues. You can listen to the interview here. Be sure to give Bill a 'thumbs up'! https://rumble.com/vedhd1-priscilla-giddings-battles-the-idaho-swamp-3.2.21.html
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Nate Shelman from KBOI 670 (Boise) had a great show on Wednesday March 3rd and let me discuss several legislative updates during his busy afternoon show "Where the Money Goes..." You can listen to the podcast linked here. |
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On Thursday Kevin Miller from KIDO 580 (Boise) let me discuss the early childhood development grant and the college and university budget request. You can listen to his March 4th podcast; my comments are toward the end. https://podcasts.google.com/feed/ |
I’ve listed some of the hot topics being discussed at the capitol below. I want to represent what the people of Idaho think, not the special interests of the Treasure Valley, so please take a minute and email me your thoughts on these issues (Click on the blue font to follow links).
H256 Require Accepting Cash in Sales: This act guarantees that consumers making purchases subject to Idaho's sales & use tax will have the option to pay in cash if that is their choice. As more transactions are being made electronically, some people are becoming worried that we may soon not be able to conduct transactions in cash--our designated legal tender. Some Idaho Fish and Game locations will not accept cash; do you know of any other places that don't accept cash? Do you think it is a good idea to require businesses to accept cash in transactions?
H266 Cloud Seeding: This legislation would authorize the water resource board to sponsor or develop local or statewide cloud seeding programs. The water resource board would be able to contract with any individual or organization for consultation, assistance and further research related to cloud seeding. Cloud seeing has been done in Idaho; is there any reason this needs to be inserted into law now?
H291 Business Bill of Rights: This legislation states,
"During any disaster emergency declared by the governor or any public health order issued by a governmental entity, a governmental entity shall not:
1) Revoke or threaten to revoke a business license or liquor license
because such business remains open;
(2) Revoke or threaten to revoke the occupational or professional licensure of a business owner or employee because such business remains open;
(3) Fine, sanction, or seize funds or assets of a business because such business remains open; or
(4) Require a business to close, to reduce its hours, to alter its manner of business operations, or to otherwise restrict such business in its manner of operation, including with respect to access by employees, customers, suppliers, consultants, or contractors."
Thanks to Representative Crane for introducing this much needed legislation. Do you think creating more laws to protect peoples' constitutional rights is going to help in the long run?
 Thirty-one states and the federal government incarcerated 116,000 people in private prisons in 2019. Private prisons now house 8% of the total prisoner population.
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* Idaho National Laboratory is powering NASA’s Mars Perseverance Rover with its Multi-Mission Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generator (MMRTG).
* Idaho is home to 65 wineries.
* Idaho's 2020 growth rate was 2.12%, which is more than 6 times the national average of .35%.
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+ GOOD: On Tuesday the House voted down H226. The bill was initially sponsored by Senator Crabtree from District 7, and would have accepted $5,980,500 in federal grant money for a non-profit organization. The beneficiary was to have been the Idaho Association for the Education of Young Children (IDAEYC). IDAEYC is an affiliate with the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC), which as part of its mission, seeks to advance social justice and critical race theory programming even in pre-K education initiatives. One of their position statements is "Whiteness, for example, confers privilege, as does being male."
The IDAEYC website provides teachers a list of classroom literature, including the book A is for Activist “an ABC board book written and illustrated for the next generation of progressives: families who want their kids to grow up in a space that is unapologetic about activism, environmental justice, civil rights, LGBTQ rights, and everything else that activists believe in and fight for."
The IDAEYC Early Learning Collaborative Project Director is a former Idaho Conservation League (ICL) employee. ICL is a progressive conservation lobby group that has sued the State of Idaho 15 times.
The IDAEYC includes as one of its goals to eventually transition to a full state-funded pre-K education system. While pre-K education is important, it will be more effective, more responsive, and better quality if run as multiple private programs, rather than a centralized, state-funded program that is subject to these kinds of indoctrination. A video of my testimony can be viewed here. Even though the measure failed, the Idaho Association of Commerce and Industry (Idaho's largest lobby group) stated, "The grant will eventually be approved in some form, perhaps with new legislation."
- BAD: Governor Little requested and received another $39 million in federal assistance for the Idaho Office of Emergency Management to set up vaccination centers to support COVID-19 shot efforts.
--UGLY: Vindictive progressive republican JFAC members slashed the Lt. Governor's budget request. Rep. Syme (District 11), Senator Woodward (District 1) and Senator Crabtree (District 7) rallied together with democrats to cut the Lt Governor's budget by $17,000 and remove one of her full-time positions. This will require her to fire 1 of her 2 staff members. Her shoestring budget of $183,100 and 3 total positions already took a 5% cut at the request of the Governor. My motion to provide her with the governor's recommended maintenance budget failed 3-16. The budget will move to the floor for a vote next week. In order to restore the budget fully, house members will have to vote against the budget and send it back to JFAC. The political fratricide was a disgrace to the republican party.
"Finally the Aryans Define (Themselves)...Here are the child haters."
~disgruntled progressive voter over conservatives' efforts to defeat H226
"Thank you for representing the people by abiding by the constitution, looking out for all people, and preventing specific misguided social liberal agendas from being promoted. Thank you for supporting equality for all."
~supportive conservative voter referencing the defeat of H226
We all know that money has influence, even more so in state government. During session I will track the money and keep you informed about budget concerns. This week:
$ JFAC approved a $632,000,000 College/University budget that included a transfer of $400,000 from BSU to LCSC as a penalty for BSU’s promotion of their skewed social justice ideology. My motion to remove the entire $18 million of imbedded social justice curriculum from all 4 institutions failed to gain support. I do not think targeting BSU with an amount less than the University President's salary adequately addresses the problem. Their entire budget will move to the floor for a vote next week.
$ JFAC approved a line item in the community college budget called "Zero-cost textbook program" that will provide $1,000,000 of taxpayer funds for student books.
$ JFAC voted against H153 (the bill that would have required splitting the higher education budget into 4 bills; BSU, UI, LCSC and ISU). This would have given the legislature more flexibility in addressing the social justice ideology creeping into the curriculum of these institutions. During testimony it was discovered that the State Board of Education has the authority to transfer money between object codes and programs without legislative approval. Public comment was allowed in the committee for the first time all year, and people from all over the state testified. There were 10 participants online that were not permitted to testify, and ultimately the bill failed 3-17. (Aye voters: Rep. Giddings, Rep. Horman, Rep. Nate)
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