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Hello,
Welcome back to my newsletter and thank you for reading. Since last week, Senate Republicans and Independents have protested the unconstitutional actions of the majority party by exercising our constitutional right to deny quorum or the minimum number of Senators required to conduct business on the Senate Floor.
The spark that lit the match to walkout is the Democrats’ willful violation of the law. Democrats in Salem behave as if they are above the law. With control of the three branches of government, they act as though they have a mandate to move Oregon to be the national model of extreme progressive ideals.
My colleagues and I are doing what we can to not let that happen. We won't let their corruption and intent to serve special interests prevail over the Constitution and the will of hard-working Oregonians. |
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When I hear from constituents that Democrats are “willing to negotiate” and “compromise”, I genuinely want to know what these constituents are talking about. This has not been my experience. Democrats in Salem operate in a "smoke-filled" backroom with their special interests and activists around the table; Republicans are excluded from these discussions and no amendments are considered. I refuse to stand by and facilitate this deeply flawed and partisan process.
The oath of office is essential, and when I swore to uphold the law and the Constitution - I meant it. I will not sit by and help move along the majority party's extreme and unconstitutional agenda - especially with their complete and obvious dismissal of the law.
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When a bill is introduced, its summary must be clearly understandable at an 8th-grade level, as laid out in the Constitution and subsection 5 of Senate Rule 13.02 and ORS 171.134. |
This is to ensure transparency, so laws are not merely crafted by attorneys and those with enough money to afford them. Every Oregonian should have reasonable access to the process.
The Legislative Counsel (LC), is supposed to be nonpartisan legal staff and work for all members in the Oregon Legislature, but instead LC willingly broke the law, under the direction of the Senate President and Speaker of the House, by writing bill summaries that do not meet the readability standards required by law.
Democrats have utilized this same Legislative Counsel (who is theoretically nonpartisan), for their partisan purposes - to provide the opinion that the measure summaries for bills under legislative consideration are “good enough,” with respect to the readability standards. This is what corruption looks like.
Democrats must FOLLOW THE LAW.
HB 2002 is an example of the majority party ignoring the Constitution to favor their activist agenda.
They are pushing this bill and lying to Oregonians about what it does. The only change to Oregon's current abortion laws, where a woman may already terminate her pregnancy through all 9-months, is to remove any requirement for little girls to notify their parents of their decision to have an abortion. Oregon Democrats have passed laws over the years to ensure abortions are not only available for women in Oregon, but for non-residents and non-citizens alike - making Oregon an “abortion tourism” state, as my friend Christine Drazan pointed out during the 2022 gubernatorial campaign.
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The bill is a direct attack on parental rights because it allows a child of any age, without parental knowledge, to receive an abortion, and 15-year-old minors could have irreversible sex-changing treatments.
This bill is anti-parent and anti-family.
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Worsening the already bad bill, the Democrats who allegedly played a major role in writing HB 2002, gasped when asked about how children as young as 10-years-old could have abortions without parental knowledge. Whoever gets an 10-year-old pregnant needs to be in jail. With HB 2002, these criminals will now potentially bypass exposure because parents won’t know. They will coach young women about how to go in and have an abortion, destroying the evidence of wrongdoing and have protection under the law.
I fear HB 2002 will open up the opportunity for it to become the “rapist, pedophile, incest protection act”.
Oregon Democrats have created this bill in a vacuum. This bill was crafted by prominent Democrats in leadership from both the House and the Senate with their uber-progressive friends from NARAL and Planned Parenthood sitting in a "smoke-filled" backroom and figuring out how to move the state farther left. No conservative voices were included at all. This wasn't an inclusive process; they are not willing to consider any amendments, and they are not honoring campaign promises, instead - they are pushing an extreme agenda, all while the Capitol is under construction and Oregonians have limited access to express opposition.
HB 2002 will make Oregon a “transgender tourism” state as well. The state will provide our doctors liability protections so that a teenage boy can come here and attempt to change his gender and uniqueness with no risk of prosecution - even when that boy's parents are not aware of the process. Oregonians will be paying for this as insurance companies, and the plans parents use to insure their children, will be required to cover these radical procedures.
The government is not a parent. It never has been, and it never will be.
The dice are loaded, and the game is rigged. Democrats in Salem are doing this to you, not with you, and in a bubble. My colleagues and I are fighting back.
Click Here to Subscribe to Senator Daniel Bonham's E-Newsletter.
I will be back with more updates soon.
Until then,
Senator Daniel Bonham, District 26
Capitol Phone: 503-986-1726
Capitol Address: 900 Court St NE, S-423, Salem, OR, 97301
Email: Sen.DanielBonham@oregonlegislature.gov
Website: http://www.oregonlegislature.gov/bonham
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