There are 67 weeks until the November 2024 election, but some campaigns have set their alarm clocks extra early.
The Oregon Senate Republican Caucus said three senators who did not miss 10 or more floor sessions this legislative session plan to file for re-election. They are Dick Anderson of Lincoln City, David Brock Smith of Port Orford, and Fred Girod of Lyons.
Anderson, a former Lincoln City mayor, lost his first attempt for the Senate seat in 2016 but was elected to a four-year term in 2020, defeating Coos County commissioner Melissa Cribbins. He spent nearly $1 million in that campaign.
An early question mark will be the fate of a group of Republican senators who took part in a boycott of Senate floor sessions this year in order to deny a quorum required to meet and do any business. The 42-day walkout ended when Democrats agreed to watered-down versions of House-passed legislation on abortion, transgender medical care and gun control.
After Republican walkouts had led to the stall or collapse of previous sessions, voters in November 2022 approved Measure 113 as a way to increase penalties for taking part in stall tactics in the Legislature. Backers said the measure would bar the re-election of any lawmaker who had 10 unexcused absences. Nine Republicans and one independent member of the Senate surpassed the mark during the 2023 walkout.
The GOP lawmakers and their supporters say the bill was poorly written and likely unconstitutional. Senate Republican Leader Tim Knopp, R-Bend, and Sen. Dennis Linthicum, R-Klamath Falls sent a letter to Secretary of State LaVonne Griffin-Valade, last week asking for “a declaratory ruling on Measure 113” whether they will be allowed ballot access for the 2024 election.”
The letter officially only asks Griffin-Valade to make a decision. That decision — a yes or no answer — could then be appealed in court.
Four other senators who had 10 or more absences and have seats on the 2024 ballot are either retiring or haven’t announced their plans.
— Oregon Capital Bureau
Dick Anderson may not have missed more than 10 sessions, but he fully supported the Republican boycott, and was quoted as saying so in news media reports. So don’t let him play games, as he did in an email to me, and tell his constituents that he was working the whole time when he was actually supporting the obstructionist Republicans who walked out. Vote him out.
Lee’s right.
We wrote Senator Anderson before anyone had been out 10 days, after they made their point about “tyranny of the majority”, but before the point of no return had been reached.
We earnestly asked what he was doing to return his caucus to work, citing a couple of bills we decided would benefit the coast and would have bipartisan support, if they could get out of Committee and on the Floor for debate, negotiation, and a vote.
He replied us that he “supported” his “fellow Senators who have chosen a specific path of protest.”
Did this mean he supported ten unlawful protestors over the best interests of the 232,237 constituents in Lincoln, Lane, Douglas, Benton, and Coos counties, who voted 70% in favor of Measure 113 to limit legislative walkouts?
My spouse and I drove to Salem, to meet personally with Senator Anderson at an appointed time, to look him in the eye and ask him. First, his staff said he had left the building. Then he showed up, late.
We were ushered in, seated with smiles all around, until I asked our question: “What are you doing to end the Walkout?” He answered that he supported his colleagues “right “to walk. I asked how he felt about the rights of his colleagues (R and D) to have good faith negotiations on bills important to voters?
We were ushered out.
Maybe he tried to persuade Senators not to walk. He went to the Absentees’ morning strategy meetings which was why he was late for our appointment. Maybe there was nothing he could have done. If this were the case, he should have told us.
Working, not just showing up, earns my vote. I want a candidate more beholden to his District’s law abiding voters than the anti-democratic scofflaws of his Caucus.
Voters deserve a Senator who is intends to work, not just pretends.
But who’s is going to run? What R will run to primary him? We can’t let him off scott free.
Too many bills important to the Coast languished in Committee this Session. Thanks in large part to Dick Anderson, the voters of his District lost, big, this Session.