Op-Ed: Sen. Jesse Salomon - Why I'm voting No on the statewide initiatives
Friday, October 4, 2024
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| Sen. Jesse Salomon, 32nd LD |
I wanted to take time to talk about the danger posed by the four statewide initiatives on your ballot, and I am voting No on all four.
These initiatives were put on the ballot by hedge fund manager Brian Heywood, a mega millionaire who spent $6 million of his own money on paid signature gathering. He wants to give himself and his wealthy friends a tax cut at the expense of hard-working Washington families.
Each of these initiatives repeals a landmark piece of legislation passed by the Democrats in the state legislature and rolls back hard-won progress we’ve made on fighting climate change, investing in education, lowering utility costs, and providing health care:
These initiatives collectively will undo a decade of progress on education and childcare funding, reducing energy costs, protecting our clean air and water, and to providing care for seniors and people with disabilities. They cut taxes for big corporations and the wealthy, and shift the bill to middle- and lower-income families.
I’ll be voting no on all four initiatives.
Best,
Jesse
Sen. Jesse Salomon
These initiatives were put on the ballot by hedge fund manager Brian Heywood, a mega millionaire who spent $6 million of his own money on paid signature gathering. He wants to give himself and his wealthy friends a tax cut at the expense of hard-working Washington families.
Each of these initiatives repeals a landmark piece of legislation passed by the Democrats in the state legislature and rolls back hard-won progress we’ve made on fighting climate change, investing in education, lowering utility costs, and providing health care:
- Initiative 2117 would allow more pollution across Washington state, threatening our air, waterways and health, and it would slash funding for our state’s transportation plan, putting roads and bridges at risk, cutting transit services and leaving us with more traffic.
- Initiative 2124 would bankrupt Washington’s long term care insurance program, driving up costs for all of us and putting more pressure on women to leave their careers to care for loved ones with disabilities, chronic illness, or who are aging.
- Initiative 2109 would repeal our state’s capital gains tax on Wall Street profits, giving a tax break to the Washington’s mega-millionaires and billionaires while slashing $2.2 billion from our state’s budgets for childcare and public education over the next 5 years.
- Initiative 2066 would increase energy bills, repeal important customer rebates, and stop communities from making decisions that work best for them.
These initiatives collectively will undo a decade of progress on education and childcare funding, reducing energy costs, protecting our clean air and water, and to providing care for seniors and people with disabilities. They cut taxes for big corporations and the wealthy, and shift the bill to middle- and lower-income families.
I’ll be voting no on all four initiatives.
Best,
Jesse
Sen. Jesse Salomon
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2 comments:
Of course Salomon is voting no on the initiatives. He supported all four bills which were passed in acts of extreme partisanship. Of the four laws, only the long term care law received even one Republican vote. The other three were passed exclusively by Democrats. Here's a tally of how many Democrats voted no per bill:
SB 5126 Climate Commitment Act 2 Senators, 3 Representatives
HB 1323 Compulsory Long Term Care Insurance 3 Senators, 2 Representatives
ESSB 5096 Capital Gains Income Tax 4 Senators, 5 Representatives
HB 1589 Natural Gas Phaseout 2 Senators, 8 Representatives
In total, there were 11 Democratic Senator votes against and 20 Democratic Representative votes against.
It starts to make sense why all these laws are being challenged by initiatives, when they picked up a single Republican vote while losing 31 Democratic votes. They reflect an extreme agenda that has not even been inclusive of the entire Democratic Party, much less the whole state.
I find it interesting that the senator calls Brian Heywood a mega millionaire while saying nothing about the mega billionaires with a B who oppose these initiatives. I see lots of TV commercials opposing the initiatives but haven't seen any in support. The rich/powerful/electeds in our state fear initiatives because they don't want the people getting in the way.
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