After it looked like the legislature was finally about to reclaim its authority, Governor McKee plunged the state back into unilateral rule.
For all the wrong reasons earlier this summer, the Rhode Island General Assembly finally did the right thing in restoring a proper balance of powers. But just weeks later, the governor double-crossed lawmakers with an audacious, and likely illegal, power play.
Now some lawmakers are speaking out against their own party’s governor and asking leadership to intervene against his latest gambit.
In a state where COVID-19 case and fatality rates have persistently ranked among the worst in the nation — and where economic recovery is among America’s weakest — Rhode Island’s General Assembly, in June, finally felt compelled to step in and exert its legal authority to put an end to the emergency powers of the sitting executive. But little did most realize that the governor had a major trick up his sleeve.
After former governor Gina Raimondo seized unilateral control over the state’s pandemic response by issuing and extending states-of-emergency and executive orders — later to be continued by current Governor Dan McKee — the do-nothing General Assembly sat idly by and failed to engage while Rhode Islanders suffered.
The unexpected June legislative action was not inspired by the executive branch’s failed attempts to balance health and economic outcomes. Nor was it about putting a stop to some of the abusive and unconstitutional executive orders.
Not surprisingly, the issue that shocked legislators into action was money. When the executive branch suggested it had authority — under its ongoing emergency powers — to spend the billion-plus dollars in federal pandemic-relief aid headed to Rhode Island, this proved a bridge too far for legislative leaders. The fight was on — albeit secretly.
For 15 months, the General Assembly ignored the tyranny of the executive branch, which failed to act with “strict regard to the rights of the people,” as the law requires. Legislation submitted in early 2021 to restore balanced governance was killed by Assembly leadership.
But, in the late spring, it was the smell of money — over a billion dollars’ worth (and all the favor and votes that could be bought with it) — that finally spurred action.
Contravening the governor in late June, and acting within the General Assembly’s legal purview, legislative leaders quietly slipped a provision into Article 3 of the 2022 state budget that effectively ended Rhode Island’s state of emergency and, with it, the governor’s emergency powers. By early July, the governor had little choice but to sign the budget that ended his regime’s unilateral reign. But, other than co-conspiring insiders, no one understood that this gubernatorial neutering would not last for long.
Seizing the opportunity of restored equal powers, a special fall General Assembly session was quickly announced so that state senators and representatives could gorge themselves at the federal buffet table.
But McKee would not give up all his emergency powers so easily. Under pressure from teachers’ unions and the radical Left to impose mask mandates on K–12 students, McKee was forced to play the ace up his sleeve and end-run the law. So he declared a new state of emergency, effectively extending his unilateral emergency powers for another six months, by claiming that the Delta variant presented a “new” and different emergency from the original COVID-19 virus.
This controversial executive action will likely face legal challenges. But one thing is certain: Compliant Democratic General Assembly leaders do not plan to intervene, already publicly conceding full pandemic powers to the executive branch. In doing so, they are contravening the very law they enacted weeks earlier. The governor, uncertain himself of the legality of his own new declaration, called on the General Assembly to reconvene and ratify his “new” powers.
Sources suggest that House and Senate leaders may even have been complicit in a deceptive scheme to strip, then allow the restoration of executive emergency powers — for the sole purpose of granting themselves the power to spend the federal relief money.
But what about the rank-and-file Assembly lawmakers who, in good faith, voted to end executive emergency powers and, in doing so, to restore a proper constitutional balance to government? Were they played by leadership?
On my video blog show In the Dugout, Charlene Lima, the deputy speaker of the Rhode Island House, openly challenged the governor’s declaration of a new state of emergency. Lima called this executive overreach “absurd” and “ridiculous” and astutely noted that the governor could arbitrarily and unilaterally extend his executive powers for 180 days anytime a new variant might appear on the scene in the coming years.
Lima called on the governor to “pull that executive order,” which she claimed was “trying to deceive the public.” She also claimed that there are other Democrats who are not happy about this gubernatorial betrayal and who would support reconvening the entire General Assembly after Labor Day to debate whether they should legislatively enforce the law they passed in June. Lima further stated that she would soon discuss this issue with Rhode Island House speaker Joseph Shekarchi.
The General Assembly should indeed reconvene, as the governor requested. It should do so, however, not to ratify his self-granted new emergency powers but to debate stripping those powers.
Even with unanimous support certain from Republican lawmakers, it remains to be seen whether enough grassroots Democratic legislative pressure can be mounted to compel Assembly leadership to take action. At this point, it seems unlikely — even though it’s clearly the right thing to do, whatever your political party.
Ignoring constitutional, parental, or student rights — to say nothing of the medical and economic health of the state — General Assembly leaders manipulated the process to be able to sink their teeth firmly into the billion-dollar pound of federal flesh. That’s all that mattered. Now they can sit back again and wash their hands of having to deal with any controversial pandemic decisions that might arise in the future, no matter the consequences.
The old adage is almost always true with politicians: Just follow the money.