Micah Clark of American Family Association of Indiana shares his latest update.
Missed Opportunities for General Assembly
The Indiana Senate Was a Disaster for Pro-Family Hoosiers
The 2022 Indiana General Assembly ended after midnight last night. There are a few good bills we can appreciate. It is noteworthy, however, that those bills came mostly from the House where every seat is up for election. At times, the House actually seemed more concerned about voters than powerful special interest groups.
I want to specifically express my deep disappointment with our Senate.
Twenty-two minutes after midnight, 29 Senators voted against keeping pornography out of schools, just before they adjourned, as the HB 1369 Conference Committee Report failed to be adopted. This is tragic and disgraceful.
Twenty-two minutes after midnight, 29 Senators voted against keeping pornography out of schools, just before they adjourned, as the HB 1369 Conference Committee Report failed to be adopted. This is tragic and disgraceful.
You are aware of the growing effort to empower parents and protect schoolchildren from radical indoctrination. Across the nation from Virginia to Florida, even in liberal San Francisco, parents are rising to oppose left-wing school policies. In the “city by the bay” parents threw out three ‘woke” school board members who wanted to change the name of a school named not after Robert E. Lee, but after Abraham Lincoln! In Texas last week, Governor Greg Abbott won his primary 54 points ahead of his nearest opponent while campaigning on a parents’ bill of rights and stopping Critical Race Theory in schools.
Here in the heartland, Republican Senate leaders repeatedly discarded the concerns of parents. You know of Senator Linda Rogers gutting and then killing a bill (HB 1134) on divisive concepts and parental empowerment.
Here are two other failures you may not know.
Here are two other failures you may not know.
HB 1122 sought to protect children and families by extending the buffer zone between sexually oriented businesses and childcare centers, child facilities, schools, etc. HB 1122, authored by Rep. Mike Speedy, passed with broad bipartisan support. There was no opposition testimony to it in the local government committee. The Indianapolis Star even praised the House for this bi-partisan effort. (There was an immediate need for this bill for some Indianapolis families with an adult business near a Sky Zone amusement facility.)
Incredibly, HB 1122 did not get a hearing in Senator Jim Buck’s Local Government Committee. He handed the bill off to Senator Liz Brown chair of the Judiciary Committee. She refused to give the bill a hearing, and time ran out.
Several Indianapolis legislators whose local city officials had refused to deal with this problem, still wanted the bill to become law. They found a home for it in a Conference Committee. Senate President Rod Bray purposefully, and single-handedly blocked that move prohibiting HB 1122 from being included in another bill.
Next, we have another disheartening display that surprised many members of the media. House Bill 1107 was an effort to help parents of special education, disabled, or special needs children who have a complaint about how a school may have treated their child. The bill made a due process burden of proof change to favor parents and it limited non-disclosure agreements (NDA) in settlements. (Other parents might never know of an incident or a problem in their school with NDAs.)
The Bill passed the House with bipartisan support. It was then sponsored by Senator Dennis Kruse. However, when he called it for a vote, all 49 Senators voted “no.” A surprised Senator Kruse reluctantly voted “no” before the board was closed.
Like HB 1134, the education establishment had lobbied strongly against HB 1107.
As Kim Dodson, CEO of ARC of Indiana, a leading voice for people with disabilities told WFYI public media, “We were, unfortunately, in a situation where, you know, the opposition gets paid to come to the Statehouse and do their testimony,” Dodson said. “I rely on families who unfortunately cannot always take time off work for this particular issue.”
Some families were scared to testify publicly because they remain under NDAs that bar them from speaking candidly about their conflicts with schools over special education services. Dodson said some also feared retaliation from their school districts.
I was told by several legislators that this was more of a signal to the House author than the bill’s issues itself. I’ve seen a few things like this before, but it makes me uncomfortable here. It implies that a personal squabble is more important than addressing parents’ concerns over the mistreatment of their children!
You can read more here.
These are just three examples of how out of touch the Senate is with parents. Unfortunately, most Indiana State Senators do not have primary opponents this May. They will not be held accountable for this weakness.
Some of these failures will be forgotten before November when many pro-family voters will have little choice between an open opponent of their values who respects their liberal base, and a charlatan who dislikes or misleads his/her conservative base. (You thought that little R by a candidate name stood for Republican. It may stand for Rollover.)
I think another factor behind the Senate’s weakness involves a moderate Governor who pushes leadership to avoid hot button issues because he has his eyes on a run for US Senate.
There is also the oddity that even though there are far fewer Democrats in the Senate than the House (20% vs 30%) they are more radical, bolder, more partisan and they face less opposition in the Senate than in the House. I’d guess that this 20% in the Senate accounts for more than 50% of the entire debate and speaking time on issues from the Senate floor. Maybe they sense the GOP weakness to defend conservative principles too.
OK So, Now What?
As you might guess, this has been boiling up inside of me for weeks.
Yet, I am not quitting or disengaging from the culture, and neither should you.
I will address several good pieces of legislation that are headed to the Governor in my next email. These bills might not have passed without your emails and phone calls. You made a positive difference in this legislative session! Your prayers and support of AFA-IN made a difference too.
Being disappointed is not the same as being a defeatist.
We have a duty to do what is right, speak the truth, and be involved in the civic arena. (This is a unique blessing we have as Americans.) After doing all we ought to stand, we leave the results in God’s hands.
No one is in office forever, and no one can legislate against his or her district by ignoring average Hoosiers’ values without paying a political price for it. People will rise to run against certain legislators. And these unresolved problems will still be on the minds of Hoosier families for the next legislative session.
In Their Own Words:
“It’s not that we don’t have enough scoundrels to curse; it’s that we don’t have enough good men to curse them.” – G.K. Chesterton
Missed Opportunities for General Assembly – American Family Association of Indiana
