Inslee faces bipartisan veto challenge
By Terry Murry on Wednesday, December 22nd, 2021 in Columbia Basin News More Top Stories
OLYMPIA – The Washington Legislature’s new legal challenge to Gov. Jay Inslee’s vetoes is a united effort. The Facilities and Operations Committee in the Senate and the House Executive Rules Committee have decided to file a lawsuit against Inslee for his partial vetoes of two bills from the 2021 legislative session which lawmakers from both parties claim to be a violation of the state constitution.
Senate Republican Leader John Braun said this is not a partisan effort to undermine the governor’s authority.
“The constitution envisions three different branches of government and this is the governor trying to use the Executive Branch to overshadow the Legislative Branch,” he said.
The vetoes at issue include the subsection veto in the low carbon/high-cost fuel standard bill and several one sentence vetoes about fuel type in the transportation budget that mirror those that were challenged by the legislature after the 2019 legislative session and recently struck down by the Washington Supreme Court.
“The cap-and-trade bill and the transportation bill falls on the heels of him losing similar litigation that we filed a couple years ago where he vetoed specific lines,” Braun said. The constitution couldn’t be clearer on this.”
Braun said the governor is only allowed to veto entire sections.
