Seattle judge’s I-27 ruling threatens all initiatives
Oct 17, 2017, 2:02 PM | Updated: 2:35 pm
(Patrick Kovarik, Pool via AP)
(Patrick Kovarik, Pool via AP)
On Monday, Judge Veronica Alicea-Galván announced in her ruling against the voters of King County that all initiatives are illegal. She didn’t write those words, but the excuses she used to explain her feelings add up to just that.
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Judge Alicea-Galván based her feelings and decree on two main points — to which she attached case law with a tenuous connection to her assertions in this case.
First, the judge claims that I-27, which would ban government-funded heroin dens, affects the appropriations, or budget of King County. All initiatives have an impact on the budget — every single one. Even an initiative that made it OK for county employees to say “hello” would affect the budget because lawyers would need to process it.
Alicea-Galvánhas laid the groundwork for the elitists in King County to do what they want to: make voters shut their mouths and open their wallets because if affecting the budget invalidates then all of them are invalid.
Secondly, Judge Veronica Alicea-Galván claims — and this is flatly bizarre — that if I-27 appeared on the ballot, passed and became law (which it would), members of the King County Board of Health could be criminally and civilly liable for not setting up the government-funded heroin dens ordered under the King County law.
The fact is this: if I-27 passed, it would be the law and the argument in favor of the heroin dens would be moot. But Judge Veronica Alicea-Galván would like us to believe that the county health board would be charged criminally for following the law?
People do not have endless patience. When politicians become rulers, bad things follow. That has always been the case and it always will be the case. I pray that politicians like Judge Veronica Alicea-Galván wake up to that fact through election cycles. The last thing America needs is a even more distrust of and outright disregard for our institutions. But, what else would politicians earn when they tell people their vote is invalid because a judge feels differently?
