Interesting How The Detroit Free Press Reported On Michigan Senate Repealing Michigan’s 1945 Emergency Powers Act

I have been speaking about this issue for quite a long time.  In fact, the first piece I wrote about it was back in July of 2020.  Last August I wrote:

“When Whitmer accuses people of using “unscrupulous measures” when attempting to repeal the Emergency Powers Act that she believes gives her dictatorial control over the entire state, that tells me she is concerned, perhaps very concerned.

The group collecting the signatures to repeal Michigan's Emergency Powers of Governor Act, 1945 is called Unlock Michigan.  The group needs to collect more than 340,000 valid signatures to submit the petition to the Legislature.”

A year later with thirteen pieces written and a number of interviews with Unlock Michigan’s spokesperson Fred Wzolek, the Michigan Senate finally had a chance to vote on the ballot and passed it as written on a Party line vote 20-15.  Next week it moves to the House where they have an opportunity to pass it as written and then the 1945 Emergency Powers of the Governor Act will officially be repealed.

Interestingly no Democrats voted to repeal the law.  I say interestingly because last October the Michigan Supreme Court voted 4-3 ruling the law to be unconstitutional.  Due to the fact that the law shifted the power inappropriately from the legislative branch to the executive branch.  Does that mean the Michigan state Democrat Senators believe in keeping unconstitutional laws on the books?  It certainly appears that way.

Everyone will be reporting on the passing of the Ballot initiative, I want to talk about the article published late yesterday in the afternoon in the Detroit Free Press by one of their reporters.  The headline was “Michigan Senate repeals emergency powers law; Whitmer can't veto”.  The interesting part was his first paragraph where he wrote:

“Michigan Republican senators used a relatively obscure procedural tactic Thursday to repeal an emergency powers law in a manner that prevents Gov. Gretchen Whitmer from issuing a veto”

I was wondering what “obscure procedural tactic” they used.  I read the rest of his article to determine what exactly was this “obscure procedural tactic”.  I never found the answer.  I reached out to the reporter to ask him what exactly he was referring to as the “obscure procedural tactic”.  It was exactly what I thought it would be.  He was referring to the initiative law itself.  That law states that when a ballot initiative collects enough legal signatures and the State Board of Canvassers certifies the ballot, it moves to the House and Senate.  If the House and Senate accept the ballot initiative language as written and it passes the ballot initiative becomes law.  In this case, because the ballot initiative was passed as written and a result of an initiative campaign, no Governor, even Whitmer can veto it.

My point: it was not part of an “obscure procedural tactic” but just part of the law.

Interesting how facts can be spun and who does the spinning.  We are all entitled to our own opinion, at least for today, but we are not entitled to our own facts and the spinning of those facts.