John Braun: When Democrats say they want to lower costs, ask them about the cost-saving initiatives
Posted Friday, July 19, 2024 4:07 pm
They say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. But Senate Republicans aren’t feeling particularly flattered that state Attorney General Bob Ferguson is claiming to support a majority of our legislative priorities only now that he is running for governor.
For years, we have focused our policy proposals on three priorities, and for years that list has started with reestablishing public safety and restoring affordability — as in controlling and lowering the cost of living in Washington. These have become perpetual priorities because Democrats have perpetually failed to work with us to solve them.
So it caught our attention when, in his first television ad, Ferguson doesn’t just try to convince people that he values police officers and wants to clamp down on criminals. He also vows to “work to lower costs” and make it so “families have an easier time making ends meet.”
Let’s pretend for a moment that Ferguson actually cares about doing something to ease the financial burden on families.
Has Ferguson promised that if he is elected governor, he will veto any tax increase passed by the Legislature? Of course not. While that may make him more honest than Gov. Jay Inslee, who made and then broke the same vow, it’s also true that Ferguson has stood by silently for years while Inslee and legislative Democrats piled one new cost after another on our state, and doubled state spending during Inslee’s time in office.
Does Ferguson support the four cost-saving initiatives that will be on the November ballot? Not that anyone can tell. Three of those initiatives could have been passed by the Legislature while we were in session. Republicans wanted to, but Democratic leaders said no, and Ferguson remained quiet.
An example is Initiative 2117, which would repeal the cap-and-tax law passed by Democrats in 2021.
Cap-and-tax, officially known as the Climate Commitment Act, has become one of the biggest government money grabs in recent memory while inflating the price of gas in Washington by nearly 50 cents this past year and increasing energy costs for natural-gas users.
If Ferguson cared about “skyrocketing costs” as much as his TV ad claims, he wouldn’t have used the power of his position as attorney general to keep our state’s largest utility from telling its ratepayers how the cap-and-tax law inflates their utility bills.
As I’ve noted before — and it can’t be said too often — the person whose office is in charge of protecting our state’s consumers chose to put his ideology first, and stand with the cap-and-taxers while Washington families pay some of the highest gas prices in our nation.
Republicans are working to lower costs by supporting not only I-2117 but also Initiative 2109, to end the capital-gains income tax before it is expanded to go after home sales; Initiative 2124, to end the mandatory long-term care payroll tax on working people across Washington; and Initiative 2066, which would end the Democrats’ new effort to ban natural gas in our state and force hundreds of thousands of Washingtonians to pay tens of thousands of dollars each to electrify their homes.
Any of these measures would help make living in our state more affordable. Voters should pass every one of them this fall.
Ferguson does touch on high costs elsewhere on his campaign website, but has nothing new to offer.
For instance, under “affordable housing” he vows to streamline permitting, which is a perennial priority for Republicans.
While we all agree Washington has an acute shortage of housing people can afford, Democrats seem unwilling to admit that before more homes can be built, more land needs to be freed up for development.
Ferguson also claims to want to make child care more affordable for Washington families. He would do this by pouring more tax dollars into a government program created by a Democratic law only a few years ago.
Even worse, this program is tied closely to the state Department of Children, Youth and Families, which is already having significant challenges meeting its primary responsibilities.
Republicans remember when child-care providers were relatively plentiful in our communities, before ever-increasing state regulations drove most out of business. It’s interesting that Ferguson seems to recognize how overregulation has a negative effect on Washington’s housing supply but can’t see how it also limits the supply of child care.
Ferguson has been preparing for his run for governor for many years. He certainly could have spoken out about the high cost of living long ago. He also could have supported Republican priorities when legislators were in session, instead of claiming only now that he is for them.
Instead, his idea of cost-saving includes distributing checks, with his name prominently printed on them, to poor and rich Washingtonians alike who were supposedly harmed by the price of chicken and tuna. It’s no coincidence that most of the “chicken check” recipients are voters.
Voters can determine which candidates are and aren’t serious about lowering costs for families simply by asking how they would vote on the four cost-saving initiatives on the ballot.
Bob Ferguson could back up his professed concern for the budgets of Washington households by publicly endorsing those initiatives. The fact that he hasn’t, and won’t, means Ferguson is even less serious about addressing the skyrocketing costs of living than he is about dealing with the public-safety concerns that have become worse due to policies he’s pushed.
The First Amendment gives Ferguson and other Democrats the right to pretend, in campaign ads and elsewhere, that they are worried about your cost of living.
But there’s no need to settle for an imitation when you can have the real thing. Voters looking for leaders who truly care about lowering the cost of living in our state should — after saying “yes” to all four cost-saving initiatives — simply skip over Ferguson’s name on the ballot and vote Republican instead.
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Sen. John Braun of Centralia serves the 20th Legislative District, which spans parts of four counties from Yelm to Vancouver. He became Senate Republican leader in 2020.