Thread by @DempseyTwo

It’s being reported Sen James Inhofe (F-OK), will retire prior to the end of his term. If he leaves at the end of this year he will still have 4 years left. During that 4 years, Oklahomans will be able to choose his replacem…what?…when?…oh…you guys…another wee OK🧵👇🏻

Oklahoma used to fill their vacant US Senate seats by a special election. That meant the people got to choose who would be their next senator in 9 months. They had a special election process which means people could run for the seat and they could earn the votes of the people.

I say they had that right because Oklahoma’s Governor signed SB959.
billtrack50.com/BillDetail/128…

SB959 for those who didn’t read it, the gist is it eliminates the special election and allows the Governor to fill the vacancy with the person of their choosing. The Governor of OK is Republican Kevin Stitt. (📌1. More on this monstrosity later👇🏻)

What this means is a Republican of Gov Stitt’s choosing will be in Inhofe’s seat for 4 years even if the people of Oklahoma do not want that. There are 37 states that do it this way but with various timings to hold elections. Why bother with elections, tho? It’s just democracy.

The timing of this is interesting too. The law was just changed last year. Why was it so important for Oklahoma to make this change? Did someone know of Inhofe’s decision to retire early? Why take away the vote? The spin was because it saved $4m dollars.

I guess $4m is too expensive for democracy. A billionaire just made $4m in the time it took you to read this sentence. Isn’t it the GOP telling us it is the Democrats who are eroding our freedoms? Silencing us? Taking away our rights to vote? In Oklahoma they did precisely that.

We’re always told to follow the money. We need to follow the power too. Let’s think about this completely differently now. Let’s look at the other end of the spectrum. Let’s look at a place where the Gov didn’t need the law to be changed to have the power to fill vacancies.

Kentucky’s Gov is a Democrat. I know, right? Andy Beshear is the Gov of Kentucky. The two US Senate seats are held by Rand Paul and Mitch McConnell. So if one of them were to retire, the Dems would pick up a seat because Gov Beshear would choose a Dem…wait…not so fast.

Let’s say the people of KY voted for Andy Beshear because he’s a democrat and better represents them. They bestowed the powers of the Governor in him and entrusted him to select a qualified candidate for the US senate should a vacancy occur.

I mean, if Rand Paul is ever questioned about what he knows in relation to Putin, Patrick Byrne, his grass clippings, he could be 14th out of the place. Tortoises live for like 150 years so I don’t know what Mitch would be worried about except that Mitch *was* worried.

So worried in fact, he helped to change the law in Kentucky to *strip* the powers of the Governor to no longer allow them to fill vacancies. Enter Kentucky’s SB228.

https://twitter.com/dempseytwo/status/1375081205851435012

We can see them giving the Republican Governor more powers in an effort to retain power in one state and removing powers from a Democratic Governor so the republicans can retain power in another.

They are only serving themselves. Each of these law changes cuts the voters out.

These actions illustrate how it doesn’t matter to these republicans what they do or how they do it so long as they retain power and remove the voter from the equation.

I cannot stress enough to you the importance of the 2022 elections. Please confirm you are registered and vote.

📌1 was about Governor Kevin Stitt. He along with other officials from Oklahoma appear on the ‘path to trump’ whiteboard. That board needs to be understood. We need to watch very closely what comes of Inhofe’s departure.

https://twitter.com/dempseytwo/status/1461334305431502857