Bright, Democrats bottled up legislation
What really happened during the last week of session in the Senate? Whatever happened, a lot of people are angry.
The pro-lifers are angry that the 24-hour abortion wait bill was canned. The realtors are mad that their point-of-sale bill failed. The entire business community, including NFIB, the S.C. Chamber of Commerce, and the S.C. Manufacturers Alliance are pissed that the card check bill got checked. Republican party activists, including S.C. Republican Party staff, have their panties in a wad that the voter ID bill didn’t make it out.
So, who is to blame? According to a call with S.C. Senate Republican Caucus director Wesley Donehue, he was quick to put it all on one man -– Sen. Lee Bright.
“I’m not going to say that Sen. Bright killed all these bills, but I will say that the Democrats used his bill to kill everything else,” Donehue said. “This week I was flooded by calls and bombarded in the lobby and I told everyone the same exact thing. We can’t move anything until we get 10th Amendment out of the way because [Sen. Brad] Hutto is filibustering it. We don’t have the 37 votes to sit Hutto down, so the only option we have is to pull the bill down. Numerous senators tried to get Sen. Bright to budge, but he wouldn’t move.
“Brad Hutto and the Democrats were using the 10th Amendment resolution to block everything else. They told me to my face that putting the resolution on special order was the stupidest thing we did all year. They were right. I don’t care how anyone tries to spin it. The truth is that the abortion bill, card check, voter ID, and point of sale all died because of Sen. Bright’s bill.”
One party activist told WR, “Sure, it’s a great conservative gesture, but in the grand scheme of things its nothing more than a useless letter to Obama. Most folks would have rather fought unions and protected the unborn.”
When asked how a freshman senator can cause such chaos, Donehue said that anyone who makes that statement knows little about the legislative process.
“Any one senator can kill nearly anything. For example, at one point last week, Sen. Bright objected to every single bill on the calendar, effectively killing them all,” he said.
We’ve heard from numerous sources that the Senate went into its hour-long closed executive session (when senators kick everyone out, including press and staff) to scold Bright. Donehue would not comment, claiming, “Senators don’t tell us what happens in executive session.”
However, one senator did speak to WR on background, claming that the entire hour was spent putting Bright into place.
Maybe that’s why Bright, who took the podium nearly every day this session and even called for roll call votes on adjournment, became so quiet in the last four hours of session.
