Committee meeting could be ‘new beginning’ for relationship between tribes, state

Posted on by Brett Stover

Outside statutorily required organizational meetings, the Joint Committee on State-Tribal Relations had met only 10 times between its creation in 1999 and a daylong gathering Wednesday.

That could change after lawmakers heard concerns from tribal leaders and extensive presentations on the history issues concerning Native American nations in Kansas.

Wednesday’s meeting “could be a new beginning” to building relationships between tribal governments and the state, Iowa Tribe of Kansas and Nebraska Chairman Timothy Rhodd told the committee.

Rhodd was one of three tribal chairs who spoke at the meeting, along with Gail Cheatham, chairwoman of the Kickapoo Tribe in Kansas, and Joseph Rupnick, chairman of the Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation. The Sac and Fox Nation of Missouri in Kansas and Nebraska, the state’s fourth federally recognized tribe, did not have a representative speak to the committee.

The Legislature formed the State-Tribal Relations Committee in 1999 from what was then the Joint Committee on Gaming Compacts. It met several times between then and 2006, according to the Kansas Legislative Research Department, but didn’t convene again for a full meeting until 2023.

“We’re just trying to gather information and absorb all this,” Rep. Will Carpenter, who chairs the committee, said during the meeting. “A lot of this, I think, is the committee’s first time hearing these kinds of issues. But we’re going to dig into it.”

One issue that tribal leaders raised was an ongoing doctrine that allows tribe members to be tried criminally in both state and tribal courts. Rupnick said that doctrine could be changing, referencing the 2020 McGirt ruling where the U.S. Supreme Court held that criminal cases involving tribal members on tribal land shouldn’t be tried in state court in Oklahoma.

“I think it’s important that we start those conversations and at least learn about the history, what those laws are and how we can work cooperatively together,” Rupnick said.

Other issues discussed included removing references to “blood quantum” from old state statutes, and tax policies that tribal leaders believed were unfair to their members.

Cheatham called for dedicated legislative subcommittees — a method used by other states — that could address how proposed legislation would impact tribes.

“The tribes … should never be an afterthought,” she said.

One of the major topics of discussion was how water issues affect tribes in Kansas. Washburn University law professor Burke Griggs, who represented the state during a 2016 water rights settlement with the Kickapoo Tribe, called it “one of the most complicated subjects in natural resources law.”

Many tribes have some of the largest and oldest water rights in the United States, but that doesn’t often result in actual access to water. Griggs encouraged lawmakers to support negotiated settlements with tribes and said that avenue provides better solutions than taking disputes to court. 

Eric Sheets, environmental director for the Kickapoo, said the tribe depends solely on the Delaware River and is impacted by agricultural runoff upstream. He proposed involving tribes more directly in state water management discussions, helping with water technology training and legislative fixes.

Rhodd said his tribe, the Iowa, has ongoing issues with water quality and quantity.

“There will come a day where we will not have water, and if we do have water we will not be able to drink [it],” he said. “If we have no water, we have no life, just as it is with food.”

The committee also heard testimony on some groups’ efforts to gain state recognition as a tribe — even though the federal government handles that process.

Rupnick criticized non-recognized groups that attempt to gain recognition, saying some steal culture and tradition from recognized tribes with hopes of “establishing a casino or taking advantage of federal funds.”

Jancita Warrington, executive director of the Kansas Native American Affairs Office, said two groups in Kansas are seeking state recognition “because they tried and they couldn’t meet those [federal] requirements.”

“We will not create a policy to violate that sovereignty of the [existing] tribes here and extend the recognition process outside the federal recognition process that’s already established by federal law,” Warrington said.

After the meeting, Carpenter, R-El Dorado, told State Affairs the committee previously met only “when we had reason to meet, so to speak,” about issues such as gaming compacts. He decided to call more meetings after hearing about issues affecting tribes within Kansas.

The amount of information in Wednesday’s meeting was like “drinking from a fire hose,” Carpenter said, and he wants the committee to meet again to discuss its recommendations.

“Obviously, some of this stuff is federal authority, out of our jurisdiction,” he said. “But I do think there are some things that are within our purview as the state Legislature that we can improve on.”

Managing Editor Bryan Richardson contributed to this story.

Brett Stover is a Statehouse reporter at State Affairs Pro Kansas/Hawver’s Capitol Report. Reach him at [email protected] or on X @BrettStoverKS.

Lawmakers approve 3 Commerce Department audits after accusation of improper pandemic aid

Posted on by Bryan Richardson

The fallout continues from a now-deceased former official’s claims of improper pandemic aid conduct as the Kansas Department of Commerce will face three separate audits.

The Legislative Post Audit Committee on Tuesday approved state auditors looking into three topics:

  • Evaluating the adequacy of the Department of Commerce’s pre-employment screening.
  • Reviewing the department’s process for scoring Building a Stronger Economy (BASE) 1.0 gGrant applications.
  • Evaluating SOFTwarfare LLC’s use of BASE 1.0 Grant Funding.

Sen. Mike Thompson, R-Shawnee; Sen. Caryn Tyson, R-Parker; Rep. Shannon Francis, R-Liberal; Rep. Jason Probst, D-Hutchinson; Rep. Sean Tarwater, R-Stilwell; and Rep. Kristey Williams, R-Augusta — six of the 10 committee members — requested the first two audits.

Tarwater, who chairs the House Commerce, Labor and Economic Development Committee, told State Affairs that the audit requests shouldn’t be viewed as any of the legislators saying the commerce department has done something wrong.

“There’s a lot of money being distributed that we may or may not be aware of,” he said. “The whole idea is to get to the bottom of how the scoring works and make sure that it’s fair. It’s just that this [situation] brought to light quite a few questions.”

The situation ties to Jonathan Clayton, the commerce department’s former economic recovery director who was found dead in his wrecked pickup truck last month.

Clayton, who worked for the department from 2020 to 2023, alleged Lt. Gov. David Toland, who also serves as commerce secretary, created a scheme to alter the recipients of the first round of pandemic aid. The accusation came from an email purported to be from Clayton that was sent to various officials after his disappearance on Aug. 3.

Another layer to the situation is Clayton’s previous felony convictions for finance crimes in Pennsylvania, which the Peabody Gazette-Bulletin first reported in July. Clayton had most recently worked as interim city clerk in Peabody, where he also faced scrutiny of his handling of grants.

The commerce department said in a statement on Aug. 29 that it was not aware of Clayton’s felony convictions, pointing to existing state law as a reason it couldn’t perform “national level criminal background checks for the position that Clayton held.”

Tyson said that it’s “intriguing” the state would prohibit any type of background check and that legislators need to understand what would prevent agencies from getting the information.

Thompson said he spoke with a former colonel who did security background checks in the military.

“He said it should have been very easy to find this, so hopefully you’ll be able to see what avenues are available for doing those kinds of background checks and find out why they weren’t followed,” he said.

Rep. Tory Marie Blew, R-Great Bend, requested the audit related to SOFTwarfare, a cybersecurity company headquartered in Prairie Village.

The company received $3 million to develop the first phase of a micro-modular edge data center in Great Bend. Blew, who joined the meeting virtually, said she hasn’t seen the company in the city despite the implementation deadline passing.

“I hear from the Department of Commerce that there’s a supply chain issue,” she said. “But my worry has to deal with the fact that this business is not from this area nor have they ever been from this area.”

The audit will examine whether the company properly spent its $3 million as it described in its application.

Each audit is estimated to take 100 staff hours to complete.

The department, which denied Clayton’s allegations in its Aug. 29 statement, didn’t immediately respond to State Affairs’ request for comment on the audits.

The department previously announced it had hired a third-party contractor to do a full review of all American Rescue Plan Act grants.

Bryan Richardson is the managing editor at State Affairs Pro Kansas/Hawver’s Capitol Report. Reach him at [email protected] or on X @RichInNews.

Student attendance improved last school year, but more work remains, officials say

Posted on by Jarred Meeks

Indiana students’ chronic absenteeism rate improved last school year, but more work remains, and education officials hope new data-tracking tools will help.

More than 205,000 Hoosier students (17.8%) were chronically absent in the 2023-24 school year — meaning they missed at least 10% of school days — down from more than 220,000 (19.2%) during the 2022-23 school year and over 237,000 (21.1%) during the 2021-22 school year.

Despite the improvement, the number of chronically absent students in Indiana remains well above pre-pandemic levels: Fewer than 130,000 students (11.2%) were chronically absent during the 2018-19 school year. John Keller, chief information officer at the Indiana Department of Education, told the State Board of Education Wednesday that enough students were chronically absent last school year to fill 2,850 school buses.

Keller said local school administrators will play an instrumental role in tackling the issue because the reasons for the poor student attendance numbers “are probably about as varied as the schools.”

To help local school administrators, the state has launched the Attendance Insights Dashboard. A version of the dashboard available to schools was released in August, and a public version is expected to be released in late September or early October, Keller said. (The public version will include only certified data.)

The school version of the dashboard shows local school administrators real-time attendance data for their corporation, schools and grade levels, and the data can be sorted by school year, week, day and more. The dashboard allows administrators to identify data trends, make policy decisions and detect possible data collection improvements, education officials said. Ultimately, the officials hope the dashboard will also assist in finding the causes of Hoosier students’ attendance issues.

In addition, the state launched a pilot of the Early Warning Dashboard. The state aims to develop the dashboard to help Indiana schools direct attention and resources to students most at risk of not graduating. According to Keller, 11 school corporations are participating in the pilot, which started Monday.

When creating the pilot dashboard, officials looked at data from more than 300,000 graduates and from others who didn’t graduate, Keller said. The dashboard highlights which current students display data patterns reminiscent of prior students who did not graduate.

“We want all schools to have a minimum level of understanding of what their data is telling them,” Keller said.

Chronic absenteeism is on the rise nationally, and each state is under pressure to establish a goal for when they will reach their pre-pandemic attendance levels, Indiana Secretary of Education Katie Jenner said. Indiana is “on that trajectory,” but the department and state board are looking to work with stakeholders before pinpointing a specific state goal, Jenner said.

During the 2023-24 school year, all grade levels saw decreased levels of chronic absenteeism, according to state data. (High school grades still showed the greatest levels of chronic absenteeism, and nearly 1 in 3 Hoosier students were chronically absent during their senior year.) The decreases were also reflected across student ethnicities and socioeconomic statuses, Keller said.

State data shows students who miss more school have worse test scores. Chronically absent students scored lower on the IREAD assessment, ILEARN assessment and SAT, according to data presented Wednesday.

“Teachers could have told us this before we ran the data, right? But running the data, it’s very clear: Students need to be in the classroom,” Jenner said.

Jenner told reporters after the board meeting that the department’s data would help inform state lawmakers while they consider possible legislation on the matter. The Interim Study Committee on Education this year is charged with studying steps to improve school attendance and “the impact of absenteeism on school funding distributions.” The interim committee is scheduled to meet Sept. 26.

Contact Jarred Meeks on X @jarredsmeeks or email him at [email protected].

Postal Service addresses concerns; other states’ election officials weigh in

Posted on by Brett Stover

The U.S. Postal Service said Wednesday it has been in “close communication” with state election officials and will respond to Secretary of State Scott Schwab’s concerns directly.

Mark Inglett, a spokesperson for the Postal Service, said in an email that the federal agency has received a letter Schwab sent Monday to Postmaster General Louis DeJoy. In the letter, the secretary of state said issues with ballot delivery effectively disenfranchised about 1,000 Kansas voters during the August primary.

Those ballots, mailed before election day, were received without a postmark or after the three-day grace period, Schwab said, and therefore couldn’t be counted under Kansas law. He called the issues “unacceptable” and demanded an explanation of how the Postal Service will ensure all ballots can be counted in November.

“We have been in close communication with Secretary of State Scott Schwab and other Kansas election officials throughout the year to resolve their concerns and specifically to review our policy on postmarks,” Inglett said in a statement.

The Postal Service doesn’t normally postmark every piece of mail, Inglett said. But the agency recognizes the importance that some state laws place on them and tries to “ensure that every return ballot mailed by voters receives a postmark” and has instructed employees about those special ballot postmarking policies.

Inglett encouraged voters, “as a common-sense measure,” to mail ballots at least a week before the deadline — in the case of Kansas, the end of the three-day grace period.

Election officials weigh in

Election officials from all 50 states signed a letter Wednesday expressing “ongoing concerns” with the U.S. Postal Service ahead of the general election.

The signatories came from two groups, the National Association of Secretaries of State and the National Association of State Election Directors. Two Kansans signed the letter: Kansas State Director of Elections Bryan Caskey and Rick Piepho, president of the Kansas County Clerks and Election Officials Association.

The letter mentioned several alleged issues, including inconsistent training for Postal Service staff, “exceptionally long” delivery times and an increase in election-related mail returned as “undeliverable.”

“Despite repeated engagement with USPS Election and Political Mail headquarters staff and state/regional Managers of Customer Relations, we have not seen improvement or concerted efforts to remediate our concerns,” the letter said.

Election officials need a “committed partner” in the Postal Service, the letter concluded. The signatories called on the agency to “take immediate and tangible corrective action” to address the issues and said a failure to do so would risk harming voter participation and trust in elections.

Brett Stover is a Statehouse reporter at State Affairs Pro Kansas/Hawver’s Capitol Report. Reach him at [email protected] or on X @BrettStoverKS.

Todd Rokita’s thirst for battle isn’t going away

Posted on by Rory Appleton

Editor’s note: This story is the first in a two-part look into the race for Indiana attorney general in 2024. A story on Democratic challenger Destiny Wells will be published next week.

Todd Rokita walked onto the stage at the Indiana Republican Party convention wearing a pair of boxing gloves despite having no one to oppose him for the party’s nomination in the November election. 

The gloves were, he would imply, for fighting back against Democrats. The gesture itself was analogous to Rokita’s first term as attorney general — one striped with conflict over what some see as his inflammatory language, be it with political opponents, the Indiana Supreme Court or the governor  of his own party. 

Rokita, now seeking a second term, is happy to engage with his perceived enemies.

“The vitriol and the hate from all of the socialists on the left — you would think makes things more difficult and less intriguing,” he said. “But it really just spurs me on to protect the people of this state and the state itself.”  

Destiny Wells, the Democrat challenging Rokita in November, said his penchant for involving the state in national political issues — abortion, immigration and so on — has embarrassed Indiana and ruffled more than a few feathers in the Republican Party. 

“We need to get out of the business of national culture issues,” she said. 

Others, however, say Rokita is right where he should be.

“He’s done exactly what he said he would do,” Michael Schopmeyer, a partner at Kahn, Dees, Donovan & Kahn, LLP in Evansville, said of Rokita’s time in office. Schopmeyer has known Rokita since his 2002 election as secretary of state. He served on Rokita’s attorney general transition team in 2020. 

Reprimanded by Supreme Court

Perhaps Rokita’s most well-known interactions since taking office unfolded in 2022 and 2023, when he took issue with an Indianapolis physician who provided an abortion to a 10-year-old rape victim from Ohio. 

In a July 2022 Fox News interview, Rokita called the physician, Dr. Caitlin Bernard, an “abortion activist acting as a doctor” and accused her of not filing required medical reports. He then called on the state Medical Licensing Board to suspend Bernard’s license. 

Bernard was ultimately reprimanded and fined, but not suspended, for speaking to an Indianapolis Star reporter about the case. 

Wells, Rokita’s opponent, said the state needed to “get out of the doctor’s office.” 

“Todd is abusing his authority in an attempt to chill care,” she said. 

More than a year later, Rokita was reprimanded by the Indiana Supreme Court for the comments. The reprimand came as part of an agreement Rokita reached with the court’s Disciplinary Commission, an appointed board of seven attorneys and two non-attorneys that reviews complaints and enforces ethics requirements in the legal community. 

“Everything I said about Caitlin Bernard was true,” Rokita told State Affairs about the incident. “The media narrative tried to make it out like I was being accused of and have been found to say some false things, and I didn’t.” 

Rokita said he agreed only that his comments could be perceived as ill-timed. He did not acknowledge any wrongdoing. 

“In order to save the state money and to show we can all do things better, I settled the matter,” said Rokita, who has since been accused of misconduct in several other grievances on unrelated matters. 

The Disciplinary Commission is investigating at least one such grievance, which claimed Rokita took a position opposite of the Indiana Department of Health on whether terminated pregnancy reports are a matter of public record. As the attorney general’s office represents the Department of Health and other state agencies in court, the complaint supposes an ethics breach. 

Rokita said the grievance process has been “weaponized and politicized” against him. 

“The disciplinary commission is focused on my speech,” Rokita said. “I have a First Amendment right against my government to speak. This is not me grabbing anybody or stealing money. It’s about political speech.”

Justin Forkner, chief administrative officer of the Supreme Court’s Office of Judicial Administration, refuted Rokita’s claims. 

“The Commission members are selected without regard to political party and represent Indiana’s population and legal practice,” he said in a statement. “Their work is not political and is limited to the procedures laid out in the Court’s Admission and Discipline Rules.”

Forkner said all attorneys are held to the same standard and given multiple opportunities to weigh in on the claims made against them. 

Pandemic criticism

In March, Rokita released a report claiming Indiana had overreported deaths during the COVID-19 pandemic. In his interview with State Affairs, he defended the report, as well as both preceding and ensuing conflicts with Gov. Eric Holcomb. 

Rokita said he does not judge Holcomb for issuing a stay-at-home order in 2020, several months prior to Rokita’s election. However, Rokita said he would not have handled it the same way and would “do everything in his power” to stop a shutdown should a similar situation arise. 

“Real leadership comes from quickly diagnosing an issue and seeking an action,” Rokita said. “And, if it’s wrong, adjusting.” 

Holcomb took issue with a statement Rokita made on a local newscast questioning the Indiana Department of Health’s COVID-19 numbers.

The governor has not reviewed Rokita’s report, the attorney general said. The report claimed Indiana overreported death totals by 10.9% in 2020, 7% in 2021 and 12.5% in 2022. 

“The governor said, ‘We put no weight in the report.’ Well, that’s because of his inability to show any leadership,” Rokita said. 

The Indiana Department of Health declined to comment on Rokita’s statements. A spokeswoman for Holcomb did not respond to a request for comment. 

It was not the only COVID-related clash between the governor and attorney general. 

Holcomb took issue with a 2021 bill that allowed the Indiana General Assembly to call itself into session after the governor declared an emergency — a responsibility that normally rested solely with the governor. Rokita sided with the Legislature and represented it in court despite also typically representing the governor’s office in legal matters.  

The Indiana Supreme Court then unanimously ruled the legislation was unconstitutional. 

‘Eyes on Education’

Rokita again waded into national political debate with his “Parents’ Bill of Rights,” a 108-page document released in four sections between June 2021 and August 2023. The first installment came at a time of national conservative outrage over COVID-19 restrictions in schools. 

He said at the time he sought to fight the “indoctrination” of students and focus teachers on academics amid lagging test scores. 

The Indiana Democratic Party criticized Rokita’s rollout at the time, saying he released the document “to double down on his crusade on culture war issues.”

Rokita told State Affairs he first offered the document to Indiana Secretary of Education Katie Jenner but received no response. 

“Where there’s a vacuum of leadership, I will fill it,” Rokita said of his fellow Republican official. 

A spokeswoman for Jenner did not respond to a request for comment. 

In February, Rokita launched his “Eyes on Education” portal, which allowed citizens to report instances of political ideology in schools. Districts immediately criticized the information contained in the portal as outdated or inaccurate. 

Rokita said his office received 30 or so lesson plans showing critical race theory — an academic field centered around the social implications of race and a popular villain for conservatives — being taught in Indiana schools. His office validated submissions to the portal, he added. 

School administrators should use the portal to verify what is and isn’t being taught on their campuses, Rokita said. 

Immigration fights

Rokita touted his office’s many legal battles with President Joe Biden’s administration, especially on immigration. 

“We’re proud to be the first non-border state to sue Biden for lawlessness at the border,” he said. 

Closer to home, Rokita has pushed for the removal of “sanctuary city” laws from Indiana municipal codes. Such laws generally involve a government pledging its employees will not fully cooperate with federal immigration officials and are banned by state law. 

Three cities — West Lafayette, Gary and East Chicago — amended their local laws to Rokita’s satisfaction. The attorney general’s office has filed a lawsuit against Monroe County, which Rokita said has refused to repeal a sheriff’s department policy. 

Rokita referred to the lawsuits against Biden and Monroe County as “part of my portfolio protecting Hoosiers from illegals.”

Indiana Democrats have criticized Rokita’s focus on national issues, which they say have no bearing on the state. 

“Todd Rokita has been very extreme, very partisan in his approach to the job,” Indiana Democratic Party Chair Mike Schmuhl told State Affairs. “He’s really attracted to national politics and culture wars.” 

Rokita on the job

Rokita enjoys his job, controversies and all. 

“I’ve been secretary of state and a congressman,” he told State Affairs. “This work allows me to get more done than the other two offices combined.”

The attorney general’s primary duties are to represent the state and its agencies in civil court and criminal appeals, offer legal advisory opinions and return unclaimed property to Hoosiers. 

To those ends, his office has secured more than $1 billion in settlements, racked up a 98% win rate on jury trials and returned more than $81 million in unclaimed property in 2023, Rokita said. He’s led legal action against unscrupulous landlords and companies that dump harmful chemicals in the state — two areas in which a Republican wouldn’t normally act, Rokita added. 

‘He fits the state’

Rokita has protected election integrity, supported school vouchers and done well in fighting against abortion, Schopmeyer, the Evansville lawyer, said.

“He may have gone a little further than I would have gone on COVID,” Schopmeyer said. “We needed to shut down for a while, but it went too long.” 

Schopmeyer also questioned the wisdom of the “Eyes on Education” portal. 

“You have to trust teachers,” he said. “It’s problematic when the capital sticks its nose in education.” 

But Rokita probably fits the electorate, Schopmeyer said. 

“He’s probably a little more right than I’d want to be, but he fits the state,” Schopmeyer said of Rokita. 

Contact Rory Appleton on X at @roryehappleton or email him at [email protected].

Correction: This story has been updated to correct the dollar amount of unclaimed property returned by the Attorney General’s Office.

Todd Rokita
  • Title: Attorney General
  • Age: 54
  • Hometown: Brownsburg
  • Education: Bachelor’s degree from Wabash College, law degree from Indiana University Indianapolis
  • Career: Indiana Secretary of State (2002-10), 4th District congressman (2011-2019), Indiana Attorney General (2020-present). Rokita also ran unsuccessfully for the governor’s nomination in 2016 and U.S. Senate in 2018.
  • Family: Rokita and his wife, Kathy, have two sons
  • Hobbies: Piloting

Former U.S. Sen. Jim Sasser of Tennessee dies at 87

Posted on by Andy Sher

Jim Sasser, a former 18-year U.S. senator from Tennessee who went on to become the nation’s ambassador to China, has died. He was 87.

The former Democratic politician’s son, Gray Sasser, confirmed his father had passed away in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, on Tuesday evening. 

Sasser, a Memphis native and long-time active in Democratic circles, managed Albert Gore Sr.’s unsuccessful 1970 reelection campaign. A Vanderbilt law school graduate, Sasser won back the seat in 1976 from Republican U.S. Sen. Bill Brock of Lookout Mountain.

Sasser’s win came after Brock, a millionaire businessman whose family owned a candy company, came under pressure to reveal his finances. Brock acknowledged he had paid $2,026 on an income of $51,670, a rate of less than 4% at a time when others earning that amount would have to cut the IRS a check for as much as 62% of their  income.

Sasser and gleeful Democrats seized on the tax issue and began hammering away at Brock. Hot pink buttons quickly sprang up with the slogan, “I Paid More Taxes Than Brock.” Organized labor jumped in with a news conference where leaders compared Brock’s taxes with that of auto and steel workers. Sasser won the post-Watergate era contest and went on to serve three terms, from 1977 to 1995. He rose to become chairman of the Senate Budget Committee.

Sasser lost his 1994 reelection bid to Nashville heart-transplant surgeon and Republican Bill Frist. During the campaign, the Frist campaign’s rallying cry was: “18 years are long enough.” 

While the 1994 race was underway, Sasser entered the race to replace Maine’s George Mitchell as Senate majority leader. Sasser had earned respect and chits among his Democratic colleagues in his position as budget chair. But while Sasser was enjoying his new national prominence, Republican candidates in Tennessee attacked his record in passing President Bill Clinton’s budget and raising taxes. While squabbling among themselves on an array of issues, the “six pack” of GOP candidates were unified in blasting Sasser as entrenched and out of touch. 

“Jim Sasser is a bleeding heart liberal, and who better to take him out than a heart transplant surgeon,” Frist said early in the race. 

As Republicans painted him as an old fashioned liberal, Sasser used his first TV ads of the campaign to stake out a favorite conservative issue — school prayer. The spot said Sasser repeatedly voted in favor of the idea. The turn toward conservative issues left Republicans unimpressed.

“Why, it’s like he’s a born-again Rush Limbaugh,” Tennessee Conservative Union President John Davies joked at the time.

As he saw his lead in the race slipping away, Sasser attacked Frist for his failure to vote until age 36 and for his family wealth. But in the end, Frist pulled off one of the biggest upsets in the country, a political neophyte defeating one of the Senate’s top leaders. 

Several planets aligned to give Frist the victory. He benefited from a huge Republican wave, and his consultants gave him the exact message to maximize his boost from it. Frist’s campaign was run by Georgia political mastermind Tom Perdue and fundraising efforts were supplemented by $3.2 million of the candidate’s own money — a large amount at the time.

Sasser’s campaign was not as smooth. He was hurt by having to stay in Washington while Frist hammered him at home. And Sasser’s messages that was really a conservative and that having a four-term incumbent would be good for Tennessee didn’t work.

Despite his three six-year terms in office, Sasser was only 58 when he left the Senate. President Bill Clinton later named ambassador to China in 1995. Admiral Joseph W. Prueher, a Nashville native, succeeded Sasser as U.S. ambassador to China in 1999.

Jim Sasser had first become active in the Democratic Party after working on Estes Kefauver’s 1960 Senate campaign. He served as chairman of the state party from 1973 to 1976. 

Sasser is survived by his wife, Mary. His son, Gray, followed in his footsteps by serving a term as state Democratic Party chair from 2007 to 2009.

“It is impossible to put into words how much Jim Sasser meant to me and my family,” said former Vice President Al Gore. “He was a man of outstanding character and conviction, a great United States senator and later an outstanding diplomat in the truest sense of the word. Throughout his career in public service, Jim represented the best of Tennessee and the best of America.”

Judge turns down bid to broaden abortion ban exceptions

Posted on by Tom Davies

The Gist

A county judge has rejected arguments that the health exceptions to Indiana’s near-total abortion ban are too narrow to comply with the state constitution.

Owen County Judge Kelsey Hanlon released a decision Wednesday denying a request from abortion providers for an order expanding those health exceptions and lifting the state’s ban on abortion clinic licenses. 

An appeal of the decision to higher courts is likely, but a Planned Parenthood spokeswoman told State Affairs that legal options were still being evaluated.

What’s Happening

The Indiana Supreme Court allowed the abortion ban law — adopted in 2022 as Senate Bill 1 — to take effect last year but left unresolved how broad the health exceptions needed to be under the state constitution. 

An attorney representing Planned Parenthood and other abortion providers argued before Halon in May that the law’s provisions allowing abortion to protect the life and health of the mother are unclear and leave doctors uncertain about their actions.

Hanlon, however, ruled that the providers “have not shown that S.B. 1 materially burdens the rights of any specific patient or well-defined class of patients to access constitutionally protect abortion care.”

Hanlon wrote that the ban’s opponents had presented “significant and compelling evidence” regarding the law’s impact on medical professionals but that she couldn’t substitute her policy preferences for those of the General Assembly.

The judge’s decision leaves the current law in place with no modifications.

The ban approved by the Republican-dominated Legislature in 2022 prohibits abortions at any stage, except in cases of rape or incest before 10 weeks postfertilization or to protect the life and health of the mother. 

Why It Matters

The abortion providers argued that the ban’s exceptions are too narrow to abide by the state constitution’s Article 1, Section 1 life and liberty protections.

The ban’s opponents wanted the health exceptions broadened to include mental health and numerous health risks that can be exacerbated by pregnancy. They also sought an injunction lifting the ban on abortion clinic licenses, arguing that so few hospitals provide abortions that access is severely limited even in circumstances that meet the law’s exceptions.

Hanlon cited “the legislation’s failure to account for the individual risk tolerance of physicians and patients” in their medical decision under the law, which allows felony criminal charges against a doctor performing an abortion that doesn’t meet the exceptions.

The judge, however, ruled that the Legislature had not overstepped its authority.

“Plaintiffs have not shown an instance where an abortion is necessary [judge’s emphasis] to treat a serious health risk but would also fall outside of the Health and Life Exception,” Hanlon wrote. “Additionally, Plaintiffs have not demonstrated that the Hospital Requirement is materially burdensome to constitutionally protected abortion access.”

Hanlon, who is special judge on the lawsuit filed in a Monroe County court, issued a preliminary injunction in 2022 blocking the abortion ban from taking effect as she ruled it likely violated the state constitution’s privacy protections. 

Hanlon’s injunction was later overturned by the Supreme Court with its June 2023 decision.

What’s Next?

It has taken a year or more for various legal challenges to the abortion ban to be taken up and decided by the state Court of Appeals and Supreme Court.

Planned Parenthood, the American Civil Liberties Union of Indiana and other groups fighting the ban didn’t immediately say Wednesday what they would do next, but maintained that Hanlon’s ruling “means that pregnant Hoosiers’ lives will continue to be endangered by Indiana’s abortion ban.”

“Already, Hoosiers with serious health complications have been forced to endure unjustifiable suffering due to miscarriages, ectopic pregnancies, and other pregnancy-related issues or leave the state to access appropriate care,” the groups said in a statement. “We will continue to serve patients as best as possible and work towards a future where patients and their doctors can make decisions without politicians in their exam rooms.” 

State Solicitor General James Barta, a top aide to Attorney General Todd Rokita, argued in May that the law allows doctors to apply “reasonable medical judgment” in deciding whether an abortion is necessary.

Rokita said in a statement that the abortion ban law was “reasonable and constitutional” as he cheered Wednesday’s court ruling.

“This is another huge win for life and no matter how many times Planned Parenthood tries to sue and push forward their culture of death, we will continue fighting for mothers, fathers and the unborn,” Rokita said.

Update: This story has been updated with additional details and comments.

Tom Davies is a Statehouse reporter for State Affairs Pro Indiana. Reach him at [email protected] or on X at @TomDaviesIND.

Opinion: You maybe don’t want to ask how we can balance our federal budget

Posted on by Michael Hicks

MUNCIE, Ind. — One glaring omission from both the Democratic and Republican platforms are substantive proposals to curb the deficit. To be fair, both platforms hint at the issue, but neither deals honestly with the challenge before us. The clear reason is that honesty is probably an electoral disaster for either party. For that, we must blame ourselves.

It is too early to know if compromise will happen after the next election, or if we’ll have to wait until things worsen enough to force compromise. Until then, it’s best to think about the magnitude of the problem and what types of policies might be a basis for a budget solution.

First, the current debt is not at crisis level, but our debt-to-GDP ratio is now high enough that it threatens long-term increase to our borrowing costs. It is akin to paying more of our monthly credit card bill in interest than on things we might wish to buy, like national defense, public health or infrastructure.

Right now, the federal government is spending about 23.3% of our GDP while collecting about 19.4% of GDP in tax revenue. That gap is about $6.5 trillion, or roughly $19,350 per citizen. It seems like we could easily cut spending — until you understand what we are spending money on.

We spend 28% on Medicaid and Medicare, 25.3% on Social Security and a further 22.2% on national defense, including veteran benefits. Those three things sum to 74.5% of our federal budget, but our annual deficit last year was close to 74.3%.

So, without cutting Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security or defense, we’d need to cut everything else, and that still would not balance the budget. But what would such a drastic step really mean?

Even if we stopped maintaining federal roads, closed all federal parks, cut all science funding, housing, education and agriculture subsidies, closed the FAA and fired air traffic controllers, ended pensions for all retired federal employees, abolished NASA and stopped all border enforcement, we still couldn’t balance the budget.

It is clear to most adults that nothing like that is going to happen. There aren’t votes to fire air traffic controllers, cut farm subsidies or let the interstate road system disappear. There aren’t places within the federal budget to make big enough cuts to close the annual deficit without deep cuts to defense, Medicaid and Medicare, or Social Security.

It is necessary to point out that we are spending less of our GDP on national defense — including aid to allies, like Ukraine — than at any time since the end of World War II. The “fat” in the federal budget is in the form of Medicaid, Medicare and especially Social Security. Any fix involves these programs and higher taxes.

Social Security has always been an intergenerational transfer from working adults to retired adults. This works fine if there is steady population growth of younger people relative to older people. But a large baby boom and longer life expectancy means the program collects too little money in payroll taxes. Medicare is much the same.

There are several ways to deal with these problems. The first is to boost payroll taxes by a percent or two. The second would be to make income taxes more progressive for Social Security recipients, exposing more affluent ones with higher taxes. Finally, we could collect Social Security and Medicare taxes on all income, not just the first $168,600 as we currently do.

None of these are ideal policies. All have costs and benefits, as well as winners and losers. So, this is an area ripe for political compromise.

The Medicaid program has more options. The Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare) ended up being a large Medicaid expansion with protections for preexisting conditions. So, it was neither as great as supporters claim nor as damaging as its enemies contend. 

However, it could be modified in ways to significantly improve the federal budget.

Medicaid could have an expanded co-pay system, like Indiana’s HIP 2.0. Also, the federal government could tax nonprofit hospitals for windfall profits.

The biggest savings in Medicaid would come from treating all states the same and ending the practice of rich states subsidizing poor states. Currently, individual states pay between 38.9% and 14.3% of their total Medicaid costs. The federal government picks up the remainder of the bill. Part of this huge difference is because states may choose to vary some aspects of their Medicaid offering. But most of the difference is simply that Medicaid’s formula pays more to states that are poorer.

If all states were required to pay the same share as the highest state share, the total federal cost of Medicaid would drop by more than $82 billion a year, or more than 10%. Of course, for many states, that is an eye-watering budget shock. Just hitting the national average would cost Indiana $1.03 billion per year, and matching the highest state level would cost taxpayers $2.75 billion per year.

It should be obvious why the Medicaid formula would be a ripe target for congressional compromise, but the real issue runs a bit deeper. Not only do rich states pay a larger share for Medicaid out of their own budgets, but also the progressive federal income tax collects a higher share of earnings from residents of richer states, like Massachusetts, New York and Connecticut.

So, rich states get a triple whammy on Medicaid. Their residents pay a higher federal tax and then get less back in Medicaid payments. This forces them to also raise state taxes to provide the same level of Medicaid to their residents as poor states.

For example, the average Illinois resident pays $91 more in state taxes each year to fund their state’s higher share of Medicaid than the average Hoosier. Illinois gets back a whopping $680 less per resident from the federal government for Medicaid than Indiana, while at the same time, the average Illinois resident pays $90 more in federal taxes than the average Hoosier.

Just to further complicate the issue, 24 of the 25 states with the lowest state share of Medicaid are firmly Republican, while 21 of the 25 states with the highest Medicaid share are firmly Democratic. So, I would expect every budget negotiation to include equalizing Medicaid payment share across states.

I have no idea where the discussion will end up, but it will undoubtedly be part of negotiations for the coming years.

Michael J. Hicks, Ph.D., is the director of the Center for Business and Economic Research and the George and Frances Ball distinguished professor of economics in the Miller College of Business at Ball State University. Contact him at [email protected].

Hagerty on Asia trip predicts Trump would take ax to ‘completely partisan’ Inflation Reduction Act

Posted on by Erik Schelzig

Republican U.S. Sen. Bill Hagerty of Nashville, a former U.S. ambassador to Japan, told South Korea business titans during a bipartisan Congressional visit this month there could be major changes to outgoing President Joe Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act if his one-time boss, Donald Trump, is elected president.

Provisions in the $300 billion law include incentivizing South Korean and Japanese companies to make huge investments in areas such as electric battery production on U.S. soil. 

In fact, Ford Motor Co. and South Korea-headquartered SK Innovation are currently constructing a $5.6 billion assembly and battery production assembly facilities for electric pickup trucks in Haywood County. The facility is called BlueOval City.

The state is providing close to $1 billion in incentives for the project. But production has been delayed due to lower-than-expected demand for electric vehicles. 

Seoul-based Maeil Business Newspaper reported Hagerty was asked whether an advanced manufacturing production credit based on the IRA would be maintained. He was quoted saying no Republican had voted for the measure and called it a “completely partisan product” that “led to levels of inflation not seen in 40 years in the United States. The relevant obligations and the size of subsidies have never been discussed in the U.S. Congress, so they will certainly be subject to review.”

Hagerty praised the Ford-SK Innovation project as it was announced by Republican Gov. Bill Lee in 2021. So did fellow Republican U.S. Sen. Marsha Blackburn of Brentwood and U.S. Rep. David Kustoff of Memphis.

“This historic investment by Ford and SK Innovation will bring good-paying jobs and incredible opportunities to thousands of Tennessee workers and families in West Tennessee, and throughout the mid-south,” Hagerty said at the time. “These two companies could have chosen any other state, but they chose Tennessee because they saw the advantages our state offers — a business-friendly climate, an incredible workforce, a logistics hub.”

Hagerty praised Lee and then-Economic and Community Development Commissioner Bobby Rolfe who formerly worked under Hagerty when he was the department’s commissioner and a vocal proponent of landing a major investor at the West Tennessee megasite.

Another South Korean company, LG Energy Solution, is a partner with General Motors on a new Ultium Cells electric vehicle battery plant in Spring Hill. And German automaker Volkswagen makes electric crossovers at its plant in Chattanooga.

Trump’s campaign issued a statement Tuesday saying Trump would “end the Biden-Harris EV disaster on Day 1” as president.

Still, it remains unclear how far Trump would actually go if he wins as well as what impact a second Trump presidency would have on electric vehicle production in Tennessee and elsewhere. 

The former president has spent time attacking Biden’s EV policies as “lunacy,” also calling for electric car supporters to “ROT IN HELL,” according to Politico. But he told attendees at an Atlanta rally he can be supportive of a “very small slice” of vehicles being electric.

“I have to be, you know, because Elon [Musk] endorsed me very strongly,” Trump said of the billionaire businessman who revolutionized electric cars with his Tesla company. Trump has said he will appoint Musk as head of an “efficiency commission.” Tennessee had pitched Tesla on building an assembly plant in the state before the company instead chose to locate the facility in Texas.

Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act into law in August 2022. He touted it a year later as a transformative move, calling it the largest investment in clean energy ever, representing “historic climate action” that also would create good-paying jobs while reducing costs.

Hagerty: ‘It hurts the U.S. Economy’

Yunhap News Agency quoted Hagerty as saying the law “hurts the United States economy. The mandates and subsidies are certainly going to be subject to review.”

Hagerty is said to be under consideration to join a Trump Cabinet as secretary or state or commerce should the former president win the election.

Senators met with SK Group, Hyundai, Samsung and LG Group in Seoul last week. U.S. Sen. Chris Coons, a Delaware Democrat, told reporters there that leaders of the companies had voiced “some concern” about the uncertainty.

Politico reported that Trump did not single out which programs he would seek to eliminate. The news organization reported that some Republicans in Congress are critical of the law’s funding for green banks and other programs. 

Some GOP leaders have expressed support for maintaining some of the law’s tax credits that support manufacturing in rural areas  that are home to large numbers of Republican voters.

Trump’s former trade adviser Robert Lighthizer has suggested that some of the law’s provisions, like those that support U.S. factories, could be kept in place under a second Trump administration.

SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won said the Korean conglomerate discussed ways to strengthen economic cooperation between South Korea and the U.S. a day earlier with the senators in Seoul and sought their bipartisan efforts to support Korean companies.

“SK Group has been setting up semiconductor ecosystems in both Korea and the US, and through this, we will be able to contribute to strengthening the two countries’ (artificial intelligence) leadership,” Chey said.

“SK’s energy business has also been growing at a global level,” Chey said. “The energy business including battery is very important for not only the economy but also security.”

Tensions are high in South Korea and the region with North Korea and China. 

PATTERSON: LABI is No Stranger to DC

Posted on by Jim Patterson

The Louisiana Association of Business and Industry, the state’s chamber of commerce and manufacturers association, is well known for its work at the Louisiana Legislature.

During its almost 50-year history, LABI has significantly impacted and changed the state’s political landscape. From its successful effort to obtain enactment of a right-to-work law in its first year of existence, to the present year, where it led the charge last session to improve education and insurance outcomes for the state, LABI has been a difference-maker in its endeavors to create a better business climate in Louisiana.

While the organization regularly garners attention for its state-level activities, it might surprise you to learn that it does not limit its focus to the home front. LABI is no stranger to D.C.

It has, for the last decade, conducted an annual Federal Outreach Tour that brings key federal stakeholders together with Louisiana’s business leaders to discuss a wide array of policy priorities, allowing them to acquire an inside-the-beltway perspective and express their views directly to Louisiana’s congressional delegation. This year’s trip is planned for November.

LABI appears every bit as impactful in Washington as it is in Baton Rouge. “Congressional staff always ask where LABI is on an issue,” according to Randy Hayden, head of Creative Communications, a public and governmental relations firm.

Hayden is frequently in the nation’s capital, meeting with Louisiana congressional members. “When you mention LABI, pens immediately come out and they start taking it all down,” he said.

LABI often partners with its national counterparts—the US Chamber of Commerce and the National Association of Manufacturers—to jointly represent Louisiana’s businesses on specific bills before Congress. This expands the group’s political muscle to influence the views of congressional members from other states. Currently, LABI is joining these groups in advocating for the extension of several of the provisions encompassed in the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017. The TCJA achieved a substantial modernization of the federal approach to taxing business income.

However, many of the TCJA’s tax reforms were enacted on a temporary basis and will expire at the end of 2025. Without congressional action, the expiration of these provisions will negatively impact businesses of all sizes.

For example, among the expiring provisions are the 20 percent deduction for qualifying pass-through business income, as well as a more favorable tax treatment of certain business expenses and investment costs, such as those in research and development.

As the organization approaches its 50th anniversary, it is more apparent than ever how much weight LABI’s voice, guided by its members’ thoughtful and insightful perspectives, carries in Washington—a source of great pride for Louisiana’s business community.

Jim Patterson is senior vice president for government relations with the Louisiana Association of Business and Industry.

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