Elon Musk may make KY lawmakers look like statesmen, but they’ve still got bad ideas | Opinion
Some good news for Kentucky: the Muskian chaos enveloping Washington D.C. right now is making our own General Assembly look relatively sane and statesmanlike.
But keep your eye on the ball — despite some good legislation, there’s plenty of insanity in Frankfort that should be opposed all the way to the session’s end.
Some are related, of course, our own version of DOGE and a bill to require the Ten Commandments in schools just to remind the little children that President Donald Trump has broken nearly all of God’s commands. (The religious freedom crowd never think they’re the ones we need protection from.)
Here are some more of the worst bills:
▪ There’s two things that really scare our GOP supermajority: Black people protesting and LGBTQ people protesting. Between Breonna Taylor’s death in 2020 and the debate over Senate Bill 150 in 2023, legislators still haven’t forgotten how scared they were. It seems the only good public debate is quiet public debate. House Bill 399 would allow legislators to order police to arrest protesters whom they believe are “disrupting the business of the General Assembly.”
Given how few public comments are allowed in committee meetings these days, pretty soon, the public will be stopped at the front door. No people, no problems.
▪ The Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Fan Club bills: Senate Bill 177 would ban anyone under 18 from getting a COVID vaccine, even if the parents wish their children to get one. Because freedom.
And speaking of freedom, the House has passed House Bill 16 to make fluoridation of public water systems a community choice because as Rep. Mark Hart, R-Falmouth pointed out: “Water fluoridation is a medical treatment without consent.”
Of course, the Center for Disease Control said fluoride is a “cornerstone strategy” for reducing tooth decay, particularly in children, and because of this, one of the “10 greatest public health inventions of the 20th century.”
Kind of like measles vaccines.
But hey, as our economy tanks amid Trump’s trade wars, there are going to be some very prosperous dentists around Kentucky.
▪ The Let’s Go Back in Time bills ... oh hang on, these all go back in time. The Let’s Go Back to 1963 and Take on The Pointy-Headed Academics Who Got Us in This Mess bills to end DEI and tenure.
It’s brilliant framing to portray a way to mend historic injustice as the injustice itself just so you can pretend you’re not racist.
On the one hand, if it makes Republicans feel good to force a lot of universities to change department names with House Bill 4 so be it. If they use this to go after Black employees, as Trump is doing, and Black history and curriculum, then we have another problem altogether.
Same for House Bill 424, which would add more evaluations for university faculty, a thin end of the wedge for losing tenure. First off, tenured faculty are reviewed, and second, tenure actually provides the freedom to do the kind of scholarship that may not be popular with, say authoritarian governments.
▪ But while we’re trying to control what people say and do, let’s go to our public libraries, which definitely need more politics on top of book banning efforts in recent years.
Senate Bill 71 would give county judge-executives more authority to appoint county library board members. It seems like a bad idea to let people who, say, don’t think systemic racism exists, be in charge of buying books that explain what systemic racism is.
But maybe that’s just me.
▪ Because the We Know Best lobby is loud and strong. You may have been taught that the three branches of government are equal. But that’s not true. According to the GOP supermajority in the General Assembly, the legislative branch is the most powerful. Unless you’re in Washington, D.C., and then the executive branch is.
Please, someone make it make sense.
Anyway, House Bill 6, “disallows state agencies from taking action that isn’t explicitly authorized by the Kentucky General Assembly if it costs more than $500,000 over two years.”
▪ Then there’s the DISTINCTLY NOT FUNNY part of the program: The sponsor of House Bill 495, which would have protected conversion therapy, replaced the original bill with language that not only protects a discredited practice aimed at “changing” gay kids, but also nullified Gov. Beshear’s executive order banning tax dollars for the practice. As my colleague Alex Acquisto writes, “conversion therapy, also known as reparative therapy, hinges on a belief being LGBTQ is a condition that must be cured or corrected. It’s opposed by all major medical associations, including the American Psychiatric Association, which reaffirmed its opposition to the practice in July 2024, saying “conversion therapies lack efficacy and may carry significant risks of harm.”
Once again, these bigoted culture wars do not help Kentucky, they only show us the kind of people we have in elected office.
There are some good ideas in Frankfort these days: a bill to create independent birthing centers and a bill to allow churches to build affordable housing, to name a few.
But we have come too far to start doubting vaccines and fluoride, having politicians run librarians, or telling gay kids something’s wrong with them.
As repetitive as it sounds, call your representatives and tell them so. You can leave a message at your legislator’s office by calling 1-502-564-8100 or by going here: https://apps.legislature.ky.gov/Legislators/contact_legislator.html
This story was originally published March 6, 2025 at 7:00 AM.
