Monday, March 18, 2024

The Tyranny of the law - Update

Update: AG requests a correction

Posted

I received an email from Attorney General Bob Ferguson’s office today claiming I had made an inaccurate statement in my column. Here is the substance of the email:

The writer incorrectly states that our office is asking the court to prohibit Mr. Eyman from all political activity. In fact, we ask the court to prohibit Mr. Eyman from participating in or directing financial transactions for any political committees. He was permanently barred from serving as treasurer for political committees in 2002.

I immediately attempted to contact the AG’s office but was not able to discuss the issue so I responded by email. In my return email I pointed out that I had listened to the entire court hearing held over a year ago in Olympia and it was clear from that hearing that the AG’s attorney was requesting that the judge refuse to allow Mr. Eyman to use his Constitutional protections as a defense. Here is the AG’s office response to my email:

Thank you for your prompt response. You write: " Ferguson wants a lifetime ban on Eyman for any future political activity."

The actual request, as written in the complaint linked in my previous email, is: "barring Defendant Eyman from managing, controlling, negotiating, or directing financial transactions of any kind for any political committee in the future."

If you would like to share your opinion as to the appropriateness of the relief, that makes perfect sense in the context of an opinion blog. I simply ask that the facts be stated correctly.

So, I stand by my opinion as originally stated. Whether they seek to prevent him from any political activity or just “managing, controlling, negotiating, or directing financial transaction of any kind for any political committee in the future.” The result is the same. He loses his constitutional rights to petition the government for a redress of his grievances.

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