Senate RINO Index Updated

Correction on Last Week's Senate RINO Index

  Stuff happens, 48 Senators and 28 bills that needed votes tallied, 1344 votes in all in the 2017 Oklahoma RINO Index for the State Senate. And one vote has been reported as wrong, Senator Nathan Dahm's vote on SB 120, the aerospace tax credit/corporate welfare bill. That is a 99.995 % error rating, probably better than we thought possible.

  Still Dahm's score was lowered by five points and correcting the vote restored him to his 100 score. In our defense Dahm had voted poorly on some of the bills that were left out of the Index and had there been just one wrong vote we certainly would have looked at it to triple check. Still this is a fine voting record in a year where leadership throughout the state was demanding more and more tax increases.

Bad Bills Part 3: The REAL Capitulation

HB 1845 is the REAL ID bill that forces Oklahoma into the federal identification card system.

The program is a privacy nightmare and unneeded. Worse, those promoting the scheme have long lied about the consequences of not having Oklahoma drivers licenses REAL ID compliant, claiming that you couldn't get on an airplane which is not true.

Here is a bill that was chosen for scoring the RINO Index,
& why this bill is bad for the average Oklahoman.

It is also a fee increase, adding $5.00 to the license fee, like the $5.00 they added to the tags last year, with the money siphoned off into Public Safety and two dollars to the tag agents. Even worse, this bill guts the state prohibition on REAL ID passed about eight to ten years ago. There is a clause stating that the state won't share biometric data of its citizen but there is an out for data sharing required by the feds.

Bad Bills Part 2: A Gotcha Tax After The Sale

HB 1449 creates a new tax on electric and hybrid vehicles. Electric vehicles will have $100.00 tacked on to the annual vehicle registration fee and hybrid vehicles will have $30.00 added the registration fee.

Here is a bill that was chosen for scoring the RINO Index,
& why this bill is bad for the average Oklahoman.

All vehicles should be paying something toward road costs but at the same time they give out incentives to buy these vehicles so one hand gives, the other hand takes away. If the incentive is bad, eliminate it. At this time there simply isn't that many of these vehicles to make enough difference to pay for the cost of the legislation.

Bad Bills Part 1: Department Of Harassment

HB 1427 allows the Oklahoma Tax Commission to create a new department and hire outside auditors to attempt to collect out of state sales tax payments. This appears to be an attempt to harass out of state vendors with Oklahoma customers with the idea of forcing these out of state vendors to collect sales tax or use tax.

Here is a bill that was chosen for scoring the RINO Index,
& why this bill is bad for the average Oklahoman.

If the out of state vendors comply with the auditors and hand over a list of shipments into Oklahoma that would cost Oklahoma companies billions of dollars in new taxes.

Not only is this illegal as federal law prohibits out of state taxation for products shipped into a state, it encourages the growth of government instead of the trimming back to core government functions. Not only that, but this law adds employees and expenses to the state budget.

2017 Senate RINO Index

2017 RINO IndexSenate List

  The 2017 RINO Index is really simple this year, a No vote is good, a yes vote is bad. That is because we focus on what legislators do wrong, not what they should be doing which is representing their constituents and voting on the good legislation. The major impetus this year was raising taxes, raising fees, and preserving special interest tax credits so that all of the legislation that was bad needed a No vote.  Each vote is worth five points, an E or Excused is a negative 2.5 points for missing the vote.

  Of the 28 bills that made our decision list we had one senator that voted right every time, Senator Breechen. We threw out six bills to weed the list down to an even twenty bills, choosing bills that some of the good guys had other opinions on. That is a challenge because some of them were bad bills but the larger the list the more a bad vote is diluted. Originally we used ten bills but that leaves a lot of bad bills behind. Then there were two bills out of the batch that the Senate didn't vote on.

  The higher the index number the more conservative the legislator. Anything below 70% is considered a RINO, Republican In Name Only.

Tulsa Republican Mens Club: June Meeting

Tulsa County Govt. Elects New Leaders

Come join us this month at:

• Oklahoma Joes (6175 E 61st St, Tulsa, OK), from 11:30 a.m. - 1:00 p.m. for another great meeting!

  Lunch is only $13, drink, tax, and tip (pay when you check in at our table in banquet room)  Membership is $20, Ladies $10, open to the public.  For a $25 membership you also get a shirt or hat!

To RSVP call Billie at 918-638-9977 or billiej86@cox.net.

(you can now pay with a credit or debit card)

...ask about being a sponsor!

Keep on Keep'n on, growing that is...bring a friend and lets fill the room again! 

Our guests this month is Tulsa County Court Clerk Don Newberry

and Tulsa County Clerk Michael Willis!

Oklahoma Joe's - Tulsa
6175 E 61st St
Tulsa, OK, OK 74136
RSVP:  Billie Bell 918-638-9977 or billiej86@cox.net

Considerations For The 2017 RINO Index

Legislation Being Considered for the 2017 RINO Index

Oh we were told that the budget would be cut and tax credits trimmed down to size yet what happened is new tax credit schemes and ultra low gross production taxes were extended and expanded in scope. While another billion dollars in new taxes or fees were added. Below is a list of bills that we are considering for the 2017 Oklahoma RINO Index.

HB 1427 allows the Oklahoma Tax Commission to create a new department and hire outside auditors to attempt to collect out of state sales tax payments. This appears to be an attempt to harass out of state vendors with Oklahoma customers with the idea of forcing these out of state vendors to collect sales tax or use tax. If the out of state vendors comply with the auditors and hand over a list of shipments into Oklahoma that would cost Oklahoma companies billions of dollars in new taxes.