Category Archives: State

State should not penalize parents

By Jonathan Small

Oklahoma, like most states, has a compulsory education law. If you don’t homeschool or send your child to a private school, you are required to enroll your child in a public school. Failure to do so means you can face fines and up to 15 days imprisonment on a third offense.

But if parents enroll their child in the “wrong” public school, they can face up to one year in jail.

Put simply, the potential consequences for neglecting a child’s education are far less severe than the consequences for trying to get your child in a safer public school with a better academic atmosphere.

Fortunately, one lawmaker wants to put an end to that mixed message.

Oklahoma Senator Ally Seifried
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Bill Would Require School List of Materials

By David Arnett

Sen. Warren Hamilton, R-McCurtain, filed legislation to ensure public and charter school libraries are free from inappropriate materials. Senate Bill 1208 would require each public school district and charter school to submit an inventory of their library materials to the State Department of Education each year.

In a statement today, Hamilton said, “Children are too often exposed to material that is explicit and not age appropriate, and the last place that should be occurring is in our state’s schools.

“This legislation would put safeguards in place to not only ensure that students are protected from reading or viewing inappropriate content, but that the school districts are held accountable for the availability of such materials,” Hamilton added.

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OU to Unravel Past in Anadarko Basin

By David Arnett

A team of researchers at the University of Oklahoma will explore the Permian sediment of Oklahoma’s Anadarko Basin, which contains dust deposits from Earth’s deep-time past. The Anadarko Basin includes the most complete continental record of low-latitude Pangea, enabling researchers to better understand the collapse of one of Earth’s greatest glaciations, a period of colder temperatures leading up to the largest extinction in Earth’s history.

The principal investigator of the research venture, known as the Deep Dust project, is Lynn Soreghan, Ph.D., professor in the School of Geosciences, Mewbourne College of Earth and Energy. The Deep Dust project was recently awarded a $2.3 million grant from the National Science Foundation and includes researchers from OU’s School of Geosciences, the Sam Noble Oklahoma Museum of Natural History, and the Oklahoma Geological Survey, including several early-career scientists. Several other universities are collaborators on the NSF project. Researchers include principal investigator Lynn Soreghan, Xiaolei Liu, Gilby Jepson, Sarah George, Rick Lupia, Jaqueline Lungmus and Molly Yunker.

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AG Drummond to Testify on Border Invasion

By David Arnett

Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond will testify Wednesday to the U.S. House Homeland Security Committee as part of that panel’s impeachment proceedings against Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. The action comes in the wake of Mayorkas’ failure to secure the nation’s southwest border. 

Drummond was invited to testify due to his focus of ridding Oklahoma of the foreign nationals who have invaded the marijuana industry. He is expected to tell committee members how the recent influx of illegal immigrants into the U.S. has allowed criminal enterprises, primarily populated by Mexican and Chinese nationals, to jeopardize public safety through drug trafficking and other crimes. 

“It is my honor and solemn duty to share with Congress how the porous border has grievously compromised the safety of Oklahomans,” he said in a release Monday. “Criminal illegal immigrants truly pose a threat to communities all across our state. They are not content with only growing black-market marijuana. They are producing and distributing fentanyl, and they are engaging in sex trafficking and labor trafficking. I believe it is time for some accountability in Washington, D.C.” 

Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond
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Rep. Gann Seeks Halt to “Verbal” Earmarks

By David Arnett

Rep. Tom Gann, R- Inola today announced the release of the “Verbal Earmarks Transparency Act of 2024” The Act, HB2967, will require state agency officials to disclose attempts by legislators to enforce “verbal earmarks.”

A verbal earmark occurs when a powerful legislator, such as an appropriation official, attempts to direct state agency officials on how to spend recently appropriated money. This practice contrasts with written earmarks, where the agency’s obligations are spelled out in an appropriations’ bill for all to see.

“All earmarks are always bad policy, through which non-meritorious pork projects take place; but, at the very least, written earmarks are visible to the public, and the people of Oklahoma can hold their legislators accountable for their vote. Verbal earmarks take this bad policy to a new level. This practice allows a few powerful legislators to direct the spending of state money, and worse, because this is done behind closed doors, the people of Oklahoma have no ability to know that the spending came at the request of a powerful legislator.

“The shady practice of verbal earmarks does a great disservice to the public, to the state agencies, and to the majority of legislators who have neither the inclination nor the means to participate in this shady practice,” Gann said.

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