On April 30, U.S. Rep. Pramila Jayapal, a Democrat representing Washington's 7th Congressional District, put forward an amendment to a budget bill in the House Judiciary Committee that would have prevented funds given to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement from being used to detain or deport a citizen. "Whether you're a Democrat or a Republican, I hope we can all agree that U.S. citizens should never be detained by ICE or any agency conducting civil immigration enforcement," Jayapal told fellow committee members. Jayapal cited examples like U.S. citizen Jose Hermosillo, 19, who was detained in Tucson for 10 days by immigration officials. In a press release, the Washington State Democratic Party chair, Shasti Conrad, criticized the no vote by Republican committee member Rep. Michael Baumgartner, who represents Washington's 5th Congressional District. "Rep. Baumgartner's inaction and fealty to this administration over his oath to uphold the Constitution is an affront to the hard-working people of Eastern Washington," Conrad said. Baumgartner says he doesn't think citizens should be detained, which is already illegal, and said this "was just a nuisance amendment meant to slow down the process." (VICTOR CORRAL MARTINEZ)
PIPE DREAMS
In 2017, the Air Force discovered its firefighting foam had contaminated groundwater in Airway Heights with copious amounts of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS — toxins so persistent they're nicknamed "forever chemicals." For the past eight years, city and county administrators have been trying to figure out what to do. On April 29, Spokane County Commissioner Al French announced that the state awarded Spokane County a $7.5 million grant to install filtration systems in areas with the most PFAS contamination in the West Plains. Spokane County, the Spokane Regional Health District and the Washington Department of Ecology will work together to identify the hardest hit areas. The county's original request to the Legislature was $18.5 million, but "it's reassuring to know that even in a tight budget, the personal health of our citizens is a shared priority," French said in a press release. French is still committed to finding a way to pipe water into the West Plains. (ELIZA BILLINGHAM)
MANDATED DISCRIMINATION?
Last week, the U.S. Department of Education and Department of Justice announced an investigation into the Washington Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction, alleging that the state agency's gender-inclusive schools law is a violation of Title IX, the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, and the Protection of Pupil Rights Amendment. "Washington State appears to use its position of authority to coerce its districts into hiding 'gender identity' information from students' parents and to adopt policies to covertly smuggle gender ideology into the classroom," U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon states. Districts including the Mead School Board sent letters to the federal government complaining that state and federal policy on transgender students conflict. The districts argued that if they followed state law, they'd violate President Donald Trump's "Ending Radical Indoctrination in K-12 Schooling" executive order and lose federal funding, or they'd lose state funding by following federal rules. "In this alarming attempt to infringe on the rights of our transgender and gender-expansive students, the Department is trying to co-opt laws enacted to protect students from discrimination and distort them into mandated discrimination," Washington schools Superintendent Chris Reykdal states. (COLTON RASANEN) ♦
