Voting Rights Lobby Day Brings Out Crowds and Moves us Forward!
Yesterday, KFTC members and allies filled the halls of Frankfort for our major lobby day to support HB 70, our proposed constitutional amendment to restore voting rights to former felons who have served their debt to society.
Three hundred of us were there, breaking most of us into small lobby teams to talk to senators about House Bill 70. We met with more than twenty senators total (of only 38), including many key meetings with leaders and committee chairs. We built more and more support among legislators, slightly moving many of them in the right direction.
At this point, we have the votes we need to pass the bill both in the Senate committee and the 60% we need to pass the full Senate. The primary obstacle to a victory is allowing the bill to be voted on in the Senate State and Local Government Committee, chaired by Senator Damon Thayer.
We met with Thayer with 13 people including 9 from his district, 2 religious leaders, 2 law students, and others with powerful personal stories.
They made strong arguments rooted in values like fairness, democracy, faith, and crime prevention - and rooted in real life experiences. When Thayer dismissed HB 70 by claiming we have a process to restore rights already, Charlie House stepped in to let him know that he's tried to get his rights back four times and has never succeeded.
Mostly, Thayer didn't make a reasoned argument at all, instead simply saying "no" without rationale. He explained to members that this is a Republic, not a Democracy, and he is elected to make decisions for the people using his own best judgment. Furthermore, he told us that as committee chair, he has the ability to decide which bills are allowed to be voted on and he has never allowed anything to come to a vote that he didn't agree with.
Our campaign is now strongly focused on just that point - putting pressure on Senator Damon Thayer to allow the bill to come to a vote - and also to put pressure on Senate President David Williams. We had a meeting in Thayer's hometown in Georgetown last night after the lobby day to focus on what we can do there. More on this in another blog post soon.
Our Voting Rights lobby day culminated in a powerful rally and included a lot of people who brought their personal stories about why we should restore voting rights:
Tayna Fogle – Former felon, Lexington
Charlie House – Former felon, Henderson
Jerry Moody – Brother of a former felon, Lexington
Rep Jesse Crenshaw – Kentucky Representative, Lexington
Gail Ray – Mother of a former felon, Georgetown
Maria Houghton – Former felon from Lexington – singing America the Beautiful
Carl Shoupe – Father of a former felon, Harlan County
Janssen Willhoit - Former felon, Lexington
We'll have some video from the event soon in the next few days.
Some local media pieces on the event:
Ashland Daily Independent Story
Look for another blog post soon about some next-steps.
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