Standing outside his office in the Kentucky statehouse Wednesday, Gov. Andy Beshear expressed concern over what he sees as the legislature passing “shell” bills without much oversight or time for review.
A shell bill is when a legislator presents a bill with minimal language, but when presenting to a committee, they will present a committee substitute with completely different legislation to take the place of the original bill.
Legislators on the committee must then decide whether or not to vote on the bill quickly — often leaving them little time to read the bill or giving the public time to understand legislation before either chamber votes on a bill.
“I have a concern that the General Assembly year in and year out has less transparency than it ever has when you have a shell bill with one or two words, and suddenly 140 pages are dropped during a committee, and people have to vote,” Beshear said.
The tactic gained statewide notoriety in 2017 when the Republican-led legislature attempted to sneak through an overhaul of the state’s teachers’ pension via a “wastewater” bill. After receiving two readings in the Senate as a wastewater bill, the bill switched to a pension bill on the third reading.
The Kentucky Supreme Court struck down the pension bill in 2018 because it violated the state’s constitution. The law was challenged by then-Attorney General Andy Beshear.
“The process deemed unconstitutional by the Supreme Court has been utilized for at least a half-century by both parties to pass critical legislation, and has never been challenged until now,” GOP lawmakers said at the time.
Beshear didn’t mention a specific bill Wednesday. Still, the inference was to Senate Bill 150 — an omnibus bill that bans gender-affirming care and is Kentucky’s version of a “Don’t Say Gay Law” that the American Civil Liberties Union called the “worst anti-trans bill in the nation.”
The legislation — which switched to multiple bill numbers and took a dizzying number of different forms in the final 24 hours — ended up jammed into Senate Bill 150, a bill that initially gave teachers the option on whether or not to use a students’ chosen pronouns.
The move to pass it started last week in the House when a surprise House Education meeting was called during lunch for Senate Bill 150 with newly added language similar to a law in South Dakota that bans puberty blockers, gender-affirming surgery, and cross-sex hormones.
Republicans then rushed the bill to the House floor, where a vote quickly took place, but not before Democrats spent nearly two hours trying to stall it.
“This shouldn’t be a trust exercise,” Beshear said. “Every legislator should have the time, as should the public, to read anything that’s coming up for a committee or for a legislative vote.”
Freshman legislator Rep. Lindsey Burke (D-Lexington) questioned whether the House Education Committee meeting violated the Open Records Act, which requires 24 hours notice before a public meeting — the House Education committee gave less than 10 minutes’ notice.
Burke asked the sponsor of the bill, Rep. David Meade (R-Stanford), who is also House Speaker pro tem and was carrying the bill through the House for the bill’s original sponsor, Sen. Max Wise (R-Campbellsville), if he knew that the House Education meeting “was held in violation of the Open Meetings Act.”
House Speaker David Osborne (R-Prospect) said she couldn’t ask that question because it wasn’t on the topic of the bill.
“There’s a reason we have an Open Meetings Law,” Burke said. “And it’s because this is not good government. This is not how we’re supposed to do this.”
After the bill passed both chambers, the Interim Director of the ACLU Kentucky said that the process undermines public trust.
“True democracy requires meaningful and informed debate and engagement from the public,” Duke said. “The shameful process on display in the Kentucky House undermines the public trust in government.”
Beshear didn’t say if he’ll veto Senate Bill 150 but instead focused on the fact that he is taking time to read the bills — something he said the legislature isn’t doing.
“It’s very important since that’s not happening anymore that we take the time to read each of these bills,” Beshear said.