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Senate Republicans adopted a joint resolution Wednesday pressuring Gov. Tony Evers to convene a special election to replace Secretary of State Doug La Follette who resigned last week. State law, however, does not require a new election.

The move comes after the governor appointed Sarah Godlewski, former state treasurer and unsuccessful U.S. Senate candidate, to fill the rest of La Follettes nearly four year term.

Senate Republicans balked at Evers appointment, claiming voters should have the chance to choose their own secretary of state in a special election.

The legislature is simply calling on the governor to exercise his authority to allow the people of Wisconsin to elect their next secretary of state, Sen. Majority Leader Devin LeMahieu (R-Oostburg) explained at Wednesdays floor vote. The people of Wisconsin did not vote for Sarah Godlewski.

Democrats defended the appointment, recalling former Republican Gov. Scott Walkers appointment of Rebecca Bradley and Dan Kelly to the State Supreme Court without ever calling a special election, and pointing to Godlewskis recent history in elected statewide office.

Gov. Evers did not pick a random person off the street, said Sen. Kelda Roys (D-Madison). He picked Sarah Godlewski, a person who was elected in her own right, statewide, served four years as state treasurer, and she won her election overwhelmingly in a Wisconsin landslide by 100,000 votes.

Shell do a great job, Evers remarked at a press conference Tuesday. Shes been part of the executive branch of government, and I trust her.

Republicans have also accused the governor of colluding with La Follette, the popular 82 year old incumbent and fellow Democrat, to resign and give the much younger Godlewski an incumbency advantage in 2026. Evers denies any such involvement.

I think the last I talked to Doug La Follette, I saw him at the inauguration, and I said Good speech, Doug, Evers explained.

Additionally, Evers noted there was no collusion.

He brought [to] my office a letter saying Im sick of this stuff. He left, I appointed a completely competent person to do the work and thats the end of that story, Evers added.

The secretary of state is a largely symbolic position, mainly responsible for safeguarding the states official seal.

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If a special election is not called, Godlewskis term will expire in 2027. She will likely face a reelection challenge from Republicans in 2026.

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Wisconsin Republicans recommend special election for secretary of ... - Daily Cardinal

On Saturday, March 25th, along northbound Highway 101, beginning at Parkway Drive, you may have seen men and women wearing hardhats and vests. The Del Norte Republicans participated in a statewide effort to clean up California one segment at a time.

The CalTrans sponsored event, Clean California Community Spring into Action, encouraged groups and residents statewide to participate in cleaning their communities.

Under the Adopt-a-Highway program, the Del Norte Republicans are responsible for keeping the segment along northbound Highway 101 between Parkway Dr and Highway 199 clean.

Garbage collected on the highway.

Our committee cares about our community. Keeping our stretch of the highway trash free is one way to give back. Being part of the community is important, not just during election season.

Thats why we, the Del Norte Republicans, have adopted one of the most littered segments in Del Norte County, Karen Sanders, chairwoman of the Del Norte Republicans, said during the event.

The Del Norte Republicans are responsible for cleaning their section of Highway 101 about 6 times a year. They average 13 bags of trash each time. If you are interested in helping in the future, please go to their website at http://www.delnorterepublicans.org and click the "Volunteer" button.

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Del Norte Republicans Participate in the Clean California ... - The Triplicate

Inspired by a reader from Salem, last week we launched a game to invent a new meaning for the acronym RINO. For years thats referred to Republicans in name only, but more recently the insults taken on a new level of viciousness.

Thats because Donald Trump vehemently hurls it at any Republican who publicly rejects his evidence-free claims that President Joe Biden stole the 2020 election. And certain Trump acolytes have begun emulating his behavior.

One is Del. Marie March, R-Floyd, who in a recent fundraising email blamed Richmond swamp RINOs for thwarting pro-gun legislation she introduced in the 2023 legislative session.

Artist Celeste Tethal desired a kinder and gentler word-set to describe her rational conservative friends whove turned their backs on 2020s sore loser.

People are also reading

I published Tethals challenge in the March 21 column. Readers delivered and kept me laughing all last week. Here we go with their suggestions, which number in the dozens.

Betsy Biesenbach of Roanoke, a longtime freelancer for this paper, was first out of the gate. Her RINO proposal hit my inbox at 5:44 a.m. the day of publication.

She offered, Rejecting [an] Insanity-Normalizing Organization.

Tom Gourley of Penhook proposed Reasonable Insightful Never [Trump] Organizers.

Narrows resident J. Lewis Webbs suggestion required neither an extra word nor article. He suggested RINO signifies Republicans Intelligent Not Outrageous.

Jim Lawrence of Blacksburg offered something close: Republicans Informed, Not Outrageous.

Roanoke Countys Jeanne Larsen proposed five slogans for RINO. The best two were Righteously Indignant Nutcase Opponent, and Reckon Im Not One-a-them.

(The retired schoolteacher also created a feminine-gendered version, RINA, which she said signifies Raving Idiots Neednt Apply and Reagans [ghost] Is Nearly Apoplectic.)

Christiansburgs Jeff Crowder came up with six suggestions. One was Republicans In [a] Nightmare Ongoing. Another was Republicans In Need Of (fill in the blank).

I filled that in, and got Republicans In Need Of Sanity. And now we have a nifty plural acronym, RINOS. Thanks, Jeff!

The farthest-away reply came from California and it was brutally cynical. Peter Kleinman of Oakland offered no suggestion. Instead, he chided the game as a childish exercise to even care how jerks demean each other. What a joy-killer, eh?

Blacksburg artist Sally Mook offered five proposals. One was Reasonable Individuals Nixing Obstructionists. A second one: Refuting Insipid Nefarious Oddballs.

Reality Is Not Optional

Three readers independently suggested RINO ought to mean Reality Is Not Optional. Theyre Gregg Williams, from the Hollins area of Roanoke County; Dr. Jim Reinhard of Salem; and Ed Vigen of Blacksburg. (Another suggestion, by Reinhard, stands out for its creative punctuation Really? Im Now Odd?)

Bob Miller, who said he lives in the (mostly) Democratic enclave of Blacksburg, came up with another nifty phrase for rational GOPers Republicans In Normal Orbit.

Ingeniously, he also coined a new acronym to describe party members recovering from years of QAnonsense, Trumpism and election denialism: Republicans Accelerating Toward Sanity, aka RATS.

Rick Barrow of Christiansburg devised Ruthless Ideologues Negating Officeholders. Accurately, that captures the actions of GOPers who marginalized and ultimately drove House Republicans Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger out of office, for participating on the Select January 6 Committee.

Salems Matthew Keele managed to work a hue into his suggestion: Right In Negating Orange.

Anne Hunt of Franklin County offered four word sets to describe those she characterized as Republicans who seem to be exercising freedom of thought. One: Republicans, Impartial, Nonpartisan, Open-minded. A second: Republicans, Independent, Not Owned.

Nancy Duval of Roanoke had a minor dyslexic moment when composing three different entries. They were: Really Observant Non Ignoramuses; Really Observant Non Idiots; and Rationally Opinionated Non Idiots.

Those are worthy efforts, except she confused the vowel order. Her ideas form the acronym RONI. When I brought that to Duvals attention, she replied, Well goodness gracious it was way too early in the morning I guess.

Whoops. Have another cup of coffee, Nancy!

Charles McLaughlin of Daleville suggested two clever definitions for RINO. One was, Reveres Institutions, Not Oligarchies. The other: Resists Ignorant Nutjob Opportunists.

Hardys Sandi Saunders devised Republican Integrity Not Obsolete.

Retching Inside, Nonplussed Out

Michael Holloway of York County had a few suggestions. Two of them were Relatively Intelligent Nonsense Opposers, and Republicans in Nostalgic Opposition.

Roanokes Phillip Coffey suggested Rallying in National Opportunity or Rightly Impressive National Orators, to describe traditional Main Street Republicans such as former presidents Dwight Eisenhower and George H.W. Bush and the late U.S. senator from Indiana, Richard Lugar.

Coffey, who worked in mental health treatment or 35 years, said if RINO was applied to Trumpers, it could signify Rightly Insane Nutty Opportunists.

My apologies to former patients in using those words, he added.

Vicky Rowland of Salem came up with Reliable Intelligent Notable Observer.

Katrina White of Salem offered Republican Incumbents Need Ousting. Steve Huppert of Christiansburg proposed Return Intelligence Now Obtrusively. And Debbie Warren of Blacksburg suggested Reduce Insults Now, Outlaws!

I also heard from one of Tethals conservative friends who shares concern for the level of disdain Trump has brought to the term RINO. Bill Hill said he knows Tethal through the League of Roanoke Artists, to which both belong.

I am one of her conservative Republican friends, although she has no reason to be aware of that, he wrote. I am one of those Republicans who cannot stand Trump (ditto Biden, of course).

DJT is scarcely a Republican or conservative at all. I have been both since my college days more than a half century ago. I have never voted for a Democrat, or contributed to any. Trump has bragged that he has at least contributed to some. He may be the biggest Republican in name only.

Hill added: Any discussion of conservative principle must begin with respect and loyalty to ones culture, community, country, constitution, and willingness to use compromise and party to keep the system afloat. It is my judgment that [Trump] falls far short of all these requisite standards.

Well wrap this up with one final redefinition for RINO, from Diane Rhody-Scott of Giles County. Hers may be an apt description for feelings Hill described: Retching Inside, Nonplussed Out.

Thank you, readers, for the fun and yuks. If you care to vote for any of these RINO explanations, drop another email to dan.casey@roanoke.com with the one you liked best.

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Many different definitions for Republican In Name Only - Roanoke Times

NEW YORK, March 23 (Reuters) - Manhattan prosecutors on Thursday said Donald Trump misled people to expect he would be arrested this week and prompted fellow Republicans in Congress to interfere with a probe under way into his hush-money payment to porn star Stormy Daniels.

On Saturday, the former president said he would be arrested on Tuesday in the probe by the Manhattan District Attorney's office.

On Monday, three Republican committee chairmen in the U.S. House of Representatives went on the offensive against District Attorney Alvin Bragg, a Democrat, accusing him of abusing prosecutorial authority and seeking communications, documents and testimony from him.

As of Wednesday, a grand jury hearing evidence in the Stormy Daniels case had yet to issue an indictment, and on Thursday Bragg's office sent the committee chairmen a letter seen by Reuters.

The letter said the chairmen's accusations "only came after Donald Trump created a false expectation that he would be arrested the next day and his lawyers reportedly urged you to intervene."

It confirmed that Bragg's office was "investigating allegations that Donald Trump engaged in violations of New York State penal law."

If indicted, Trump would be the first U.S. president to face criminal charges. He served as president from 2017-2021 and has mounted a third campaign for the White House while facing legal woes on several fronts.

Trump also faces federal investigations stemming from his handling of government documents after leaving the White House and alleged attempts to overturn his 2020 election defeat as well as a state-level probe in Georgia into whether he unlawfully sought to reverse the 2020 election results there.

Trump has said he will continue campaigning for president if charged with a crime.

The response on Thursday from Bragg's office said the three Republican House committee chairmen had sought non-public information about a pending criminal investigation, which is confidential under state law.

"The letter's requests are an unlawful incursion into New York's sovereignty," said the letter signed by the district attorney's general counsel, Leslie Dubeck. "Congress cannot have any legitimate legislative task relating to the oversight of local prosecutors enforcing state law."

The grand jury, made up of U.S. citizens residing in Manhattan, convened in January. Its proceedings are not public and prosecutors are barred from discussing them. It was not expected to meet again until next week at the earliest after media reports said it would not take up the case on Thursday.

Michael Cohen, Trump's former personal fixer and lawyer, has said he made the payment to Daniels days before the 2016 presidential election at Trump's direction.

Daniels, a well-known adult film actress and director whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, has said she received the money in exchange for keeping silent about a sexual encounter she had with Trump in 2006.

Trump has denied he ever had an affair with Daniels, and has called the payment a "simple private transaction." He has said he did not commit a crime and has called the investigation politically motivated.

Cohen pleaded guilty in 2018 to campaign finance law violations and other crimes related to the payment and received a prison sentence. Last week he testified before the grand jury, which is believed generally to meet on Mondays, Wednesdays and Thursdays.

Reporting by Karen Freifeld; Writing by Doina Chiacu and Luc Cohen; Editing by Tim Ahmann, Noeleen Walder and Howard Goller

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Thomson Reuters

Reports on the New York federal courts. Previously worked as a correspondent in Venezuela and Argentina.

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Manhattan DA: Trump created false expectation of arrest ... - Reuters

Members of the drag show community listen in during a meeting at the Texas Capitol on March 23, 2023, in Austin, Texas.

Photo: Brandon Bell/Getty Images

Given Republicans relentless legislative attempts to erase trans and gender nonconforming people, a new bill in Texas that LGBTQ+ advocates are describing as the drag bounty hunter bill may seem like a drop in the ocean. This fact alone is intolerable. There is, however, something particularly barbaric in the bills explicit encouragement of citizen harassment to drive gender variance out of public life.

The proposed legislation defines drag as any performance in which a performer exhibits a gender that is different than the performers gender recorded at birth using clothing, makeup, or other physical markers and sings, lip syncs, dances, or otherwise performs in a lascivious manner before an audience.

The inclusion of lascivious might suggest that the bill is only aimed at performances in venues that already exclude minors, like nightclubs. But given that Texas Republicans are at this very moment attempting to pass a law defining any venue that hosts a drag performance as a sexually oriented business including restaurants its clear that lascivious provides no limit to the bounty hunter bill.

If passed, the law is certain to shut down family-friendly drag events and library story hours, but it threatens all gender-nonconforming performers, and even events like Pride.

The bill is a rehash of a strategy used against abortion in the state. When Texas lawmakers passed Senate Bill 8 in 2021, effectively banning abortion in the state, they introduced a novel legislative approach for running roughshod over constitutional protections: sanctioned vigilantism.

The abortion law deputized private citizens to sue anyone suspected of helping a person obtain an abortion, with the promise of a $10,000 reward for successful cases. Since its passing, copycat laws have abounded, given the legislations ability to evade federal court challenges by relying on civil lawsuits. Now, Texas Republicans are seeking to use the same legal mechanism in their all-out assault on gender variance.

The drag bounty bill likewise encourages citizens to sue anyone who hosts or performs in a drag performance in the presence of a minor with the added allure of a monetary reward. Successful plaintiffs could receive as much as $5,000 in damages, up to 10 years after the event.

Across the country, even in New York City, far-right militias and other armed fascists have already made a habit of threatening family-friendly drag performances and story hours. The Texas bill grants the practice a vile authority and pulls from a long legacy of the government using state-sanctioned vigilantism to enforce white supremacy, gender conformity, and border rule.

The very nature of such base-catering legislation is to chill LGBTQ+ expression and embolden attacks against it. Even technically ineffectual laws have material consequences for public life, like the recently passed anti-drag law in Tennessee, which makes nothing illegal that is not already illegal.

Compulsory heterosexuality and gender conformity is so manufactured, so fragile, that it requires heavy policing and enforcement.

Like every new anti-LGBTQ+ law, the bounty hunter bill rests on the formulated far-right paranoia around drag performances and trans existence as sites of grooming and sexual predation. Underlying this anti-trans, anti-queer panic is the fact that compulsory heterosexuality and gender conformity is so manufactured, so fragile, that it requires heavy policing and enforcement both by the state and vigilante forces.

The same reliance on vigilantism has shaped most every aspect of the history of oppression in this country. Armed far-right groups on the U.S.-Mexico border have been active in brutal border enforcement for over 40 years, with a notable presence since Donald Trumps presidency. In recent years, racist vigilantes have hunted and captured hundreds of undocumented people attempting to cross the border, largely without retribution.The Texas GOP is currently seeking to codify the practice with the recent introduction of a vigilante death squads policy. The proposed legislation would create an official security force, comprised of both police and private citizens, to track down, arrest, and deport undocumented people.

The history of such violence is long, including the extreme, deadly brutality of the fabled Texas Rangers from the mid-19th century onward, who perpetrated extraordinary lethal violence against Indigenous and Mexican people to establish and maintain settler border lines. From the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, to many thousands of lynchings, to the vigilante violence on which Jim Crow rule relied, the U.S. government and law enforcement have embraced vigilantism through outright deputization or the granting of expansive impunity to uphold white supremacy. The porousness between far-right armed groups and police forces, as well as Republican elected officials, has long made this relationship all too clear.

Racist stand-your-ground laws, which permit citizens to use deadly force when they deem it necessary to defend themselves or their property, reliably uphold the white paranoia that the mere presence of Black men and boys constitutes a threat. What are such laws, then, if not the legal sanctioning of vigilantism?

And when it comes to the governments endorsement of anti-queer, anti-trans violence, consider the fact that the LGBTQ+ panic defense still remains on the books nationwide today, despite long and widespread protest. This legal strategy permits a defendant, even one accused of murder, to assert that their victims sexual orientation or gender expression is to blame for their violent response. A jury can, of course, outright reject such a defense, but the ability to deploy it in court unambiguously constitutes the legal acceptance of violence against gender nonconformity.

It is building on this legacy that the Republicans have turned to vigilante loopholes in new legislation to police bodily autonomy, when it comes to both reproductive freedoms and LGBTQ+ liberation. Such legislation continues to tell a right-wing story about for whom the U.S. exists those granted the permission to take up its violent powers, in the brutish image of the Texas Ranger.

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Texas Republicans Just Proposed a Bounty on Drag Shows - The Intercept