Gov. Kevin Stitt Holds Oklahoma State Legislation Press Briefing

4 months ago

On Friday, Gov. Kevin Stitt (R-OK) held a press briefing.

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Transcript

00:00 Hello, everybody. Happy, happy, signy die to everyone. This has been, it's great. This

00:14 is our last press conference of the year. And so I've enjoyed chatting with everybody

00:18 every Friday and getting to know everybody better. And so hopefully it's been helpful

00:22 for you. You know, I'm still disappointed. We, as you know, there was a couple of nominees

00:31 that didn't get over the finish line. And so I think that's something that Oklahomans

00:35 need to understand. There's some weird stuff happening on that. Heather Turner was a great,

00:41 great Oklahoman, ran the Jenks Chamber of Commerce. She didn't get confirmed as our

00:46 Commerce Secretary, excuse me, Commerce Director. Dr. Cori Finch, a medical doctor, great Oklahoman,

00:56 veteran, did not get confirmed as the Secretary of Health and Mental Health. Deb Shropshire,

01:03 she's also a medical doctor, has worked at DHS for, I don't know, 15 years, did not get

01:08 confirmed as the Secretary of Human Services. Susan Bergen, great Oklahoman, rancher, agricultural,

01:19 just very, very successful agricultural person. And Susan did not get confirmed as the OSU

01:26 new regent. Alex Gray did not get confirmed for the state school board, or state education

01:36 board, higher education board. Leah Gattis did not get reconfirmed. She was already on

01:41 the Wildlife Commission, didn't get reconfirmed to be on the Wildlife Commission. And then

01:47 Audrey Cadigan did not get confirmed for the Libraries Board, which I didn't think the

01:54 Libraries Board was a really controversial board, but somehow something happened on that

02:00 board as well. But it's been a productive session. We started out the session by passing,

02:08 which I'm really, really happy about. I was talking about it in 2019 when I first became

02:12 governor and it was to eliminate the grocery tax. As you know, we were one of only 12 states

02:17 that taxed groceries and very regressive tax, disproportionately hurting people in the lower

02:24 income bracket. And so we're excited to get that across the finish line. That got done

02:28 early, early on, and we're excited to get that implemented. Also had some of our priority

02:35 bills get done this session. The first one was the Women's Bill of Rights, and that was

02:42 kind of codifying my executive order. So I was really excited to get that one done. We

02:47 set up the framework for business courts. And you've heard me talk about that before.

02:53 And for Oklahomans that haven't heard me, I want Oklahoma to be the most business-friendly

02:58 state in the country. And if we do that, that is going to help our economy. That's going

03:01 to help education, healthcare, infrastructure. It's going to help our state grow. It's going

03:06 to help wages increase. And so we just put the framework together for business courts.

03:12 We're seeing other states stumble. You see what's happening with President Trump and

03:16 the court system in New York, which I thank everybody. This is going to have a huge long

03:21 tail with businesses fleeing New York when they see what they can do to someone up there

03:27 in that court system. It's just unjust. It's unbelievable. And so you see Delaware stumbling,

03:33 and I want to make sure that our businesses know they're protected in the state of Oklahoma

03:37 from out of control, weaponization of district attorneys, attorney generals. We want to make

03:45 sure that we, the people know that they're safe in the state of Oklahoma. Choosing Child

03:50 Mirth Act was also a priority. The felony reclassification, this is a huge, huge win

03:57 for Oklahomans. Obviously, criminal justice reform is something that I've been passionate

04:02 about since I came into office in 2019. We were last place when I was running for governor

04:07 in incarceration rates. We incarcerated more men and women than any other state. And so

04:12 we went about looking at some of our policies, and now we're 40th. We've saved the taxpayer

04:17 hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars by locking up people that we're actually afraid

04:23 of, not just who we're mad at. And so this classification is something that other states

04:28 have done it. Texas went through this, but it was a huge battle. We've been working on

04:32 it for years. And I want to specifically give a lot of kudos to Representative Osborne.

04:38 He did an amazing job of working with district attorneys and working with all the groups

04:43 to get our classification A, B, C, D on crimes. And there's still some work to do, but also

04:50 narrowing the ranges of sentences. I think most Oklahomans would agree with me that it's

04:55 really weird for the same crime to be punished 40 years in one county and one year in another

05:02 county. So we're trying to limit those ranges and actually determine what the punishment

05:06 should be, and then make sure that it kind of is across the state of Oklahoma. So C and

05:12 Ds, we actually got some ranges. We got the ranges kind of in line. A and B crimes are

05:19 still going to work on next year, but Osborne did an amazing job. Senator Rader, also want

05:24 to give him a lot of kudos and shout outs for working on that. Just did a great job

05:29 of bringing people together. So really glad we got that across the finish line as well.

05:33 But with that, let me open it up to questions and comments, what you'd like to hear more

05:37 about. With those, you said they're on a [INAUDIBLE]

05:45 Yeah, so basically they're fired from their jobs. So the governor appoints people. The

05:51 governor's job, like Kevin Corbett, for example, was in the job as Secretary of Health for

05:58 five years, and it wasn't confirmed last year. We put Cory Finch up, Dr. Finch. And so he's

06:05 been running that, advising the governor, meeting with that agency. And I don't know

06:11 exactly how long he's been on the job, but he can no longer work. And so the governor

06:16 will appoint another person. So we'll appoint new people to all these different positions.

06:22 But what's hard is it's, man, it's hard to find the right people. And if anybody's ever

06:27 hired someone, having to recruit and go through the interview process, finding the right people

06:32 with the right acumen. And then the Senate's job is to confirm those, advise and confirm,

06:41 I think is what it says. And so as long as they don't have criminal backgrounds and they

06:47 generally are moving in the right direction, that's the job, is just to make sure that

06:50 they're good Oklahomans and they meet all the qualifications.

06:54 It's not to pick on-- and I'll move on to commerce for a second. Commerce has been leaderless

07:00 now for about 18 months. Last year, they fired the person that we put over that. And so I

07:09 don't know exactly what they're looking for, but my job is to nominate the very best Oklahomans.

07:13 And I'll go back to the drawing board and we'll hopefully get in the month of June,

07:17 we'll get some other people back up to run these agencies and advise the governor on

07:22 these very, very important things as we're running the executive branch. But hopefully

07:26 Oklahomans understand what's happening and they have to call and ask their senator what

07:30 they had against Heather Turner or Dr. Cory Finch and what the reason was there.

07:36 [INAUDIBLE]

07:37 Yeah, I think-- and I've received a lot of texts. And as most people are, that was probably

07:49 the conversation around most of the dinner tables last night and it will certainly be

07:53 today. It's kind of occupying a lot of the news right now. In one sense, when you hear

08:01 somebody is convicted of 34 counts of something, you're like, man, they must have done something

08:07 really, really wrong. But when you really drill down and you realize what's happening,

08:13 people are starting to really question and start being--

08:16 Governor, you have a lot of decisions to make. I can't say the next 15 days, but if I'm not

08:23 mistaken, you've decided to veto or sign or talk of vetoes or bills sent to you in the

08:30 last five minutes, you have a lot of bills. I asked you a little bit yesterday about the

08:34 commerce reforms, right? They want to split commerce into two divisions. I'm curious your

08:39 thoughts on that as it relates to-- they will confirm your appointee, but if they want to

08:45 do that, they can do that. And also, you're from Tulsa. There's a bill sent to you regarding

08:54 liability for the application of poultry lease. And this is a major issue. The state has questioned

09:03 this bill. Limit that liability. Limit the landowner's right to sue if they are following

09:09 a management plan by the state. I know you support agriculture, but I also know your

09:13 business is based in the Tulsa area. The city of Tulsa is very opposed to this. And as a

09:19 landowner, I'm sure you may have thoughts on your own rights to sue if somebody has

09:25 impacted your land. So I'm curious your thoughts on all those bills. Anything you may have

09:29 decided on already or want to ask about?

09:33 So we do. We have 14 days to review them. I think we got 90 bills yesterday, something

09:39 like that. Our team's going through all those right now. As far as the commerce bill, we'll

09:44 dig into that more. But if there's great reform, and I think one of the parts of that bill

09:50 is they put a committee together, five House members, five Senate members, to review big

09:55 projects, it's a great idea. We have no problem with that. And so generally, I'm OK with that.

10:02 But I think the real question is, yeah, I mean, why not confirm Heather Turner? So now

10:09 we're going to go out and we're going to do our best to find the next Heather Turner.

10:12 And Heather was the Jinks Economic Development, one of the fastest growing cities in our state.

10:19 And hopefully we can find another great person to put up and start running that agency until

10:24 next May. And then we'll hopefully get the next one across the finish line. So I'll review

10:31 that bill. But generally, no problem with it. There's better ideas. I mean, I've even

10:36 considered privatizing the Commerce Department. Other states have done that and do a public

10:40 private partnership and really get that out of state government and pay people based on

10:45 performance. Right. So they pay them based on what type of deals they bring into the

10:50 state. So if there's reform and there's things that we want to do, we're generally OK with

10:56 that. The poultry bill, I've already signed it. Very excited about that bill. It's one

11:01 of the one of the reforms that we've been looking for for a long time. And basically

11:06 just so Oklahomans know what that means is if you have a permit to have a chicken farm,

11:13 for example, and in a poultry house and this is what you do, this is your living and you

11:17 follow in all the rules that your permit says, then you're immune from someone coming in

11:24 and saying, well, you should have done something different. The rules weren't strict enough

11:28 or this or that. If we want to change the rules in Oklahoma, change the rules. But you

11:33 can't have a business, have a permit doing what they're supposed to do and then come

11:39 in and let a frivolous lawsuit take place and somehow put them out of business. That's

11:44 that's that's un-American. It's not going to happen in Oklahoma. So for those reasons,

11:49 I signed that bill. We had an attorney, former attorney general that sued the chicken industry,

11:55 even though they were following all the rules at the time saying they should have done something

11:59 different. Took 13 years and this attorney general brought this lawsuit back up. And

12:04 so hopefully this will settle this once and for all. If you have a permit and you're doing

12:09 what the state says you should do in my in my movie, that is that's what you should be

12:15 doing. And so for those reasons, I signed the bill and but it also increased the fines.

12:21 If you're not doing what you're supposed to do, then the Department of Ag should hammer

12:26 you for that or you should be held accountable for not following the rules on your permit.

12:31 So that's that's that's what that bill said. I was glad to get it across the finish line.

12:36 I wanted to ask about the budget this year that is supposed to be part of your contract

12:49 that the Walters signed for the bookings. The agency says that it can touch a lot of

12:58 different things while their operations are broad as it relates to promotion and public relations.

13:05 So I'm just curious if you were concerned to see something like that in the budget.

13:10 That's something you would want to talk to. I'm just curious to hear your thoughts.

13:15 Yeah. So I mean, we're in the weeds and I always try to explain to Oklahoma what's happening.

13:20 But but generally, if someone's using state resources, not generally, if someone's using

13:27 state resources for self-promotion, that's wrong. We want to stop that. The first my

13:31 first executive order when I came into office in 2019 was to ban lobbyists from state agencies

13:38 hiring lobbyists. So I may do a new another executive order to stop state agencies from

13:45 hiring outside PR firms. I don't like it. I don't like it. But I also don't like picking

13:50 on one executive agency or one Department of Education. And if there's a rule that's

13:56 good for one agency, maybe let's have it across the board for all state agencies. And so let's

14:02 not pick on just one agency. So we're still reviewing that. It's part of the budget. It's

14:07 part in some kind of limits bill. And so we're looking at that. I know that that was a very

14:12 controversial piece of legislation on the floor. So we're still reviewing it. But do

14:17 I. There's no possible way I want state dollars being spent to promote. And if you've got

14:24 a comms department in your shop and in your state agency, why don't we hire PR firms?

14:29 I think it's a waste of taxpayer money all the way all across the board.

14:33 Speaking of the education department, you're probably aware that the Board of Education

14:40 approved several administrative rules and proposals. The legislature did not bring them

14:45 up for a vote. That's a policy you need to determine if they're approved or disapproved.

14:52 What do you think about that? When might you decide or act on that?

14:57 I think on those and that it comes to me in a resolution format. So we have longer than

15:02 the 15 days to act on them. So we have, I think, 20, 25 days or so. We're still reviewing

15:07 all those. But I know that we all want to improve education. We believe in accountability.

15:16 But as far as the details of those bills, I'm still going through those. Our teams are

15:19 going through them. But yeah, the legislature did not act on them. And so those are on our

15:24 desk. And we will have a response here over the next 20 days or so.

15:29 Yesterday, House Democrats criticized the budget saying, "You left a billion dollars

15:34 on the table."

15:38 The Democrats said we wanted to spend another billion? Is that what you're saying?

15:42 That's what they said. They said, "You left a billion dollars on the table."

15:46 Do you have plans to, you know, the income tax cut does not make it across. Do you have

15:51 plans to call them back in for a special session? Are you waiting, you know, new leadership

15:56 in the House and Senate next year?

15:58 If I could call the Democrats back in and get a tax cut, I would do that tomorrow. But

16:04 I find it interesting that the Democrats are saying we left a billion dollars on the table.

16:09 Listen, government's not the answer. Actually, most of the time, government is the problem.

16:14 We want to get government out of people's lives, creating more government. You guys

16:18 have heard my speech on this all the time. So no, we did not. We overspent again.

16:25 We've got to keep spending around where our revenue is, but we also have to keep where

16:30 we've got to keep a healthy savings account so we don't put ourselves in a bad situation.

16:34 So yeah, I'm sure politicians can think of 100 things to spend taxpayers money on.

16:40 I'm not one of those. I think we should give that back to the taxpayer in the form of a

16:44 tax cut. And but I would want we ask those same Democrats, what do they want to tax people?

16:51 How much is how much is enough? How much spending is enough? And so we still spent too much,

16:58 but so happy that we still have a great savings account. Our economy's our economy's booming.

17:03 We passed some great legislation to continue this momentum as the most business friendly

17:07 state and very optimistic. I mean, people are looking looking to Oklahoma because as

17:13 much as we're spending, California is spending a whole bunch more than us. And so we're looking

17:17 really good.

17:18 Right now, it looks to be established.

17:24 Change. Is real.

17:29 Yeah, I'm not familiar with that bill. But as far as our support for Israel, 100%, we

17:38 support Israel. And, you know, anything we can do there, our biggest, biggest and best

17:44 ally in the Middle East and the democracy over in the Middle East that they just think

17:49 the way that we do. And we want to be supportive of them. So beyond that, I don't know exactly

17:54 what that bill does.

17:59 Well, in our executive in our in our executive order, we had every agency appoint an AI designee

18:19 to kind of walk through and make sure we're we're we're we're coordinating the AI for

18:24 that agency. And then we're letting our chief information officer know how we can implement

18:28 a AI through the agencies to make government more efficient. As far as having an overall

18:34 AI expert, that's something I'll talk to the to the IT team to see if we need to do that.

18:39 There's no plans that I know of to do that at this point. But but yesterday was a great

18:43 announcement. We have Google coming in to help us on workforce. They're training about

18:46 10,000 Oklahomans for free. And that's something all for our young people out there and for

18:51 people watching. You know, there's some tools that you can get retrained and AI is an emerging

18:57 industry that's going to continue to disrupt every part of business where the manufacturing,

19:04 agriculture, the education space, call centers. And the more you can get familiar with that,

19:10 I think the better off and the more marketable your skills are. So I just encourage people

19:15 and Oklahomans to take advantage of those tools. And that's certainly something that

19:20 we're pushing throughout state government.

19:22 Yeah, you know, super, super disappointing. And I think Oklahomans need to need to understand

19:39 this. It's a it's a short term win. Right. So think about this for a second. I could

19:45 have signed that bill and taken a victory lap and and yeah, look, I'm supporting law

19:50 enforcement. Everybody knows I support law enforcement. But here's the facts of that

19:55 bill of what it actually does. We there's our way. If you're a police officer, you get

20:02 75 percent of your income for life. When you retire, you get 75 percent of it. They make

20:10 about some of the larger municipal law enforcement makes one hundred and sixteen thousand dollars

20:17 a year. That's a lot of money where I come from. Eighty seven thousand dollars a year

20:22 you already get for life. OK, this bill took it to 90 percent, 90 percent. So now you're

20:29 going to get 90 percent of your income. The argument was was going to help with recruiting.

20:34 Let me ask you a question. If I can retire right now and get 90 percent of my salary,

20:41 that incentivizes me to retire early. If I had to, if I could only get 75 percent of

20:46 my retirement, I would say, well, Sarah, man, we have to replace 25 percent of our income.

20:51 Maybe I should work for a few more years. Yes. She would tell me, absolutely. We're

20:54 going to keep you working. But if I can get 90 percent of my salary, it's going to encourage

20:59 me retirement now. So that's on the practical side. So but what people don't realize is

21:05 next year, guess what? The firefighters are going to want 90 percent. The teachers are

21:11 going to want 90 percent. Highway Patrol wasn't in this deal. They're going to come back and

21:16 want 90 percent. This is exactly what happened. There's a great national article on this that

21:21 that was talking about this exact same thing. California did this exact same thing when

21:26 their pensions were in good shape. They took them from 75 percent to 90 percent. Guys,

21:33 if there's no limit on government spending, take them to 100 percent. How about 110? It's

21:38 not fair that you have any deduct when you retire. Right. Let's say 100 percent. The

21:42 private sector can't compete with that. OK. And so the problem is we're going from 75

21:48 percent to 90 percent. So it's disappointing. But again, it's a short term win. And when

21:54 you have people that are politicians looking for the short term win, looking for the endorsement

21:58 from law enforcement as I run next time, then you vote that way. OK. And that's why Oklahomans

22:05 voted for me, because I'm the businessman governor and they know that I don't just go

22:09 along to play the political games. And so I even think it's the best politics. I think

22:14 Oklahomans understand they're too smart for those those little flyers that get mailed

22:19 out that say, oh, he's not for police or he's not for this or he's not for that. They know

22:24 when you're fighting for them. And so anyway, it got overridden. That's the law. Now, law

22:32 enforcement, the municipal law enforcement. But more than that, the pension, the retirees

22:37 think about this. The retirees that wanted a cola cola is like a cost of living adjustment.

22:43 Let's say I retired and I retired 20 years ago. And when I retired, I only had 75 percent

22:49 and I get forty five thousand a year. So that's what salaries were 20 years ago. Well, occasionally

22:53 I'd want a cola. I want a 3 percent increase. Well, you can't do a cola if the pension funds

22:59 don't have the money in them. And so all the new guys that are three years from retirement

23:04 or one year that are at the top of the helm that get to hire the lobbyists to come in

23:08 here and pass this legislation, they love them. But all the retirees, they can kiss

23:14 their coal is goodbye for probably, I don't know, 20, maybe forever, because if the pension

23:19 funds take a turn like like I think they will, then there won't be money for coal. And so

23:25 anyway, short term gain politically today, long term problematic for taxpayers in Oklahoma.

23:32 It's the Pop Museum. Probably. I think that's in the budget negotiation. So I agree with

24:01 that. I agree not to veto certain things that we agreed on. And I'll stick with my word

24:06 on that. The museum in Tulsa, I think it was in it was it was a bill last year. They're

24:13 funding it this year as long as Tulsa can privately fundraise the matching funds for

24:19 that. And so we're probably going to get that across the finish line. I don't know exactly

24:23 where that's at or if I've signed that one yet, but that was one that's probably going

24:26 to go forward. It's part of that budget negotiations. You know, we agreed not to veto the things

24:45 that we agreed were in there on. So if there's things that are added later on, yes, we think

24:51 that's a fair game and we'll look at that closely. But the deal that we cut on that

24:56 Wednesday is whatever was agreed upon at that point, we were not going to veto that budget

25:01 in exchange for some of the business court, some of the business friendly items that we

25:04 were able to get in the in the agreement as well. So we're still looking through that

25:08 to see if was there anything added on that was not part of our agreement on the day we

25:13 agreed to it. Yeah, I don't think that was in the original agreement. So we're still

25:21 looking at that part of it. Thanks, everybody. Have a great weekend.

25:25 - Thank you.

25:26 [BLANK_AUDIO]

Gov. Kevin Stitt Holds Oklahoma State Legislation Press Briefing

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