Several floor sessions have been cancelled this week in the Alaska House of Representatives over an alleged outbreak of COVID-19 cases. Despite that, the Alaska House Republicans say that the Majority coalition is virtue-signaling and using this as an excuse to not get work done. Because Wednesday’s House Floor Session was cancelled and Thursday’s is a scheduled technical session, it appears that work on the house floor, at the earliest, won’t take place until next week.
Nikiski Rep. Ben Carpenter, earlier this week, mentioned that House Speaker Louise Stutes of Kodiak gaveled out to make a political point because she doesn’t have a majority:
“Five more minutes on the floor and we could have passed the bill, but instead we gaveled out to make a political point. Honestly, the majority, the speaker, can’t get done what she wants to get done. They can’t pass their budget because they don’t have the numbers on the floor. This is a convenient excuse for her to not get stuff done.”
Homer Rep. Sarah Vance echoed similar sentiment Wednesday:
“The cancellation of the floor was not because certain members chose not to wear masks. It was because the majority did not have 21 majority members present. They still do not have 21 majority members in order to keep control of the floor. I want to make it very clear, the House Republicans, including myself, are willing to come to the floor to do business. We need to read the budget bill across so that then, our amendments can be submitted to the clerk so they can be taken up on the next business day, but that’s not happened yet because the speaker continues to delay having a floor session. She is the speaker of the house, not simply a speaker of the majority.”
The Alaska House Republicans state that they don’t want the people’s business to be thwarted due to ‘obvious delay tactics’:
