House Speaker Frank Chopp (D-Seattle) asserts that senate tinkering has jeopardized the bill's passage. "I'm questioning whether I should bring this to the floor since the senate has played politics with it," he says, adding that he recently told Gregoire "she needs to rethink this."
The bill, drafted by Locke and Gregoire, creates a series of new felonies designed to cover terrorist attacks that might occur in Washington State. Spokespeople for both Locke and Gregoire say the bill was drafted following a request from the feds; spokespeople claim it will fill crucial gaps in the state's criminal code.
But the senate change, passed in the waning days of the session, exempts guns from the equation. The tweak enraged Representative Jeannie Darneille (D-Tacoma). Darneille, under "intense" pressure from Gregoire, had withdrawn her own amendment, which would've explicitly put guns under the regulatory spotlight. After receiving assurances that the NRA-backed gun exemption amendment would also be dropped, Darneille relented. She blew up, she says, when she learned the gun exemption had been reinserted on the senate side.
Opponents of the bill, including the ACLU, say the terrorism legislation is redundant, since almost all conceivable terrorist attacks are already covered by federal laws or other state criminal statutes, and could impinge on civil liberties. "It's a bad, bad bill," says Representative Dave Upthegrove (D-Des Moines). "It's not necessary, and I think it's political grandstanding."
Despite the animosity from liberal Dems, the bill passed the house 77-20 on March 18, with the support of some moderate and conservative Democrats.
But then the Republican-majority senate passed its version of the bill on April 26, including the amendment, proposed by Senator Pam Roach (R-Auburn).
