Walsh issues statement on governor’s announcement regarding events

Aberdeen, WA – 19th District Representative Jim Walsh is taking umbrage with new restrictions by Governor Jay Inslee.

On Monday, the governor announced some updates to guidance documents for spectator and religious organization events. 

The changes, effective immediately, include instructions for vaccinated sections at sporting events, graduations, religious services, and other activities.

Representative Walsh issued a statement regarding the changes and said the governor’s action was unconstitutional. 

“Most media are focusing on the current governor’s announcement on Tuesday, that he’s putting a ‘pause’ on his scrambling of the metrics and measures of his confused reopening plan. Don’t focus on that.

“Focus instead on what he did the day before. On Monday, the governor did something much more dangerous and unconstitutional. Within the two ‘guidelines’ aimed at churches and public-event venues, he let slip his plan to create an unconstitutional, illegal, and immoral system of state-imposed segregation on the people of Washington. This system, if anyone adheres to it, seeks to divide the people of Washington into two classes: those who’ve received COVID vaccines and those who have not.

“It would provide privileges and preferred treatment to one class and deny them to another. This violates the letter and spirit of Article 1, Section 12, of the Washington State Constitution. It also violates the Fourteenth Amendment of United States Constitution.

“It does not follow established science or data. It betrays a shocking disregard for the basic principles of epidemiology. By treating people who’ve had COVID as not vaccinated. And, in promoting a Jim Crow-like forced segregation, it ignores decades of legislation and court opinions in Washington and the United States.

“This will hurt the people of Washington. We must not let this bad policy destroy lawful order and reasonable public health policy. Washingtonians should contact their state legislators and demand clear, unequivocal answers to this question: ‘Do you support the governor’s May 3, 2021, updates to spectator event and religious organization guidance?”