Philip Blumel: Oklahoma, state number six. Hi, I’m Philip Blumel. Welcome to No Uncertain Terms, the official podcast of the Term Limits Movement for the week of April 24th, 2023.
Stacey Selleck: Your sanctuary from partisan politics.
Philip Blumel: Over the last month, we have been trumpeting the passage of the Term Limits Convention Resolution in three state houses; North Carolina, Tennessee, and Oklahoma. Which one, we asked, will be the next state to fully approve the TLC? Well, that question was answered last Thursday when the Oklahoma Senate stepped up and passed the resolution, making Oklahoma the sixth state to officially apply for an amendment proposing Convention under Article 5 of the US Constitution, limited to the issue of congressional term limits. Now recall that if two-thirds of the states apply further such convention, it shall be called, under Article 5, according to the Constitution, “If the convention proposes an amendment, that amendment would require three-fourths of the states to ratify it, and then it would become law of the land.” Congress has nothing to say about it. The Senate vote was 31 to 11. I wanna give special thanks to Chris Keener and the rest of the Term Limits team that made this happen. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Philip Blumel: The other five states who have applied so far for the term limits convention are Florida, Missouri, Alabama, Wisconsin, and West Virginia. Who’s next? North Carolina? Tennessee? Stay tuned. Now, let’s hear from Holly Robichaud, who has other news from the week. This is from her Weekly Breaking News on Term Limits Program, available on YouTube.
Holly Robichaud: Americans want term limits on Congress, and our momentum continues to grow. In North Carolina, the house has already passed House Joint Resolution 151, sponsored by Speaker Tim Moore to invoke Article 5 of the US Constitution. Now, State Senator Todd Johnson has filed Senate joint resolution 487, a companion bill. Once this passes, North Carolina will join the growing roster of states pushing for congressional term limits. I’m Holly Robichaud, and this is Breaking News on Term Limits.
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Holly Robichaud: As I mentioned in last week’s episode, representative Ralph Norman of South Carolina has filed House Joint Resolution 11, and that resolution now has 87 co-sponsors. We’ve got support from both parties. Now, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy has promised to vote on this crucial legislation. This will be the first vote on congressional term limits since 1995. We’re urging you to please visit termlimits.com/mccarthy to sign a petition urging House Speaker Kevin McCarthy to bring House Joint Resolution 11 to the floor for a vote. We also want you to contact your representative and urge them to support the resolution. You could help out by visiting on this one, termlimits.com/takeaction. Let’s make term limits a reality.
Holly Robichaud: Did you know Congress today is older than it’s ever been? Across all senators and representatives, the median age is 59 years old. The median senator is 65 years old, a record high, and the median representative is 58 years old. The FiveThirtyEight organization that did this study claims the reason for the older Congress is that members are staying in office longer than ever before. No surprise, huh? Have you seen the new polling data? A poll conducted by the University of Maryland School of Public Policy showed that passing a constitutional amendment to establish term limits on Congress was favored by 83% of registered voters nationwide. The poll showed that 86% of Republicans, 80% of Democrats, and 84% of Independents all supported congressional term limits. 2700 registered voters nationwide were polled. This poll follows up on a Gallup poll showing that only 21% of Americans approve of Congress. As you know, we’re working hard to bypass Congress to get congressional term limits. In Alaska this week, State Representative Tom McKay has introduced House Joint Resolution 13, calling for congressional term limits. A recent poll conducted by Voice Broadcasting showed that 88% of voters in Alaska favor a constitutional amendment that will place term limits on Congress. In addition, 90% of the voters would want their state senator and representative to support an amendment calling for congressional term limits.
Philip Blumel: To hear the full episode of Breaking News on Term Limits and also to subscribe, go to youtube.com/termlimits. Now, in other news, a couple of anti-term limits politicians were exposed this month. The big news is that former Michigan House Speaker, yes, another house speaker, has been charged with corruption. Speaker Rick Johnson of Michigan was arrested and charged with taking over $100,000 in bribes. On April 6th, the FBI and US Attorney Mark Totten, or Totten perhaps, held a press conference in Lansing to announce charges against former Michigan speaker Rick Johnson, who served in that position from 2001 to 2004, through other private citizens were also charged. His downfall stemmed from his role as chairman of the Medical Marijuana Board in Michigan from 2017 to 2019. The marijuana board reviewed and approved applications to grow and sell marijuana for medical purposes, which of course, required a special license. Totten said Johnson was at the heart of the scheme and accepted more than $100,000 in cash and other payments and did so with the understanding that by accepting the money, he would help the people get the licenses. Specifically, he accepted $110,200 from at least two companies while voting in favor of granting the marijuana licenses according to the charge filed in federal court in Grand Rapids.
Philip Blumel: A man who was seeking a license was charged with paying bribes, and two lobbyists were charged also with bribery conspiracy. Now, speaker Johnson, as you may know from this podcast, was a vocal opponent of term limits and notably lent his support to the latest effort to overturn them in Michigan, a scheme fronted by an outfit called Voters Not Politicians, that was active on pushing an anti-term limits referendum during the same period in which Johnson was running what the FBI labeled in their charge as a “public corruption scheme”. Wow.
Philip Blumel: The other anti-term limits politician who got her comeuppance this month was an Arizona State Representative, Liz Harris, who was booted out of the legislature by her colleagues after only three months in office. Representative Harris signed the US Term Limits pledge to support the Term Limits Convention Resolution during her campaign, a move, of course, that she knew was very popular with Arizona voters, but when the Term Limits Convention Resolution came up for a vote in the Arizona house earlier this month, Harris broke her word to voters and voted nay. Sadly, she voted with the majority, and the Term Limits Convention Resolution is dead in Arizona for 2023. The Arizona house expelled Representative Harris for a non-related reason with a 46 to 13 vote. What she did was she invited a speaker to a joint elections committee hearing, who used the time to spread accusations of drug cartel, bribery and election rigging by election officials, judges and others.
Philip Blumel: Now, it takes two-thirds of the House in Arizona to remove a member, and the Republican-controlled body did just that to Harris, who is a member of that party. Specifically what Harris did was invited Jacqueline Breger, a Scottsdale Insurance agent, to give a presentation to the joint committee. Breger alleged that Arizona Governor Katie Hobbs, Secretary of State Adrian Fontes, members of the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors, legislators, the mayor of Mesa, judges, the Church of Latter-Day Saints and others are being part of a scheme involving Mexican drug cartels, money laundering, fake housing deeds, and election fraud. She didn’t present any evidence [chuckle] of any of this to substantiate this conspiracy. Afterwards, representative Stephie Stahl Hamilton of Tucson filed a complain on March 6th with the House Ethics Committee, and they ultimately went through the procedures that led to her expulsion. Ironically, Harris got tossed the day after she betrayed voters with her pledge-breaking vote against the term limits convention bill.
Speaker 4: This is a public service announcement.
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Philip Blumel: Tony Marino hosts the podcast Newsmax Daily, a recap of the day’s headlines with brief commentary. The show on April 19th included a segment regarding the House Oversight Committee’s investigation of business deals that members of the Biden family were allegedly involved in that were made possible by President Joe Biden’s political position and connections. But here’s the portion of the report that caught our attention at US Term Limits.
Tony Marino: John Bachman, host of John Bachman Now, spoke with former CIA operative and the CEO/Chairman of Portman Square Group, Mike Baker, who had a fantastic take on it.
Mike Baker: Yeah, I’m gonna get up on my term limits soap box here and say that this is what happens when you allow someone to be in politics for what? 150 years? [chuckle] Over 50 years. Let’s be realistic. But if you take that out of it, if you take the self-interest out of it, if you create term limits, then you remove in part, it’s not gonna remove it entirely, but you minimize the opportunity for the self-interest that exists when you can go to Washington, DC and stay there for your entire life as a career in politics. You should go in there maybe two terms as a Congressman, two terms as a senator, then get out, go back to your normal job, remove the self-interest in politics.
John Bachman: You mean what the Congress was intended for, a citizen government would be a novel idea indeed and…
[chuckle]
Tony Marino: That’s exactly what all Americans should be pushing for, Congress works for us. We should only be supporting the politicians that are in favor of term limits, assuming you are in favor of term limits. I only know a few of them, because why would they want term limits, right?
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Stacey Selleck: Like the show? You can help by subscribing and leaving a five-star review on both Apple and Spotify. It’s free.
Philip Blumel: Thanks for joining us for another episode of No Uncertain Terms. The term limits convention bills are moving through the state legislatures. This could be a breakthrough year for the Term Limits Movement. To check on the status of the term limits convention. Resolution in your state, go to termlimits.com/takeaction. There, you will see if it has been introduced and where it stands in the committee process on its way to the floor vote. If there’s action to take, you’ll see a take action button by your state. Click it. This will give you the opportunity to send a message to the most relevant legislators, urging them to support the legislation. They have to know you are watching. That’s termlimits.com/takeaction. If your state has already passed the Term Limits Convention Resolution or the bill’s not been introduced in your state, you can still help. Please consider making a contribution to US Term Limits. It’s our aim to hit the reset button on the US Congress, and you can help. Go to termlimits.com/donate, termlimits.com/donate. Thanks. We’ll be back next week.
Stacey Selleck: Find us on most social media at US Term Limits, like us on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, and now, LinkedIn.
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Speaker 4: USTL.