Governor Kristi Noem, R-S.D., is under fire from some of her home state Freedom Caucus members, who claim that by avoiding some of the legislative process, Noem’s administration “overstepped” its constitutional authority. One state senator claimed that it might make her 2024 presidential run more difficult, Fox News informed.
The South Dakota Freedom Caucus said in a statement last week that a fight has broken out in the South Dakota Legislature and that things are getting more heated.
The group is contesting Gov. Noem’s executive agencies’ constitutional right to introduce bills in the state legislature.
The lawsuit claims that Noem and her agencies “overstepped their authority” by taking advantage of a legal loophole that permits agencies to introduce bills without a legislative sponsor. Some Republicans in the state contend that this practice frequently veers into an area that should be under the control of elected officials.
The state’s Department of Labor and Regulations presented two measures with the Commerce and Energy Committee last week without any legislative sponsors, which brought the issue to a climax for the group. Rep. Tina Mulally, a member of the Freedom Caucus, objected to the motion when the chairman of that committee attempted to vote on the proposals, claiming that since neither had a sponsor in the legislature, it should not proceed.
The committee then voted to adopt the bills and send them to the full House after the chairman agreed to sponsor them.
Mulally claimed following the incident that it demonstrated how too much influence the executive agencies were exerting over the legislative process.
Mulally spoke out against the measures in a committee meeting, saying that the governor and the executive agencies appeared to conveniently forget that there are three, not one, branches of government.
In a committee hearing this month, Mulally contended that both proposals were supported by an executive agency that does not have constitutional authority to enact laws and that this action undermined the authority of the legislature.
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